Jazz Piano Cafe » piano

Geoff Peters performs An Afternoon in Paris (jazz) on solo piano

admin — Mon, 24 May 2010 21:14:37 +0000

A couple weeks ago I made a video of myself performing the jazz standard An Afternoon in Paris by John Lewis.

I performed solo piano on my upright acoustic Petrof piano. It’s available below or on Youtube.

Hope you enjoy it!

Ear Training Lesson – key of C Major and the Diatonic System

admin — Mon, 24 May 2010 21:00:09 +0000

My friend Marcus Emmanuel Barnes and I created a new musical ear training video as part of the series of lessons we’re making on EarPractice.com.

This week’s video is about the “Diatonic System” in music, which is where you can play a lot of different types of chords and melodies, all within one key. To keep things simple we stick to the key of C Major.

Hope you enjoy it and find the lesson useful.

Additional links:

Knobb.ca – Marcus’s music blog
Geoff Peters Trio (Geoff’s jazz band in Vancouver)

Jam session recording: Geoff Peters and Gustavo Lacerda

admin — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 19:38:42 +0000

I had a music jam today with my friend Gustavo. He is multi-talented and plays many instruments. Today he brought along his violin.

You can grab the Mp3′s we made here, or use the players below!

Minor Swing (folk music style swing tune with violin and piano)

Upbeat Evil Castle Theme from Super Mario Brothers
(violin, synth (i)pad, synth bass, Latin drum samples)

Tetris Theme played on Violin with piano, and some Gypsy songs improvized.

Giant Steps (Coltrane) piano solo by Geoff Peters

admin — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 19:26:46 +0000

Last night I recorded myself performing the jazz standard Giant Steps on the piano. In this video I give a 1 minute introduction to the song and then perform it. If you’re interested in the audio only, you can grab the MP3 from here or use the audio player above.

My Foolish Heart (jazz video) – Gio Escueta and Geoff Peters

admin — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 05:33:07 +0000

Last week, vocalist Gio Escueta and I performed at the Fairmont Waterfront Hotel in downtown Vancouver BC Canada.

We made a video of one of the songs, My Foolish Heart by Ned Washington and Victor Young. It’s available on Youtube or by using the player below. Hope you enjoy!

Ocean Apart – original composition by Geoff Peters (piano)

admin — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 20:04:24 +0000

Last night I made a video recording of myself performing an original jazz bebop tune on the piano. It’s called Ocean Apart and I wrote it last summer while taking a composition class with New York jazz pianist Misha Piatigorsky.

You can view the video on Youtube, Blip.tv, or use the player below.

The MP3 recording of this performance is available for free here.

Heartbeet – Live improvised synth & acoustic piano with drum samples

admin — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 21:09:03 +0000

My friend Marcus dropped by today for a visit, and we recorded an improvised performance of synthesizer and piano. It’s called Heartbeet. We named it this maybe because we both really like to eat beets, (yum!) and so therefore “heart” them, as well as because we were wanting to play on the concept of the pulsating bass drum that sometimes goes out of time from the piano, much like a heart beat will continue its own rhythm oblivious to the other rhythms around it.

The video is also available on Blip.tv and the Mp3 file for the song is available here.

Visit Marcus’s Knobb.ca music blog for more interesting ideas and videos. Also produced in cooperation with Birds in the House Productions.

Song of the Week – Kurt Elling “Where I Belong”

admin — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 06:53:23 +0000

Kurt Elling, jazz vocalist (photo credit: Christian Lantry)

One of my all time favorite jazz vocalists is the inimitable Kurt Elling. He has been voted Male Vocalist of the Year for 10 years in a row by critics in Downbeat magazine and for 5 years by the Downbeat readers’ choice awards.

Kurt Elling has done some really incredible recordings, and I am definitely going to go out and try to complete my collection and get all 8 of his albums.

The current JazzPianoCafe song of the week is Kurt Elling’s recording of his very romantic original song, Where I Belong. It’s from his 1998 album This Time It’s Love. Here are the lyrics, courtesy of Kurt Elling’s website:

Lyric by Kurt Elling

I hear the woman like a song / dancing down a long corridor
Reminding me I belong where I am

I see the singing in the rain/ the rhythm at my windowpane
Reminding me I belong where I am

There is a light in the silence of loving things
And when I look in my baby’s hopeful eyes
It’s like the sound just before ever morning horizon
Light comes to life

It’s like a magnet of loving sound / turning me rightside down
Keeping my two feet firmly planted on the ground
Reminding me I belong where I am.

You can listen to the song on iTunes for 99 cents, or listen for free on imeem (free account registration required). You can also purchase the CD or MP3′s online from Amazon.

This recording of Where I Belong features the following stellar musicians: Kurt Elling voice, Laurence Hobgood piano, Rob Amster bass, Michael Raynor percussion, Dave Oderdonk guitar, Paul Wertico drums, and Brad Wheeler soprano saxophone.

The track opens with burst of warm sound. A simple riff on the soprano sax is echoed by the piano, accompanied by drums, acoustic bass and guitar. The riff is repeated once and then Kurt Elling enters with his sparkling and luscious baritone. A hypnotizing bossa nova ensues, with an exciting and tasteful soprano sax solo well shaped to a gentle climax before the final vocal melody restatement. The outro is a vamp on the original intro riff, ending with a bit of Kurt Elling’s whistling on the fade out.

Highly recommended! Hope you enjoy this song and check back again next week for another JazzPianoCafe “Song of the Week”.

-Geoff Peters (Birds in the House Productions)

Live gig recording: Julian N. and Geoff Peters (alto sax and piano jazz duet)

admin — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 06:42:44 +0000

I played piano at a wedding with my friend Julian N., a saxophonist and composer. Julian is a student at Humber College in Toronto. You can view his myspace page by clicking here.

Here is a track listing with links to the individual videos:

If you’d like to download MP3′s of the concert (free) you can get them from here.

With Julian’s permission I used my minidisc unit to record the audio from our performance. There is quite a bit of background noise from the wedding guests’ conversation, but in the recordings you can hear both of us quite clearly.

I also set up my Sony Camcorder in the corner and video-taped our performance too. There was very low light, so you can barely make us out in the video, but it gives more context to the audio to be able to see us perform too.

At this wedding, we performed a selection of mainstream jazz standards in a duo style. Probably my biggest inspiration for the saxophone-piano duo format is the legendary combination of Stan Getz (saxophone) and Kenny Barron (piano). Another inspiration for rhythmic ideas has been the mighty pianist Chick Corea and his duets with the one and only voice artist Bobby Mcferrin (such as their killer performance of Autumn Leaves).

So without further ado, here’s our complete performance (except for the last song we played, Confirmation by Charlie Parker, where we got interrupted by some DJ music).

Hope you enjoy! I hope that these performances will give you some ideas or inspiration for your own journeys in jazz and music in general.

Further listening: I performed one of Julian’s original compositions with the college band at the Phil Dwyer Academy of Music and Culinary Arts (PDAMCA) last August.

New Composition: “Me N Petrof” by Geoff Peters

admin — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 01:11:35 +0000

My friend Marcus was over for a visit today and he encouraged me to write a song dedicated to the new “love” in my life, my Petrof acoustic piano.

So I wrote a simple folk ballad which I call “Me N Petrof“. It is similar to a Brad Mehldau song I vaguely remember listening to, as well as the American folk song Shenandoah which I played in high school band, quite a few years ago!

I made a rather hasty recording of it, just to get the idea cemented in my mind, and I wrote out a lead sheet on a piece of music notation paper.

Feel free to use the player above to listen to the song, or you can download the MP3 here.

My new Petrof Piano

The Petrof piano brand is from the Czech Republic. Petrof pianos have been admired and enjoyed by many amazing musicians throughout the years, including jazz greats Keith Jarrett and Count Basie and classical pianists such as Sviatoslav Richter.

I purchased my piano from Yonatan Torn in Vancouver. Yonatan is a master Steinway piano tuner and technician in the Vancouver area who also imports, rebuilds, and sells pianos (mostly European pianos). You can find out more about his piano tuning and restoration services, and view the pianos currently for sale at his website.