Rhythmic Major Arpeggios

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Illustrations
Lead Sheets
Play Alongs

Jazz Piano Skills Community

Summary
In this episode of Jazz Piano Skills, Dr. Bob Lawrence delves into the essential role of rhythm in jazz music, emphasizing its importance in improvisation and overall musicianship. The discussion begins with a review of the jazz standard 'Georgia on My Mind' and transitions into a deep exploration of rhythmic skills, highlighting common pitfalls in music education regarding rhythm neglect. Dr. Lawrence provides practical exercises for mastering rhythmic concepts and introduces rhythmic major arpeggios as a tool for developing melodic vocabulary. The episode concludes with an invitation to further explore these concepts in upcoming masterclasses and resources available to Jazz Piano Skills members.

Keywords
Jazz Piano, Rhythm, Improvisation, Music Education, Jazz Skills, Major Arpeggios, Musical Growth, Jazz Standards, Georgia on My Mind, Music Fundamentals

Takeaways
Rhythm is the engine that drives music.
Neglecting rhythm leads to musical frustration.
Daily rhythm practice is essential for growth.
Understanding measures and time is crucial for musicianship.
Rhythmic motifs can develop melodic vocabulary.
All rhythms are combinations of basic note values.
Recording yourself can expedite learning.
Practicing in different keys enhances musicality.
Awareness of time is key to playing music.
Rhythm should be a fundamental focus in music education.

Titles
Unlocking the Secrets of Jazz Piano
The Rhythm Revolution in Jazz
Mastering Jazz with Rhythmic Arpeggios
From Georgia to Groove: A Jazz Journey
The Heartbeat of Jazz: Understanding Rhythm
Jazz Piano Skills: The Essential Guide

Sound Bites
"Rhythm is the engine that drives music."
"Neglect rhythm and you will remain musically frustrated."
"Rhythm deserves daily attention."
"It's personal. It's very personal."
"No rhythmic skills, no playing music."
"Good things come in small packages."
"Everything else in music will be difficult."
"You have to be consciously aware of filling one measure."
"Rhythmic motifs can develop melodic vocabulary."
"All rhythms are some combination of basic note values."

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction
• 4:37 Discover, Learn, Play
• 5:32 Invite to Join Jazz Piano Skills
• 9:59 Let's Talk About Rhythm!
• 25:28 Essential Rhythm Exercise
• 32:23 Premium Content Message

Transcript

Dr. Bob Lawrence (00:32.866)
Welcome to Jazz Piano Skills. I'm Dr. Bob Lawrence. It's that time. It's time to discover, learn, and play jazz piano. We've completed our three-week study of the jazz standard Georgia on my mind. We've analyzed it harmonically. We've analyzed it melodically. We've looked at it improvisationally, just like we do with every tune that we tackle at Jazz Piano Skills. Our harmonic analysis that we did a couple weeks ago

It looked at the form, the chord changes, the harmonic function, the common harmonic movement, the voicings, left hand shell voicings, block voicings, two handed structures, pretty thorough harmonic analysis. Then we turned our attention to the melody, the melodic analysis. We transcribed the melody, in other words, learned it by ear. We established proper fingerings. We identified the melodic phrases and the target notes of those phrases.

as well as exploring typically standard jazz treatments like the ballad, bassa, and the swing. And then last week, we turned our attention, as we always do, to improvisation. And we took eight rhythms. This was fantastic. We took eight rhythms from our daily rhythm challenge and applied them to the first eight measures of Georgia on my mind. We then used those rhythms.

to play the harmony melodically using diatonic arpeggio motion. That's very cool. Very eye-opening. You know, eye-opening regarding the development of melodic vocabulary and its dependency. Its dependency on rhythmic vocabulary. You know, with our eyes, and more importantly, our ears, wide open, we discovered that without a good rhythmic idea,

melody and harmony fall flat. Melody and harmony need a rhythm. That's a huge revelation.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (02:42.899)
Once you realize that melody and harmony need rhythm, wow, now you're ready for growth. Again, this revelation is so important, yet very, very few come to understand this musical truth, this musical fact. In fact, it's fact number seven on our seven facts of music list. As a result, all of their attention is given to melody and harmony. In fact, most teachers

including myself, right? I'm including myself. Most teachers neglect or give very little time and attention to rhythm study and development, which absolutely makes no sense considering that rhythm is indeed the engine that drives music. I myself have come to this revelation, which is why the daily rhythm challenge now exists at Jazz Piano Skills. Rhythm deserves

daily attention. If we hope to develop into the musicians we hope to become. Bottom line, neglect rhythm and you will remain musically frustrated for the rest of your life. Which is now going to be that you know that's going to be an addendum to fact number seven of our seven facts of music. Right? Neglect rhythm and you will remain musically frustrated for the rest

of your life. I was planning on sharing today a deep dive discussion about rhythm with Mark Davis. He's the author of Jazz Piano Method Books one and two published by Hal Leonard. But I've decided to hold off on that interview in order to expound upon our improvisation in rhythm exploration from last week. So today, today we are going to discover rhythmic

major arpeggios, rhythmic major arpeggios. And we're going to learn how to use rhythmic motifs for developing melodic vocabulary. And we're going to play diatonic rhythmic arpeggios using the major sound. Today's going to be a fun day, a day of significant growth, both conceptually and physically for all of us.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (05:09.472)
So as I always like to say, regardless of where you are in your jazz journey, a beginner, an intermediate player, an advanced player, or even if you are a seasoned and experienced professional, you're going to find this Jazz Piano Skills podcast lesson exploring rhythmic major arpeggios to be very insightful, to be very beneficial. But before we get started, before we jump in, I want to, as I always do, welcome

all of the first time listeners to Jazz Piano Skills. If you're new to Jazz Piano Skills, if you're new to Jazz Piano Skills podcast, welcome. I want to personally invite you to become a Jazz Piano Skills member. And your membership does a couple things. Number one, it keeps the Jazz Piano Skills podcast ad free, 100 % ad free, which I'm very proud of. And it's been my goal from day one. Number two, your membership

comes loaded with many perks that are going to help you with your jazz journey. For example, number one, premium podcast content, which basically means you get to listen to the entire podcast. The first half of every podcast episode is free for everyone to enjoy. We deal with typically the question of the week, we lay out the educational agenda, we examine the lesson rationale. The second half of the podcast for members only,

We dive into the lesson content, the demonstrations, exploration of the podcast packets, the illustrations, the lead sheets, and the play alongs. You also have access to the online interactive courses, comprehensive, self-paced, and sequential. You also have access, a reserved seat as I like to say, to the weekly master classes that I host every Thursday evening, 8 p.m. Central Time.

Now know this is not the greatest time in the world for everybody around the world. However, the master classes are recorded and you can watch and rewatch the videos of the class as often as you wish and when convenient. You also as a Jazz Piano Skills member have access to the online private Jazz Piano Skills community.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (07:28.276)
So fabulous community which hosts a variety of forums, education specific forums, as well as jazz, general jazz forums. It's a great place to meet folks. It's a great place to receive some feedback and assistance and also to lend a helping hand and offer some feedback and assistance as well. And finally, as a Jazz Panel Skills member, you have access to unlimited educational support, private, personal and professional support whenever and as often

as you need it. all of these amazing perks, these privileges are waiting to help you discover, learn and play jazz piano. So check it all out at jazzpanelskills.com and of course, become a member. If you get to the site, you're poking around, you have some questions, don't hesitate to reach out. I'm happy to help. It's been a little time with you answer any questions that you may have. I also want to take just a few minutes to plug my YouTube channel.

I am producing educational content videos daily, and I think you'll find them to be beneficial for your jazz growth. I currently have several playlists at the channel. Of course, there's the daily rhythm challenge. I have one minute lessons, jazz talks, the song study of the month, podcast episodes, and podcast guests. Again, I'm populating these playlists with new videos every week, so

be sure to subscribe so that you are notified whenever I drop a new video. For example, I just released a one-minute lesson covering dominant chordal voicings. It's short, it's sweet, and it's to the point. So much to the point that it's only one minute long. Hence the name, One Minute Lessons. Needless to say, I'm excited about the YouTube channel, this new dimension to jazz panel skills.

and looking forward to to grow in it to help us all discover, learn and play jazz piano or whatever instrument that you are studying. Okay, so typically at this time, I do the question of the week, but since today is really more of a lecture series episode with a lot of music demonstrations to get through, I'm going to skip to question the week this week. We'll get back to that next week as usual.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (09:54.404)
as we usher in a new month and of course a new tune to study. All right, so let's talk about rhythm. Yes, let's talk about rhythm.

I have a question. Why do we neglect talking about rhythm? Why does it get neglected? Neglected by teachers, neglected by students. On the other hand, melody, improvisation, harmony, chords, and voicing. Voicings, right? They get all the attention while rhythm? Crickets.

Teachers, I think, I know, teachers want to assume that students understand rhythm. We assume that students can play a whole note in time, or two half notes in time, or four quarter notes in time. We assume this. Teachers, especially young teachers, are afraid of boring students by discussing such fundamentals.

So instead of boring students, guess it's better to musically frustrate them. And frustrate them in that musical struggles often, if not always, are traced back to a lack of an ability to command fundamentals. And being capable of playing whole notes, half notes, quarter notes in time are without question

fundamentals. Now, on the other hand, on the other hand, students don't want to talk about fundamentals like playing a whole note in time, or two half notes in time or four quarter notes in time, because of course, they can do it. The student mindset is please do not insult me. That is rhythm 101. And I certainly do not need to waste time practicing such a rudimentary skill.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (12:01.16)
See, guess, you know what, guess it comes down to rhythm is a touchy subject. It's touchy because you know why? It's personal. It's very personal. You know, no one is embarrassed because they have never been introduced to various approaches for developing improvisation skills. No one. And no one is ever embarrassed because they have never been taught two handed chordal voicings.

never. But if you're not capable of playing a single note and holding it for four counts and then strike it again on count one of the next measure in time, not coming in early or arriving late, or being able to play four quarter notes in time without rushing or dragging. Well, see, that's personal. That's very personal. That's an internal skill that you either instinctually have

or it needs to be practiced and developed. For most people, it's the latter. So when it comes to rhythm, teachers and students become ultimately, ultimately they become partners in crime by silently agreeing to not discuss rhythm and instead focus entirely on non-personal skills like melody, improvisation, and harmony chords.

One other very important side note about rhythm and why it is neglected by teachers. Rhythm, time, it cannot be taught. Teachers cannot teach a student time. We talk about it. We can certainly talk about it, which we don't do as I just explained, but we cannot teach it. Time cannot be taught. Time, rhythm,

can only be developed by experiencing it. And that is precisely why we, teachers, need to talk about it and provide students ways to practice it so that they can successfully develop rhythmic skills. Rhythmic skills needed, right? Rhythmic skills needed to be able to play music. Bottom line, no rhythmic skills.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (14:31.078)
no playing music. And this again is precisely why I started the daily rhythm challenge at Jazz Piano Skills. One sound, one chord, one measure, one rhythm every day. One sound, one chord, one measure, one rhythm every day. Studying and practicing time rhythm in bite size chunks.

one measure chunks. As the old idiom goes, right, good things come in small packages. And it's indeed true. All you need is one small measure to expose huge weaknesses in your time and rhythmic plane. It's interesting, right? One little tiny measure exposes huge weaknesses. Secretly, right, secretly, my hope is that

Everyone participating in the daily rhythm challenge experiences a personal music revelation that illuminates the importance of practicing whole notes, half notes, quarter notes, and eighth notes, and sixteenth notes in relationship. Here's the key in relationship to a single measure, one measure. Now, what exactly am I saying when I'm

make such a statement? Well, I'll tell you, it happens frequently when I begin working with a new student, especially a student, especially with a student with a music, musical background and experience. Their first lesson, I will ask them if they are comfortable with major scales. Typically, the answer is yes. I know my major skills. Of course, I respond with Hey, man, that's great.

you know what, pick your favorite scale and play it for me. So here comes the C major scale, played at least one octave, sometimes two, even three octaves. But once they get done playing the scale, I ask them this question. Hey, how many measures did you just play? The answer

Dr. Bob Lawrence (16:55.112)
Dead silence.

Awkward silence.

Eyes looking up toward the ceiling. Silence.

They have no idea. They just played a melodic line and had no idea how many measures they just played. In other words, the music they just played was done so without a conscious awareness of measures of time. Wow. I then break the awkward silence with another question.

Hey, were you playing quarter notes, eighth notes, or were those 16th notes? Again, more dead silence, more awkward silence, and more eyes looking up toward the ceiling silence. Needless to say, the first lesson is not off to a great start. So no awareness of measures, time.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (18:08.321)
and no awareness of note values within the measure, rhythm.

not good. Right? It's not good. But you know what? What the heck? Let's talk about harmony. Let's talk about chords. Let's talk about melody. Let's talk about improvisation. Let's talk about those cool things, man. Forget, just forget about the fact that you have no awareness of measures. You have no awareness of time. You have no awareness of note values within the measure. You have no awareness of rhythm. Forget all that.

Let's get to the harmony, the chords, let's get to the melody and improvisation. much better, much more comfortable, much less personal. See, instead of dealing with the glaring deficiency in time and rhythm, we teachers and students want to brush it under the rug and move on to harmonic and melodic skills.

which of course eventually leads to frustration because you'll never quite ever be able to play those harmonic and melodic skills quite right. There will always be something missing. That something rhythm time.

And I guarantee it. If rhythm. Time is missing. You will be frustrated. Forever. So back to my hope for everyone participating in the daily rhythm challenge, realizing the importance of practicing whole notes. Half notes. Quarter notes. Eighth notes.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (20:09.768)
notes in relationship to a single measure, one measure. This is the goal. This is where it all begins. This is precisely what your musicianship development is 100 % dependent upon. If you don't get this whole notes, half notes, quarter notes, eighth notes, sixteenth notes,

in relationship to a single measure, one measure, both conceptually and physically, everything else in music will be difficult.

This is so important. I need to say it again. If you do not get conceptually and physically whole notes, half notes, quarter notes, eighth notes, and sixteenth notes in relationship to a single measure, one measure, everything else in music will be forever difficult. Your attempt to play music will be painful. Not only for you,

but for everyone else listening. So I strongly, and I mean this, I strongly recommend the following exercise to begin nailing down whole notes, half notes, quarter notes, eighth notes, and sixteenth notes in relationship to a single measure. Now, this exercise that I'm about to demonstrate for you needs an ensemble backing track word.

drum backing track or metronome to make time audible. We need to make time audible. You have to practice rhythms in time and you need some timekeeping tool to keep you honest. So the objective of the exercise is to be consciously aware of filling one measure of music, right? Consciously aware

Dr. Bob Lawrence (22:18.138)
of feeling one measure of music with a rhythm. And there are five rhythms that you must absolutely command five. And they are as follows one, the whole note. Number two, two half notes, three, four quarter notes, four, eight eighth notes, and number five.

16 sixteenth notes. These five rhythms whole note, two half notes, four quarter notes, eight eighth notes, and 16 sixteenth notes. Each one of the rhythms, all five, must be played with a conscious awareness of filling an entire measure with musical sound.

a conscious awareness of playing four beats within a measure when playing each of the five rhythms. The objective is to hear the complete measure and the passing of time while playing the rhythms. You know, the way I like to practice this exercise is to play a measure of music

filled with sound rhythm all the way through the measure to count one of the following measure. By nailing count one of the following measure, I am conditioning myself to hear a completed measure of music, as well as training myself to be consciously aware of count one of every measure. Tracking time.

and awareness of count one of every measure is without question the key to playing music. So let me demonstrate to begin this exercise should be played very slow, a slow tempo. I'm talking 60, 65, 70, 80, 85. It needs to be slow enough that you can physically, technically handle the 16th notes.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (24:42.632)
I'm going to play it today for the sake of time. I'm going to play it at 85. Okay. So I am going to play each of the five rhythms, the whole note, the two half notes, four quarter notes, the eight eighth notes and the 16 sixteenth notes four times, four times. You're going to hear me play the complete measure. You're going to hear me land on count one, right?

playing through the entire measure and landing on count one of the next measure. Okay, so let me play it and then we can talk about it and I may offer some comments as I'm playing it. Okay, so here we go.

Starting with the whole note count one just nailed it.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (25:45.284)
one.

you

Great, two half notes. C to D, back to C.

One.

you

Dr. Bob Lawrence (26:14.34)
quarter notes.

I'm working my way up the scale. C D E F Nailing G on count one.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (26:36.868)
Write about 8 notes.

All the way to count one

which lands on the D.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (26:59.5)
Alright, 16th notes.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (27:04.417)
one

Dr. Bob Lawrence (27:25.342)
it. Right, nice comfortable tempo. I'm playing the five rhythms. Whole note, half notes, quarter notes, eighth notes, sixteenth notes. Now again, play at a very comfortable tempo, whatever tempo you can handle. I was only using ascending motion as well. I would also practice this using descending motion. But initially, focus on just one direction at a time.

thing you want to make sure that you are aware of, regardless of the rhythm that you're playing the whole note to half notes, quarter notes, eighth notes, the 16th notes, you're playing one measure of music, regardless of how many notes you're you're hearing, right? It's one measure of music, you're consciously aware of the passing of time counts 1234, leading to count one of the next measure.

you're consciously aware of the rhythms, whole notes, half notes, quarter notes, eighth notes, sixteenth notes. Of course, this is one of these exercises that is so easy until of course you have to do it. All right, so easy until you have to do it. I would recommend recording yourself and listening to yourself perform the exercise. How accurate is your time?

how accurate are the rhythms, right? Be very critical because this is where it all begins. And I cannot stress this enough. You have to be able to play this exercise using at least one of the 12 major scales. Ultimately, you want to play all 12 major scales that way, but at least one. Once you can, then you are primed for huge success.

with the Daily Rhythm Challenge, which means you are primed for huge musical success. And you are primed for what we are about to do today with rhythmic major arpeggios. So the educational agenda for today is as follows. Number one, we are going to continue our exploration of the first eight daily rhythm

Dr. Bob Lawrence (29:52.556)
challenges. Number two, we are going to apply these eight rhythms to musical sound. Today, the major sound. Number three, in doing so, we are going to solidify a sequential process for developing melodic vocabulary. And number four, our melodic vocabulary will be formulated using diatonic

ascending and descending arpeggio motion. How fun is this going to be? It's gonna be a blast. So if you are a JazzPianoSkills member, I want you to take a few minutes right now to download and print your podcast packet. So hit the pause button and download the illustrations, the lead sheets and the play alongs. Again, your membership grants you access

to these educational materials to the podcast packets. And as I always mention, you want these in your hands when listening to the episode to maximize the benefit from the episode. And you also want to have these materials sitting on your piano or on your music stand when practicing as well. OK, now that you have your podcast packets, I want to quickly talk through them before we

break everything apart. So number one, your lead sheets, you should have 12 lead sheets in your packet, one for each of the major keys, the major scales. And each lead sheet deals with eight rhythmic exercises. So you should see them labeled there, ABCD, and so forth. The play alongs the backing tracks, again, you will see 12 backing tracks.

one for each of the major keys. And then the illustrations contain a nifty worksheet that will allow you to conceptually expound upon the development of rhythmic vocabulary, melodic vocabulary, mirroring exactly what we are doing today. So it's pretty cool stuff that when used correctly, which I know you will, will have a profound impact on your musical development.

Dr. Bob Lawrence (32:18.468)
your musicianship, your ability to play jazz. All right, so now let's let's get down to business because we had a lot to do. So grab lead sheet one, key of C major. Let me explain how this lead sheet is structured.

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