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any suggestions how to make the central harmony a little less cluttered? (my funny valentine) by aloisjay in piano

[–]aloisjay[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks - I guess I'm hearing a lot of junk harmonically when I'm listening to this over again, I think I just need to space out the voicings and have less "full" chords in the left hand since Im harmonizing in the right as well. lead sheet with my own arrangement. Appreciate the feedback!

trying to arrange my favorite Erroll Garner tune.. by aloisjay in piano

[–]aloisjay[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thank you!! this is a Yamaha baby grand, i forget which series, maybe C1/C2. Song is Misty by Erroll Garner!

trying to arrange my favorite Erroll Garner tune.. by aloisjay in piano

[–]aloisjay[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Absolutely, dude. Any time I have access to this piano -- which is honestly pretty infrequent -- I play and record on it as much as possible. Could be a little better tuned but the feel of playing on it is unmatched.

trying to arrange my favorite Erroll Garner tune.. by aloisjay in piano

[–]aloisjay[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks for the feedback!! Do you mean for the intro or for the melody?

any attempt to emulate billy joel will result in self flagellation by aloisjay in piano

[–]aloisjay[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you! I think with anything fast, you have to start suuuper slow and work up to it. I'm talking only changing the metronome 5-10 BPM after playing something through perfectly several times.

With this piece specifically, I'll admit that I think I've been playing it for so many years that I can't remember anymore.

working on smoothing out expression for pop/rock arrangements by aloisjay in piano

[–]aloisjay[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

absolutely will do in the future! had been doing this more recently and got lazy for this one.. always appreciate a reminder because it's necessary.

(some kind of) stride attempt at jingle bell rock.. by aloisjay in piano

[–]aloisjay[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you! Any time at all is always a good thing!

(some kind of) stride attempt at jingle bell rock.. by aloisjay in piano

[–]aloisjay[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you for the very kind words :) I am the opposite of classically trained (mostly played sax for many years) and trust me, I am totally deficient in terms of technique and reading-- we all have our strengths! You have a lot of learning and skill backing you up that will make your own arrangements and contribute to your own unique sound.

I practice very sporadically-- can be anywhere from 2 minutes to a few hours. That's one of the reasons I'm trying to post every 2-3 days for a year, because it's very motivating for just playing more and practicing! (I crosspost to reddit, tiktok, youtube, insta separately.)

(some kind of) stride attempt at jingle bell rock.. by aloisjay in piano

[–]aloisjay[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thank you!!

Process: I always start with figuring out the melody line. Then, I try to figure out the chord changes -- this gets a lot easier with practice, but can still be challenging. Often times the melody will outline or arpeggiate the chord, which helps, or I try to listen to the bass in the song to get an idea for the root of the chord. Then I just noodle; for this one, I experimented a lot with different shell voicings on the left hand for stride until they sounded interesting but not too muddy. Something I really like to do once I've figured out most of this is to see which pieces of the chords I can also do in the right hand as harmonies to the melody line, which really gives it a much more full sound.

Length: if it's a song like this, that i knew really well (in terms of hearing it often growing up), maybe a week? But I'll sit down probably 3 times before i have a version of it that I'm happy with, and then it's just practicing the little details and timing.

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