Jazz Piano Skills
A podcast introducing aspiring Jazz Pianists to essential Jazz Piano Skills. Professional Jazz Piano Lessons by Dr. Bob Lawrence, President The Dallas School of Music
Jazz Piano Skills
Have You Met Miss Jones, Harmonic Analysis
Welcome to Jazz Piano Skills; it's time to discover, learn, and play Jazz Piano!
Every Jazz Piano Skills weekly podcast episode introduces aspiring jazz pianists to essential Jazz Piano Skills. Each Podcast episode explores a specific Jazz Piano Skill in depth. Today, you will discover, learn, and play "Have You Met Miss Jones". In this Jazz Piano Lesson, you will:
Discover
A classic jazz standard, “Have You Met Miss Jones”
Learn
Form, Chord Changes, and Harmonic Function for “Have You Met Miss Jones”
Play
“Have You Met Miss Jones” using my suggested Voicings plus Six Common Harmonic Progressions for Ear Training Development.
Use the Jazz Piano Podcast Packets for this Jazz Piano Lesson for maximum musical growth. All three Podcast Packets are designed to help you gain insight and command of a specific Jazz Piano Skill. The Podcast Packets are invaluable educational tools to have at your fingertips while you discover, learn, and play Have You Met Miss Jones.
Open Podcast Packets
Illustrations
(detailed graphics of the jazz piano skill)
Lead Sheets
(beautifully notated music lead sheets)
Play Alongs
(ensemble assistance and practice tips)
Educational Support
Community Forum
SpeakPipe
Episode Outline
Introduction
Discover, Learn, Play
Invite to Join Jazz Piano Skills
Lesson Rationale
Exploration of Jazz Piano Skills
Conclusion
Closing Comments
Visit Jazz Piano Skills for more educational resources that include a sequential curriculum with comprehensive Jazz Piano Courses, private and group online Jazz Piano Classes, a private jazz piano community hosting a variety of Jazz Piano Forums, an interactive Jazz Fake Book, plus unlimited professional educational jazz piano support.
If you wish to donate to JazzPianoSkills, you can do so easily through the Jazz Piano Skills Paypal Account.
Thank you for being a Jazz Piano Skills listener. I am pleased to help you discover, learn, and play jazz piano!
0:32
Welcome to jazz piano skills. I'm Dr. Bob Lawrence. It's time to discover, learn and play jazz piano. We are officially officially halfway through the year, can you believe it? I can't, I just can't. It is insane how fast the days, the weeks, the months, the years go by. You know, six months ago, we started a journey that tackles a new tune every month, not so much to learn the two, which of course, is always fun to do. But more importantly, we are using tunes as a way to accurately assess our strengths and weaknesses as jazz pianists. In other words, we are constantly in search of answers to this very important question. What jazz piano skills do I have a command of in which ones need attention? If we are capable of successfully answering this question, we have hope. Right? We know exactly what we need to practice in order to improve as jazz pianist. On the other hand, though, if we cannot accurately and successfully answer this question, we are then kidding ourselves in thinking that somehow I guess by magic, we will in time become a better musician. Sadly, many folks are doing just that relying on magic and the passing of time as the formula for becoming an accomplished jazz pianist. Not us, however, not us. We have spent the for the past four plus years tackling essential jazz piano skills, scales, arpeggios, chord scale relationships, harmonic function, piano technique, fingerings, improvisation approaches, and a ton more in preparation for our tune journey that we started in January. So since the start of the year, we have dissected six tunes, there will never be another you, Indiana, these foolish things. Days of wine Rose is no greater love. And don't blame me. Now we've dissected these tunes, harmonically melodically and improvisationally. To expose what you got it right to expose our strengths and weaknesses. The jazz piano skills that need attention, attention, either conceptually, physically, or both. I think for you jazz piano skills members who are faithfully following the agenda, you can honestly say that you have taken your discover, learn and play approach the jazz study to a whole new level. Many of you have shared your personal success stories with me and I am beyond thrilled to share your excitement, your success, and of course, your joy. I preach it every week, stay the course. Put in the grunt work on essential jazz piano skills. And your success is inevitable. Now, with the start of every new month, I get to do my monthly pep talk. That I must confess, I love doing it. And I look forward to it every month. Alright, so here it goes. You're ready. Here it goes. There will never be another you over Indiana over these foolish things over. No greater love. It's a war. Days of Wine and Roses. Long gone. Don't blame me. Definitely over. It's time. Time to move on. And that's what we do at jazz piano skills. Right no grass is allowed to grow under our feet are constantly moving and improving. I like that movie and improving. So, new month, new to, and in a few weeks, an updated assessment of our jazz piano skills. This month, we're exploring another great standard, as always, the standard coming from 1937. Coming from the library of Rodgers and Hart, the great standard. Have you met Miss Jones, we start as we always do with a harmonic analysis of Have you met Miss Jones, we're gonna look at the form. The chord changes, harmonic function, common progressions, and of course, voicings left handed shell voicings and two handed structures. Next week, we follow up with a melodic analysis, which will involve learning the melody of Have you met Miss Jones, and of course, learning that melody by ear. Plus, we'll look at fingerings and various treatments of the tune. We then enjoy the grand finale, week three, focusing on improvisation development, using patterns and motifs, common tones, common zones, and of course tension. Right? You know, if you've been a faithful listener for the past four plus years, right, you know that the tune study that we are doing is reinforcing the jazz piano skills that we have studied. Right. And if you haven't been a faithful listener over four plus years, it's it's no worries, right? The tune study that we're doing, the process that we have implemented will help you sift through and prioritize literally the last four plus years of podcast episodes so that you can begin maximizing your jazz piano skills right now immediately. So as I mentioned, every month it makes no difference. Whether you are a jazz piano skills vet, or a jazz piano skills, rookie, right, you are in the right place at the right time to begin a jazz piano journey that will have a profound impact on your understanding of music, and of course on your jazz piano playing as well.
7:18
So today, we begin our harmonic analysis of Have you met Miss Jones. So today, you're going to discover that classic standard from 1937. Have you met Miss Jones, you're going to learn the four core changes in harmonic function four Have you met Miss Jones, and you are going to play Have you met Miss Jones using my suggested voicings plus common harmonic progressions for ear training development. So as I always like to say, regardless of where you are, in your jazz journey, a beginner and intermediate player and advanced player or even even if you consider yourself a seasoned and experienced professional, you're gonna find this jazz piano skills podcast lesson, exploring Have you met Miss Jones, to be very beneficial. But before we get started, before we dig in, I want to as I always do welcome first time listeners to jazz piano skills. And if you are indeed a new listener to the jazz panel skills podcast or if you're new to jazz piano skills, I want to personally invite you to become a jazz piano skills member. Your membership grants you access to the premium content, not only for this podcast episode, but for every weekly podcast episode, past, current and future. The premium content will help you thoroughly and correctly discover, learn and play the jazz standard and the jazz piano skills that we are currently exploring. And as the old saying goes so much more. For example. As a jazz panel skills member, you have access to the past current and future educational weekly podcast packets. These are the illustrations the lead sheets, the play alongs the backing tracks if you will, that I designed and developed to help you get the most out of every weekly jazz piano skills podcast episode. You also have access to a self paced and sequential jazz piano curriculum, which is loaded with comprehensive courses containing all the courses containing educational talks, interactive learning media video demonstrations in all 12 keys of the jazz panel skills being explored and so much more. As a jazz panel skills member you also have a reserved seat in my online weekly master classes, which are held every Thursday evening. If candidates can't attend, no problem, master classes are recorded. And you can watch and rewatch In the class, the video when ever and as often as you wish you also as a jazz panel skills member have access to an online interactive Fakebook containing must know I mean must know standards, right with excellent chord changes chord scale relationships, harmonic function analysis, listening suggestions, and historical insights. As a jazz piano skills member, you can hang out with some old friends make some new jazz friends in the online private jazz piano skills community, which hosts a variety of engaging forums. Finally, last, but certainly not least, your jazz piano skills membership grants you unlimited, private, personal and professional educational support whenever and as often as you need it. All of these amazing privileges are waiting to help you discovered learn to play jazz piano. So check it all out at jazz piano skills.com. And of course, become a member and begin enjoying premium podcast content, and all of the other privileges that I just mentioned. Of course, once you get to the website, if you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. I'm always happy to spend some time with you answer any questions that you may have, and help you in any way that I can. Okay, on to the question of the week. This week's question comes from Jim Lowe, living in Charleston, South Carolina. And Jim writes, I have, as you have suggested, recorded myself playing. And I must admit, I do not like it. It's hard to listen to myself play. And as painful as it is, I must confess, I have discovered much about my plane that needs improvement. I will not bore you with the entire list, at least for now. And instead ask for your help with what I perceive to be my biggest challenge and weakness. When listening to myself, it becomes very apparent that my sense of time is not good. I find myself rushing and then dragging. I rarely settle into time. And as a result, my plane sounds unsettled, forced and tense. In other words, not enjoyable. So how do I fix this issue of time? How do I practice time? Thanks for your weekly podcast. I have learned a ton and appreciate your insight playing jazz piano. Thanks in advance for your help. Wow. Wow. And Wow. What a phenomenal question, Jim. And let me begin by saying that your ability to assess time as your issue is a huge win for you. And a clear indicator that you have done much thinking about jazz and playing jazz, to be able to recognize time as the culprit behind your plane struggles. It's the silent killer that all of us have to confront, if we hope to truly develop into accomplished jazz pianists. So congrats. It's a great question. You're spot on. When you ask how do you practice time? In fact, I bet most people listening right now, if not all, everyone listening? I bet that very few sit down at the piano and say you know what? I think today, I will practice time. Who says that? Well, I'll tell you who says it. Those who really want to get good at playing their instrument those who really want to develop into accomplished jazz pianist. All this to say to you, Jim, congratulations. I mean really? Congratulations on the questions. Congratulations on recording yourself and on your self diagnosis that can only be possible due to the hard work that you've already put in. You know, I used to have a teacher who would say, I can tell you how you how you are progressing by the questions you ask and the statements you make. Right listen to he used to say this all the time I can tell how you are progressing by the questions you ask in the statements you make Ah, and I can tell you as an educator for 40 years now, that statement is 100%. True. And I can tell you, Jim, your your question, your statements and your question, tell me a whole lot. It tells me that you're on the right track, you're on the right path. So we're going to keep moving forward. Right. So now let's talk about how to practice time. To begin, keep the following tips in mind, always, and not just for time practice, but for everything you practice, but here are my tips for you. Number one, keep it simple. Keep it simple. Number two, establish your what, why and how of your practice session before you even sit down on the piano bench. Number three, stay put, do not get anxious, do not move around after one or two reps of what, whatever you're practicing. Right? Stay put. And number four, be patient. As with the development of all jazz panel skills, it does not happen overnight. You know, I love the old expression, no one knows how many years I have worked and struggled for overnight success. Right? So let's, let's take each one of these tips and apply them to time practice. Okay, so number one, keep it simple. I would suggest when practicing time to deal with quarter notes only placed on the beat. Right placed on the beat. That's it. After all, if you cannot place quarter notes on the beats of the measure, right? What's the
17:02
point of trying to deal with eighth notes and 16th notes? I got news for you. It doesn't make it easier. It doesn't make time practice easier. So we're going to keep it simple. We're going to begin with quarter notes only number to establish the what why and how. Right. So we've already established that we're going to focus on plain time using quarter notes only. And why? Well, because I just mentioned that right, adding additional note values, eighth notes and 16th notes will not make it somehow magically easier. How? Well I strongly suggest using a drum beat practice time. And you know what I actually suggest using a rock drum beat, not a jazz feel a rock feel we want a strong illumination of each beat within the measure. Right? And nothing I mean, nothing does this better than a rock be? Stay put right repetition listen to this repetition is the name of the game. So we have an effective gameplan that must be executed over and over and over again, in order to develop muscle and oral memory. You know, leaving a game plan too soon, is just as bad as having no game plan at all. More about this during my demonstration of time practicing. And finally be patient. Well, I just mentioned it right the abandoning of a game plan. You can you cannot play something once or twice and somehow think you have it and you're ready to move on. It's a fatal mistake I see students make all the time they're ready. They move on way too soon. Right? We're not going to do that. So let me do some modeling for you with our gameplan of keeping it simple or establish the what why and how right quarter notes. We're going to stay put we're going to we're going to utilize repetition. And of course, we're going to be patient through this whole process. So let me model for you how I would do this Jim. To begin we're going to put on our simple rock beat right now to jazz rock beat. They're perfect, right? So we have a rock beat drum playing in the background. Then we're going to take any core, I'm going to use C minor. You can take any chord you choose. And I'm going to start by placing my C minor as a quarter note on count one of each measure. So here we go to Ready Go
20:03
I'm gonna do this over and over. I think I'm kidding, but I'm not in my early Am I late Am I on time, right? Once I feel comfortable without one, I'm going to switch and place it on count two
20:35
once I'm comfortable with that, I'm going to move my quarter note the count three one
20:52
once I'm comfortable with count three, I'm going to move to California want
21:05
to see my mean, so I'm going to practice that moving my quarter note around from count one, count to count three, count for over and over again and repeat it right, I would not get too anxious to move on too quick, too soon, from count one to count two to kind of three to count four. Okay. All right, so that's step number one, then I would do variations. Actually, I would do variations to this as well. So I'm going to bring my drummer back in. Now let's place our quarter notes on counts one and two rests on three and four. Right? So again
22:09
good and then once I get comfortable with that, maybe flip it around, right rest on counts one and two. Play my quarter notes on three and four right 1234.
22:37
About quarter notes on counts one and 312. Ready go.
22:58
about flipping around, how about the ISOs quarter notes on counts two and four, right one
23:14
How am I placed the quarter notes on counts one and 434?
23:38
Variety right, but focusing only drummer off thank you focusing only on placing quarter notes on variations of like counts 123 and four. That's it. Right? Keeping it very, very simple. Now many of you may be thinking like, Wow, gosh, Bob, that's like, really Elementary. You know, that's, I think that's way too simple for me. Okay, I just can tell you right now, how many times I have heard that. And then when asked the student to be able to do that with me, they can't do it. They fail. So do not think this kind of practice is too elementary, because it's not. Unless you can do that. We can't even begin to talk about adding various eighth note combinations to this drumbeat. Okay, so this is a start. This is a start. I know it's the beginning. But that's always a great place to start at the beginning. Establish time with a rock beat a drum beat. By the way, I'm using a webpage there called drum BIT dot app, drum BIT dot app. Start with a simple rock beat. Start with your quarter notes and place the quarter notes on Various beats within the measure. Okay. Great place to start. So, Jim, fantastic question. I hope that my answer provided you with some helpful insight that that, that you find to be very beneficial as you continue to study and practice time. As always, if you have additional questions or further clarification is needed. Do not hesitate to reach out to me. I'm happy to spend more time with you talking about time, right? And answer any additional questions that you may have. Okay, so let's discover learn to play jazz piano. Let's discover, learn and play. Have you met Miss Jones? As always, I like to begin with a quick outline, my outline for learning any tune and again, genre makes no difference. I don't care whether it's a jazz tune, rock tune, pop country folk r&b, makes no difference. Here's how I go about learning to tune one. Listen, I listen to various artists, vocalist, instrumentalist, and of course pianists. Number two, I determined form every song has a form, I need to know what it is, is it an A, B, A, B, A, B, A, B, a C, right determine form. Number three, I learned a chord changes in the voicings for the two. And I looked for common harmonic and I listened for common harmonic progressions, like 251145, you know, 36251, and so on. After that, I'll turn my attention to the melody. And I will learn the melody by ear by ear, right? That reading it off a lead sheet, finding it in a book or on the Internet, learn it by ear. And then I finally I like to explore various treatments and improvisation of the two. Right That's it, nothing more, nothing less. That's it. That's what I do. So this week, we focus on the harmonic analysis, right? So we're going to listen to determine form learn the chord changes, harmonic function and voicings for Have you met Miss Jones. Next week, we'll focus on the melodic analysis and in two weeks, improvisation. As always, we keep things very structured, very organized, very clean. And Heidi, with our discovered learn and play approach, and again, I don't I take this approach with whether I'm studying a specific jazz skill, or a tune right again, makes no difference. Our conceptual understanding of, of what we do musically must be structured must be simple, so that it can be replicated over and over again. And I've said it many times, and I will continue to say it many times that if your understanding of music or any musical skill is not structured, and it's not simple conceptually, then it's unorganized. And of course, if it's unorganized, it's confusing, right? And if it's unorganized and confusing conceptually upstairs right? Then you have no shot of executing it in your hands on the piano downstairs. That's just the brutal fact. So the educational agenda for today is as follows We are going to be in part one to discover learn and play Have you met Miss Jones? We are going to listen to a definitive recording of Have you met Miss Jones, we will discuss the form of Have you met Miss Jones we will discover learn and play the chord changes for Have you met Miss Jones, we will discover learn and play the harmonic function of Have you met Miss Jones, we will discover learn and play my suggested voicings for Have you met Miss Jones. These are going to be shell voicings and two handed voicings. Now, if you are a jazz piano skills member, I want you to hit the pause button right now which will take a few minutes to download and print your podcast packets. These are the illustrations, the lead sheets and the play alongs. Now again, your membership grants you access to the premium content for every weekly podcast episode, which of course includes the educational podcast packets, and I mentioned that every week. You should have these podcast packets in your hands when listening to this episode to get the most out of it. And of course you should have these podcast packets sitting on your piano when practicing as well. Okay, now that you have your podcast packets in your hands, I want you to grab your lead sheets, your lead sheets and you should have seven lead sheets. I want to go through them very quickly. A lead sheet one skill one is illustration of the form of Have you met Miss Jones. lead sheet two identifies the Unique chord changes the unique chord changes for Have you met Miss Jones? lead sheet three is your classic traditional lead sheet of the form and changes of Have you met Miss Jones? lead sheet four is a diagram of the harmonic function the harmonic function of Have you met Miss Jones, lead sheet five highlights the classic common function or common progressions that are contained within Have you met met met Miss Jones that you'll find in hundreds and hundreds of other standards as well. lead sheet six I give my left handed shell voicings I have those notated for you for Have you met Miss Jones, and lead sheet seven is contains the two handed voicings that I use when playing Have you met Miss Jones. So Wow. That's a lot right seven lead sheets packed with a ton of information. So so let's get busy. What is the first thing we do when studying and learning a tune? Right? I hope you're all saying listen to it because that is without question. Without question. I believe the be the most important thing to do. That's Listen, listen to the tune. Listen to various renditions of the tune. You know, I can't I save all the time, but I can't even imagine trying to learn a tune before spending time becoming familiar with it absorbing it right. So I like to listen to different artists performing the tune. And typically as you all know, I turned to vocal renditions first, because vocalists typically remain pretty true to the original melody, especially the vocalist like you know, Sinatra, Nat King Cole, Nancy Wilson, you know, today we're going to be listening to Tony Bennett. And you know if I really want to hear a street version of the melody, I turned to people like Andy Williams, Doris Day, Julie London, Peggy Lee, right, Perry Como always a great idea to check out vocalist doing a tune that you are wanting to learn. Right then I turned my attention to instrumentalist. And then of course I turned my attention to pianos after that. So listen selecting these tunes a rendition of these tunes and have you missed Miss Jones is no exception is really really difficult because there are many many wonderful renditions to choose from and and there are a ton of great recordings of Have you met Miss Jones, but one of my favorite one of my favorites is from one of my all time favorite vocalists and that's the late great Mr. Tony Bennett. So what I want you to do right now I want you to grab your coffee or your favorite beverage I want you to sit back I want you to get coffee and enjoy this swing and rendition of Have you met Miss Jones sung by none other than Mr. Tony Bennett check this out
33:24
Have you met Miss Jones? Someone said as we sure can. She was just Miss Jones to me then I said Miss Jones you're a girl who understands I'm a man who must be free and all at once I lost my breath and all at once was scared to death and all at once I own the earth plan sky now I've met Miss Jones and will keep on meeting with Miss Jones.
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Ha I lost my breath hands all at once was scared to the land all at once. Home
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now I've met Miss Jones And we'll keep on meeting too with Miss Jones Miss Jones
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absolutely love it. You know they don't come any better than Tony Bennett. Today, I'll be playing the changes using a similar swing groove and a tempo of 140 so that we know how this tune goes. Let's explore those lead sheets. So I want you to grab lead sheet one let's take a look at the form of Have you met Mrs. Jones, which of course isn't standard. Thank you for listening to jazz piano skills. The remaining premium content of this episode is available to jazz piano skills members at jazz piano skills podcast.com Visit jazz piano skills.com To learn more about membership privileges, and become a jazz piano skills. Thank you.
