Jazz Piano Cafe

Month: January 2008

  • Working on original tune – Joy

    I wrote a tune last fall which is my most harmonically advanced as of yet… it’s called Joy and I recorded it in a pretty hasty recording session last weekend (click here to listen). My bass playing friend Jason said that this tune is the most difficult to play of all the tunes I have…

  • Days of Wine and Roses and Originals work

    I love practicing because it allows me to take as much time as I want to work out nice ways to play tunes. When playing with a group I am always trying to play in time, and there is less time to be very thoughtful about learning new voicings and ways to play the chords.…

  • Free improv and Stella By Starlight

    I couldn’t sleep, so I tried to relax my mind by doing some freeform improvisation on the piano. I find that it can sometime have a calming effect to improvise freely on the piano for about 10 minutes, or longer if I feel like it. At the end of this session, I worked a little bit…

  • Practice recording – How High the Moon and Satin Doll

    I was inspired to work on my jazz chops a bit after attending a wonderful concert given by Amanda Tosoff quartet with Brad Turner at CBC Studio One. So I picked the standard How High the Moon and did some practice on playing a bit faster, trying to get some lines to flow, and my hands…

  • Practice Recording: original stuff and Giant Steps

    Worked a bit on an original as well as the standard Giant Steps. (Click here to listen).

  • Article: experiences at a summer jazz camp

    Felicity Rubinstein writes in the Times Online (click here to read article) about her experiences taking a jazz improvisation course with her son. She writes: Unless you play to concert standard, which I don’t, the piano is a lonely instrument. Jazz offers more of a chance to play with other people. […] But here’s the…