You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - 7 Favorite Piano-y Runs

Episode Date: July 31, 2019

In this episode, Peter and Adam go through their favorite runs to play on the piano.Interested in more music advice? Go here to browse our catalog of jazz lessons and courses available for purchase. And be sure to check out our All Access Pass - every course from Open Studio on every instrument.Let us know what you think by leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review, or head over to our YouTube channel.Follow us on Facebook | Twitter | Instagram See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Hey, Adam. Yeah. You ready for some premium episodes? I mean, this is our first one. It better be good. That's right. Let's get ready to get premium. I'm Adam Anis.

And I'm Peter Barton. And you're listening to the You'll Hear at podcast, Premium. Premium advice coming at you. Coming at you today, we're at the piano. We're at the piano because this is premium time. This time for the real stuff. I'm so excited about this. We've been talking about this for a while, and we want to thank you guys for joining us on this inaugural premium podcast episode.

and we came up with something that I think is going to be a lot of fun and we'd love to hear from you guys if you're enjoying these because we have a bunch of different ideas here too Yeah, yeah, and this is going to be pretty piano-specific these episodes Yeah, yeah, because we are pianists And also by popular request. By popular request. I mean, we have so much requests for this To be at the piano and we got the overhead going.

This is premium. It's awesome. I'm excited. Yeah, me too. So the first episode we're going to do here is about runs, Not like running or I have the runs. Right, right, right. But piano Pacific, Piano Pacific.

And Atlantic and Indian Oceans as well. Piano Pacific runs just kind of, I don't want to say licks, but things that go up and down the piano that just feel really great with our hands that fit the instrument ergonomically. Yes, I mean, I think you nail it with the piano-y runs. I mean, it sounds a little different. It sounds different. But I think it's so descriptive.

Yeah. Well, the first one I want to do is something I've done since I was a teenager, and it's a run that I usually reserve for if I'm setting up a tune in a major key, let's say we're in E-flat. Yep. I will give a nice B-flat-7 run of something like this. I love that. So the shape here is with my left hand, the seventh and the root.

Yep. And then with my right hand, I have four notes, the flat nine, the third, the sharp 11, and the 13. So this gives me the six note. Oh, I love you. You get almost like classical-esque vibe when you do that. Almost a liberati. Yeah, so a technical thing that happens with this is the biggest area of disconnect can be between the hands. So you do want to get that rhythm.

Yeah. You don't want it to sound like you have two hands. You want to sound like... I almost think about, unlike many of these that are going from bottom to top, almost like a harp. Exactly. That's what we're mimicking here. So practice slow. And getting that those two hands.

super even. You can add the root at the bottom and sustain as much as you want really. Or no sustain sounds pretty hip as well. Yeah, very different. Very different between those. So that's my first piano. I love that. Do you ever think about, oh yeah, let's go ahead and switch. I'm just wondering if you ever think, because I think I do one similar to that. Ah. Without the E, without the, without the. Yeah. But I like it with that. Yeah. Sometimes I'll exclude the root for like a five. five-note thing. And by the way, this is really easy. You can do this in C. You can do this in G. You can do this in E. Whatever key, this lays really well in most keys. Yeah, no, it's cool. Like it. Some of these are very key-specific that we'll do today. But this one is pretty nebulous for that. Right, right, right. Okay, so for my first one, so this is number two of our piano we runs. This is kind of a top-to-bottom. I mean, most of these can work either work either work either top-to-bottom or bottom-to-top. And I like how you said that one.

kind of at the beginning, you know. Yeah. Wait, is that the one? It's, yeah, I know what you're done. McCourtiner on the Coltrane and Hartman. Exactly, yeah, yeah. Nice. I think he does it without the root in there

with just A, flat, B, yeah, but similar. Okay, so what I have here is the, and we wrote these so funny, I got to remember. Oh, yeah, the altered scale, which I never thought about it like this, but it sounds like, it just flies. Flies off the fingers.

And I mean, you know, I'd definitely do this. This one in different keys. What is that? Yeah. Okay. So what it is is, first we'll do over C leading to an F minor or F major. We've got starting on the minor third, which is usually where I'd started, coming down the

altar scale. But instead of we're skipping the sharp fifth. And you know, just like your run, I think you're going to see with a lot of these, the number of notes in them, like yours was six notes, right? That really affects rhythmically kind of how we, you know, execute them. And this one, I think, because you certainly could do the whole skip. But then it's got such a whole tony thing, and you don't get to where you're going quick enough. The six-note thing is quick enough, and you can do a triplet run with it.

Exactly, exactly. And that's a good way to practice these. You can, you know, accenting different notes. And as you said, too, some slow practice will really help you up. And I think with this one, a lot of the ones coming from top to bottom, You can always kind of stop and do a little playing around, which makes it more interesting, I think, as opposed to just... Yeah, you can get to your thumb and go back. Yeah.

To hit that sharp five, whatever you want to do, that's a good one. I love it. All right, I'm going to shut on that one. With all of these, you can practice them slow, and you should practice them slow, but also practice them fast. These are opportunities where we can really gain a lot of speed. because these are ergonomically great for the piano. So ideally, these should be some of the cleanest, fastest things we do. Right.

And these are definitely ones that you pull out. This is probably some of our most contrived playing. But you really should look at opportunities like on this one. You know, to like combine chromatic stuff. You know. And then you're using it, but you're just changing it up so it doesn't sound too contrived. Yo, I don't mind if it's contrived. It sounds good.

That's true. All right. So speaking of triplets, this is one. that you can pull out when you need some sort of fast triplety runs peeking in. This is, and you can do this up or down. It's really fun either way. This is literally just, we'll start with all white keys here on C. 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3, 1, 2.

And then back down. You can see it's just really, you're just wiggling these, you know, three fingers. Going up, it takes a little more of a, I want to say, like, an armweight thing. You know, I'm almost like leaning into each one. It's execution. That's technique right there. Coming down is literally just, I'm going, that's the horridz of high range right there.

But don't sleep on these on just the white keys. So practice these like an F. There's going to be a fingering change because you're not going to want to put your thumb like that. But it's good. And do not try to the speed at first. I should. Do not try this at home.

See, I'm putting my two finger. And then there's a little anticipation that has to happen on the way down. You have to know that it's... But you can be just as fast. The same thing, key of E flat. See, these... Two, two, one.

Same thing. Hey. Anyway, I need to practice those. But those are really fun, especially if you can get those black keys going. Yeah, yeah. It's really... Now, are you always basing that off of a major scale?

Do you use all that? No, that's the beauty is. Whatever you're using for a major... scale if I'm on Dorian, you know, you can do stuff like that. But it's always a mode. It's always a mode. You can do like altered stuff. Yeah, you could do even half hole.

It's a little bit harder because of all the black keys and the weird positions. But any mode you can practice this with. And it's really great, especially for things like, you know, coming down, like if I'm on C, I might come down on the G major scale. A little sharp 11 action. Sharp 11 action. But yeah, it's something I use quite a bit. Good.

I like it. I'm shedding on that one. Cool. I'm starting slower. All right now. All right. Little musical chairs. Pampa, ba, what's up?

Premium edition. All right, this is fun. Okay, so now we're going to number four. And this major seven plus five try it. Okay. Okay, major seven. Oh, yeah. So this one is...

Is that right? Major seven. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And this one I typically... do as kind of a broken up kind of a situation but if you think about it first so you got the

major seventh four note and then you got the raised fifth you know so good for any of those like Lidian dominant sounds you can use it for major major 7 sharp 5 obviously but probably also altered stuff too and I was trying to remember I think it's

over the like like an F minor and this one this is one works nice kind of inverting it and like the other ones combining with some other things but if you think about it and you just take it as opposed to I actually don't do that one

just straight down as much as and that's just going through the inversion that's just combining it with that ascending melodic minor and then chromatic combinations too

but this one is of the category of like shape base of all four inversions. Oh, these are so important for a pianist because of how our hands lay on the keyboard. Right. And then once you get that spacing, you know, between each of them, and this is good to practice, you know, blocked out like this and like close your eyes and like, really go by feel, but try not to feel between, you know, your movement. So in other words, you're not like feeling like you're like your eyes, like you're in the dark for the door. You're trying to go straight to it.

that's when you know if you need to know it. Okay. Cool. Yeah, that's awesome. All right. So for my next one, I have a really fun one. This is a whole tone scale. Broken up.

So whole tones are a six-note scale. Again, another six-note thing. And you can break them up in the hands. So for like a whole-tone scale starting on C, they're only three, right? So we'll put our left hand on the black. black keys four, three, two. And our right hand, one, two, three. Just like that.

Now for, let's say, we're doing this one, right? So we can do, oh, sorry. Oh, sorry, that's the same one. Wait, hold on just a second. Here we go. There's one. There's one. There's like two, actually, is it?

You said three. Yeah, sorry, there's two. I mean there's all 12 with that follow the pattern. Oh yeah, I'm confusing myself here. Okay, so for this next one starting on D flat, for the other one, you can do just two in your left and four in your right. Yeah.

It's a little harder to time. Coming down too. But these are great, man. If you could do like another harp effect. Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah, love these. That's great.

And now, so you always, in terms of fingering, you're always using the left, Hand on the black keys. Yeah. It just... Yeah. For me, it's more comfortable. Yeah, I think it's good.

I have to look at some of those videos because Monk, of course, was doing these all the time. I think he used that same technique. I mean, you can do it one-handed as well, but it's really fun to go up. Yep. Yeah. Good stuff.

Yeah. Okay. We're moving along here. Now we are at F minor. Oh, yeah. Okay, so this one... Number six, number six of our seven. So, you know, I love over these kind of minor chords,

minor 11, or even just straight minor 7. But the idea here is, and I'll do it over F, it sounds like this. And again, this is a one, two, three, four, five, six, six note run. And it's just the F Dorian without the six. And I'm starting on the ninth. And we should probably talk, well, you talked about it on some of yours. Where you start these makes a big difference in how they're kind of timed out. Well, and the sound of it as well.

And the sound, absolutely. And I mean, a lot of them, well, really all of them have different opportunities. So once you learn them, try them starting at different places with, you know, so that you get the full. Because all these are useful in a couple of different ways, you know. But this one, I don't know, I kind of gravitate towards it from coming off the night. So what we're looking at, and I think it's because of the way that the triads are inlaid and embedded in them, embedded in them. But what we're looking at is there's that skip over the, over the six. So it's that.

Because to me, I don't know, something. about just the straight scale runs, except for maybe, I don't know, the whole, the half hole, even that one, I'm more likely to still skip something to make it sound good.

So this is really, and I think, you know, the grouping of six or eight is definitely part of it. This is one that you can really do in all keys, I think it's possible. I mean, if you can play a Dorian scale,

you can play this. Exactly, exactly. And this is a good one to combine with something going up, like in terms of So you're coming down Same thing, Dorian without the six And I'm more likely to As opposed to I don't know, I like to give it some kind of turn and skip or something

So it's just coming up a straight half hole there I'm trying to think any other So, yeah, usually from the ninth, but sometimes from the fifth, especially maybe like on a b. I don't know, maybe I wouldn't do that, but it's a choice. All right, so I have a really, a really fun one. This is from playing like a major seven, the most basic way to do this one,

is on the seventh, starting on the seventh of the third. You can think about this as 16th notes or 32nd notes, but. So here on C, it's just that shape. All different keys you can do, if I'm on C, you can do, like, if this was G, again, for that Sharp-Ele-Evenson. So this is a great way to end the tune. Again, another kind of cascading thing. Yeah, I like it.

But when you get, with any of these, too, when you get locked into these and you can get them solid rhythmically, you can use them as lines in time. You know, they sound great. That's great. All right, that's seven. Should we do a bonus one? Let's do a bonus one. All right, you got one. This one's actually, this is a little bit of an extension

and can be used not just as a straight run or up and down, but it's like this. Wait, wait, wait. What is it like? Okay, well, let me do it as an action. That's as a straight run. But typically, Oh, try it.

You're doing two triads. Two triads. So this is over. C minor, E flat tried it, and F try it. But the concept in terms of moving, if you're going straight in one direction, is about the inversion. So we're going up stepwise, but we're skipping.

If you're thinking about, I mean, there's a couple different ways to think about it. You can think about it as the E flat, pentatonic, or C minor, but if you're thinking about the Dorian, remember we talk about when it's interesting, what notes are we missing? It's that ninth, right? It gives it a whole different sound.

Yeah, but these are really good for, to change direction. And then E-flap major. Lidium. And then to combine them, if you want to get away from the straight triad, although the way that they're in late, I think it's actually kind of hip. But if you do want to get away from that,

the easiest is to turn it into like a four-note shape. We've talked about that before, but these triads can be useful like that. Yeah, and that gives it a little bit more obtuse kind of major 70 sound. You know, actually just to do this, it's like, say if you did, that's a little much. I mean, it's a little bit like, you know, almost like a churny exercise at the end or something. So I don't know, these, this is more the kind that I kind of inlay in the time over something.

You know, it's like a one octave, two octave situation. But these are something that once you get them, you can just rip through them. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But a lot of the other ones, you know. Yeah, a lot of the other time effects. Yeah, and they're leading somewhere. A lot of mold dominants. So you know what we're going to do for our premium members here is we'll have a PDF here in the link of each little worksheet.

An example of each one of these for you so you can check them out. These are our premium pieces. We've got to take care of you. And look for more things next month. That's right. Thank you for subscribing. That's right. You'll hear it premium.

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