Another Method For Improvising Piano Songs

Our video today demonstrates how to use musical intervals for improvising piano songs.

Click on this link to watch this video on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dc4y3d99o6A&feature=youtu.be

Good morning, this is Duane, and we’ve been doing a series called “How To Color On The Piano Without Crayons”, and lately we’ve been talking about improvising piano songs using chords. We’ve said if you’re just starting out improvising, it’s a good idea to use the rhythm of the melody to base your improvisations on so you don’t wander.

I’ve had a lot of experience teaching beginners and they tend to wander without having a definite form, but if you use the rhythm of the melody . . . For example, I use Blue Moon and the rhythm goes like this.

Now, if you improvise but don’t use those notes . . . See, I made up a different melody there, but the rhythm of it was the same. It would match the words. In other words, I could sing the words with what I just improvised. That’s a good idea to do it.

We also said that you can just break up the notes of the chords if you want. I’m just going up the C6 chord down the A minor seventh chord, up the D minor seventh chord and down the G seventh chord. Now, that gets boring, but it’s a good place to start.

Then last time we talked about using grace notes, for example. By sliding off some black keys onto the white keys. They’re also known as blue notes.

Today I’d like to talk about using two-note intervals to improvise. Now, what’s a two-note interval? Well, an interval is simply the distance between any two notes. If I just play two notes, that’s a two-note interval, obviously.

Instead of just playing one note this time, I’m going to play two notes. Notice I’m still using the rhythm of the melody to do that. All I did was, instead of paying one note, I played two notes. Those are called thirds because they’re three notes apart. I’m using thirds there.

Let me play through the bridge and I think I’ll use six in there. Let me try it from the beginning.

Here’s a bridge. Notice I switch from thirds to sixths. One, two, three, four, five, six. I use thirds in the theme, but in the bridge, I use sixths. Those are two things you can use. Of course you can use them in combination with grace notes. You can go . . . Whoops.

You can use single notes, thirds, sixths. You can use other intervals, too, but the thirds and sixths are harmonic intervals. The others are a little more dangerous to use. You can use a fifth and a fourth, but it sounds a lot more open. Of course you can use a seventh, but that’s kind of distant. You can get away with it in short term, but not over the long term.

OK, that’s it for today. Tomorrow we’ll take up using chords to improvise. I’ll say black chords, because we’re using chords anyway, but you can also improvise by playing a whole chord and we’ll talk about that tomorrow.

Thanks for being with me. If you enjoy this series, come on over to PlayPiano.com and sign up for our entire series of short videos on all aspects of piano playing. Hope to see you there. Bye-bye for now.
***For lots more good stuff on piano playing come on over to my website at https://www.playpiano.com and sign up for our free piano tips – “Exciting Piano Chords & Sizzling Chord Progressions!”
Here’s a great little book on chords and chord progressions on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Piano-Chords-Chord-Progressions-Exciting-ebook/dp/B0076OUGDE/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1404158669&sr=1-1&keywords=piano+chords+duane+shinn
_________________________________________________________________________________________