ever wondered why some people seem to have a gift for music have you ever
wished that you could play by ear sing in tune improvise and jam you're in the
right place time to turn those wishes into reality
welcome to the musicality podcast with your host Christopher Sutton hello and
welcome to the musicality podcast it is my great pleasure to be joined for
today's episode by Steve Nixon from freejazzlessons.com which is perhaps the
leading website dedicated to learning jazz piano now I know that I've probably
already lost some of you by the very mention of the word jazz but please
don't tune out because it's actually you guys that we've planned this episode for
Steve has been a guest on the podcast before so if you'd like to know more
about his backstory and get some expert insights on practicing and particularly
I think we talked a lot about rhythm skills then do check out that interview
we'll have a link in the show notes for this episode I get the chance to chat
with Steve occasionally and he noticed that whenever we talked about jazz I
would mention how our followers at musically you and the listeners to this
podcast tend to think jazz is advanced or really complex as a genre and we
definitely do have some jazz aficionados among you and certainly a lot of jazz
fans but I know that for most of you it seems like jazz is something you might
get into in future maybe once you master the simpler genres like rock and pop
blues even classical Steve is convinced that's not the case jazz does not have
to be super complicated and recently I got an email from him and if you're into
jazz piano and you're not on Steve's email list then you should definitely go
to free jazz lessons comm and sign up right now fix that but this email anyway
was about a new course he has coming out and he said something fascinating that I
just had to find out more about so I've invited him onto the show to talk about
jazz and genres and this interesting point from an email welcome to the show
Steve thank you for joining us today Christopher absolutely pleasure to hang
out with the edge again so the email I mentioned there was one about your brand
new course and you were talking about how jazz piano players today actually
need to master a range of genres maybe let's start there why can't you just
pick a genre like jazz and to it yeah that's a great question so
you know obviously online I'm known as the jazz guy you know I have tons and
tons of courses out there and jazz and blues and this is stylistically one of
my passions in life is playing this particular art form but you know the
reality is in today's day and age 98 percent of gigs out there are not eating
the Jazz genre they're in rock they're in pop they're in country they're in
bluegrass funk R&B you know even hip hop gigs you name it broad genre classical
you know all the different genres out there and so modern piano players if
they really want to go out and perform and connect with people and and live in
today's day and age musically speaking you have to be able to do a lot of
different things you can't just play jazz if you want to go out and play all
the time for people I feel like you're stepping on the third rail there and can
get some backlash from the HUD coach as people are you really allowed encourage
people to go outside of jazz Wow yes basically so this is the other
interesting thing about jazz you know a lot of people try to define what jazz is
this or jazz is that but on its highest level it's this melting pot of different
sounds and different techniques you know if you love light music and you love air
for Cuban styles there's jazz that influences and involves that particular
genre in there that mixes that in if you like rock well there's a lot of people
like for example Mike Stern or John Scofield even Miles Davis's stuff had a
lot of rock stuff going on in terms of the fusion era right you name the genre
jazz has incorporated to some degree at one point it really is and style
infinite possibilities so you know to say well jazz has to be this or has to
be that you're basically boxing in a style that is about freedom and so this
is why you know it's okay to so quote/unquote step on the third rail
nice well as exciting as you make it sound there I feel we are getting into
exactly what sometimes intimidates people which is you
jazz is so vast there's an awful lot to learn there and this thing that jumped
out at me from the email I've mentioned is that you said there was kind of a
shortcut to not only into jazz but into spreading across different genres if
you've been pigeon-holed as a jazz player or if you're not even that far
down the jazz route you were saying there is one person you can study from
that can actually open up a range of genres for you can you tell us about
that absolutely so you know what I was coming up I had gotten some jazz skills
under my belt and if you know I got pretty good at that particular style
music but then when I went to go play gigs and other genres you know I really
had to adjust and I kind of fell on my face many times you know when I go be
playing on the pop gig and I be throwing in all my reharmonization x' and sharp 9
voicings and all the stuff that scares people about jazz right so I was like
Wednesday you mean all this hip stuff I was working on my jazz things like these
aren't working I'm like 1 4 or 5 like pop gig is like what's going on I don't
really understand you know so you know I started transcribing a ton of these
different players and basically I chained myself to the piano and it's a
very fast way to burn yourself out of you're just basically transcribing
hundreds and hundreds of players and just practicing 90 million hours a day
and I was like okay who's got this all under their hands like who somebody was
able to cross your genre and succeed in all these different styles with a bunch
of different soul and different techniques so you know it did a lot of
searching and one of those guys who basically was right under in front of my
face the whole time and I did I just sort of took him for granted and then
finally I just had this aha moment was Ray Charles you know a lot of people
think of rays a sort of like iconic singer but Ray was one of the greatest
piano players of the 20th century absolutely an innovator in terms of
being able to play all these different styles not only in a soulful way but in
a stylistic way and sound great in country pop rock blues use a killer jazz
player you know you name it New Orleans styles this guy could absolutely do it
so once I found ray just locked in a huntin ray I just
started transcribing him like crazy and that's how I got all these different
skills together in the different styles that's fascinating and and this is why I
wanted to have you onto the show because if we took like one sentence from what
you just said that Ray Charles was amazing and went across the is you're on
Rah's someone might be tempted to say well Ray Charles was one in a million he
was talented he just had the gift he could do anything but I know you're a
music educator who doesn't have a lot of time for talk of talent and you have
really dissected how Ray Charles did what he did and so I'd love to
understand a bit more how it's possible that he was able to master all the
different genres without presumably spending a hundred thousand hours on
each transcribing painstakingly the kind of way you described and if it wasn't
that you just had a pretty natural gift for it yeah so the the concept of the
gift or the Oh so-and-so was born with it they just have it you know that's not
true 99.9% of the time so anybody is listening they're saying oh they're just
naturally talented or I'll never have it you either like oh that thought I've
seen it you know we've taught millions of people through our website free jazz
lessons calm we've interacted with with thousands and thousands of people want a
1 through our training programs and I can guarantee you that there really is
no that the the line between like working on talent and working on you
know working on your craft and natural talent is complete garbage okay anybody
can get good if you can learn how to speak right if you speak whatever your
language is your native language fluently you can learn how to play your
instrument natively as well just a language so there's no such thing as oh
they were just born with it I'll never have so I want to make sure we're
addressing that okay now second of all I want to talk a little bit now about
simplification of harmony and this is something that I got when I first
started learning from Ray Charles just sort of this aha moment okay so
Christopher number one chord progression in the history of the world what is that
chord progression some kind of one four or five exactly exactly one four five so
can can I play the piano a little bit in
this interview is that all right yeah go for it okay good so I'll go into the
people ski here we'll go into the key of C here right so one four five I'll just
put a major scale C major scale just to kind of get everybody's ears you know
custom to what I'm talking about here right so you go something like this
everybody's familiar with that sound right there okay now I was to play a 1 4
5 chord progression so follow me yeah ok so this would be based off the first
note of the scale the 4th note of the scale and the 5th note of the scale ok
so in this case and the key is C would be a C or because until now for the
first note of the scale C and then in chico okay which is built off the fifth
note is good okay so we have one four five chord progression all right so many
different genres of music have this chord progression right okay now in jazz
we use a different type of chord progression that's our most common and
that chord progression is the two five one and that's the disconnect that a lot
of people say oh my god like I'm totally grated playing it you know 1 4 5 or
playing a blues which is also 1 4 5 but the second week you circuiting the 2 5
ones and this jazz stuff like this is crazy how can I do this we'll check this
out this is the first thing I want to talk about 1 4 5 in 2 5 1 are actually
the same thing and one of the big takeaways that I've gotten from Ray
Charles is so much of core progressions can really be simplified and thought of
it's just basically three sounds a tonic sound a sub dominant sound any down
minute zone so if I kind of break down a little bit what I mean - please do yeah
I'm sure those words are not familiar to everyone listening so yeah and if you're
if you're driving right now listening this pull over write these words down
right ok or if you're sitting at your desk wherever you are right now write
these words down because these are very three very powerful words in music tonic
sub-dominant and dominant okay so follow me here okay tonic sound is basically
the one in the key okay so let me show you what I mean by
this again we'll go into the people's key the key of C here alright so horn a
the key of C right and I play a little chord progression that's tonic that's
the resolution sound it means you've reached your home base and if we're in
the key of C tonic is just the C chord simple stuff that right now sub dominant
is what's known as kind of like a transition chord it's to get us to set
up the very last chord that leads us back to our tonic so here's the sound of
a sub dominant chord okay so if we have a sub dominant chord okay and the key is
C we have right that's our four chord sub dominant is now dominant it's gonna
be your find the key you see that's gonna be the declarants got that pulp it
doesn't sound like we're done until we get back to our chronic sound right now
check this out I just broke this down this this concept of tonic sub-dominant
dominant over 145 a chord progression that most people know but jazz also has
this concept of tonic sub-dominant dominant and guess what
so does funk so does blues so does Latin music so does pop so does bluegrass so
does country okay so the reason why I asked everybody to write this down is
because all musical chord progressions as long as you're in a key is can be
simplified in terms of tonic sub-dominant and dominant right and this
was the big breakthrough I got when I started listening they play all these
different styles is that basically this is how he's also thinking of harmony as
well right so this is why he says okay well I can play this type of sound over
over a sub dominant right and sub dominant might be a little bit different
in jazz than it is in blues or rock whatever but it's the same type of thing
so he's simplified everything is just basically three types
of course does that make sense or have I lost you yeah no I think that's clear
you might have to explain how that tonic sub-dominant dominant maps to the 251 if
it is indeed the same thing going on let's do it let's do love this
particular question so okay cool I'm gonna go back again into the people
scheme by the way the person that I got this from we call this the people's key
was chocolate Belle the great keyboard player from the Allman Brothers and
think he tours with the stones now had just done so much different stuff
alright so here we go okay so we had again our C chord are everywhere in our
G chord right one four five well let me introduce you how basically
substitutions work scored substitutions are you just find common notes between
the chords alright so if I say okay well we get a C chord which is our one chord
we have our four which is f it will form here alright
that's the notes of the four chord well let's look at what a two chord is and
again two is one of those big chords in a two five one chord progression that we
see in jazz right so the two chord okay it's built off the second scale to be
minor in the key of C we'll check this out D minor is the note okay now focus
on these notes is they're the same notes that occur in F chord the four which is
a alright this is how basically 1 4 5 is
the same thing as 2 5 1 because for a C and D minor a are the same thing so 4 &
2 are the same okay 5 is 5 right it's the same thing and
then 1 is the same thing okay so in jazz we would have a corporation like D minor
C major that's a two flat one it's the same thing as one in the key of C
alright so the big picture takeaway here right because I could go in all kinds of
different chord substitutions and different techniques but basically
they're all just organized in these three buckets tonic sub-dominant and
dominance pretty cool right very cool and so how
would Ray Charles benefit from that okay well let me show you a couple examples
what I mean by this alright so let's say I'm playing some bluesy licks that were
really nicely over a 1 4 5 chord progression so let's say we do something
like this actually I'll I'll play a 4 or 5 1 chord
progression ok so let's say I do something like guy sounds alright right
or I do something like simple stuff just over a 4-5-1 right but now I can do the
same licks same type of sounds over a 2 5 1 same time can you hear that how it
still works
same thing again I can do over for five one okay so again the reason why this
works and I can do this with basically any chord progression that falls within
the bucket of our tonic sub-dominant dominant is just because it's all the
same stuff right so you know this is how raking play all these different things
for example here's the same chord progression I'm gonna use some more
advanced chord foam and use the same sound okay okay again just blues licks a
la style raycharles over more advanced courts right but everything I just
played again was I wanted to simplify was a tonic sound sub dominant sound and
the dominant sound super cool that's a really great demonstration and I think
this is what I found so exciting about the way you presented this was that you
know if you're purely in a world of music theory this all just sounds kind
of arbitrary and you know maybe intellectually interesting but not all
that useful and if you're at the other end of the spectrum just listening to
Ray Charles and being like wow that guy is amazing he can play anything and
sound good but somewhere in between you've kind of
made this bridge where you're taking these fairly fundamental simple music
theory concepts but connecting it directly to this rich music of Ray
Charles that we all know and love you know that's interesting you say that
because that's really our big mission statement free jazz lessons calm like we
all know theory you know you all kind of a theory geeks and in you know high
school or college and you know know you know read all the books and and things
like that right but theory is really just a tool to express yourself and
allow your inner musician out allow your soul out of the piano and again it's
just a tool and so if you aren't using these techniques and actually using them
in context of real music understanding how people acts
express themselves with these techniques you're basically missing the point right
you know I kind of grew up I was a math geek I like that kind of stuff but most
people aren't you know they don't want to be thinking math when they want to be
thinking more right brain and having fun at piano right so that's what it is you
know I wanted to take somebody who was in a very hip player not only from a
theory standpoint but also just from a soul and an expression standpoint
somebody from Ray Charles and allow people with all kinds of different
backgrounds to see his genius and show exactly how he succeeded you know how he
played all these different genres you know to sort of hold my hand out to
people no matter where they were and help them learn how Wright succeeded
loved it well I really wanted to have you on just to kind of cast a light on
this principle that we can make jazz accessible we can translate across
genres and it boils down to what can be quite simple and easy to understand
concepts so thank you I think you did a fantastic job of demonstrating that and
illustrating it I do want to talk a bit specifically about this new course
though it's called play like Ray is that right
yeah exactly and you partnered up with someone to create this Bruce Katz yep
yep yep so Bruce Katz was my mentor when I went to the Berklee College of Music
about 900 years ago I won't say how old I am
but I'm older than I look but young in spirit but anyways Bruce Katz was my
mentor at the Berklee College of Music and I learned a ton from Bruce you know
I don't know I would have had some sort of musical career I don't think I would
have had the success I had with touring and playing with a lot of the big names
I played with who wasn't for Bruce's guidance and so you know I was very
fortunate to be able to work with Bruce and you know when I was working with him
I was like man this guy is so good like like he was famous in New England and he
had you know been known in certain circles and the blues scene a little bit
in Europe I like I was like how come like he's not on the cover of keyboard
magazine he's not touring with like the most famous players because like some of
the stuff we would do in our lessons was just like it was insane I couldn't
believe the sounds he was getting out of the piano
so my instincts were right on you know but they were my timing was a little bit
off so a couple years after I graduated from Berkeley
apparently gregg allman heard him play somewhere and scooped him up and he
started twirling with Gregg Allman and he got so busy he couldn't teach at
Berkeley anymore right so during this period Bruce was like Turin was like all
these huge names Delbert McClinton and he didn't really have time to teach and
so much of the stuff that we did in our lessons was Ray Charles type stuff and I
was like man I like this I mean they completely completely changed my life so
when we started hearing from people that that like you know who were some that
your favorite players that you would love to learn you know we take surveys
for audience and things like that we kept on hearing Ray Charles and over and
over now I know a lot about Ray Charles
transcribed a ton of his stuff but that being said I wanted to partner with
Bruce because Bruce is from many people's opinion like the the most
Authority teacher out there in terms of Ray Charles style he actually toured
with David Fathead Newman I don't know if you've ever heard of David Fathead
Newman before but David's the guy took a lot of the the classic sack solos on
Ray's iconic recordings and so Bruce you know straight up with the effete head
Newman he was playing a lot of the parts that Ray played an album he learned you
know the way that that that rethought in terms of just touring with David Fathead
Newman plus Bruce was just a monster player a
monster teacher and I said you know man we got a breeze bring Bruce into this
project and Bruce absolutely killed it he's a monster player a monster teacher
and so we wanted to work with Bruce because Bruce is the man when it comes
to Ray Charles and stuff amazing and I think he gave us a little glimpse of the
kind of material you might be teaching in this course and what it can do for
people but tell us a bit more about what's packed in there and what it can
do for players absolutely so you know we talked about in the very beginning that
in today's day and age you have to be able to play lots of different styles of
music you know I've become a little bit more
of us specialists later in my career who when
I first started pulling I used to tell people's like if you pay me to play I
will do it so I you know play like you know Bar Mitzvahs I played teeth
cleanings if I needed to just to give it just to give my you know any style any
John already get to that that I Adele right that would have been that was a
fun gig but anyways the you know just not only from a financial standpoint
that I needed to feed my family but I also just wanted experience you know
wanted to be able to do all these different things tonight and I grew up
in Chicago you know we loved all these you know metal and reggae and funk and
pop you know I just wanted to deal that do all these cool things right so what
the course is is it's really a breakdown of rays playing in all these different
styles and his overall techniques of how he thinks about music so the first thing
we do is we dive deep into some just rave fundamental vocabulary that
everybody needs to know you can instantly throw that into any style okay
then after that we go into his gospel style you know the how we approach
gospel the different techniques he would use interesting enough a lot of the
vocabulary and the techniques we use they find themselves in the other genres
as well right so there's little tinges of his gospel stuff that later on we
also discover he's using in the jazz chapters right he's using it as well in
some of the Blues techniques and he's using some of the blues techniques in
his gospel playing right he's using some of that in his country playing inside
the country chapters right and you know a lot of people don't know this but Ray
was a monster of jazz player as well right so we have a chapter which breaks
down the way that he played he sort of hipped up I dare I say like Bud Powell
play and Bud Powell was one of my heroes when it comes to piano so it's hard for
me even say that but Ray had his own unique spin on the bebop style which is
a particular style of jazz right people like Charlie Parker for example if you
were famous people like that you know they were they were in the bebop era in
terms of their style right so Ray we break down the way that Ray played that
particular style right George Shearing who's a very famous
jazz piano players well we show Ray's unique approach to block voicings and
harmonizing Tunes so we do it in country music blues gospel jazz and we also do
New Orleans styles as well an interesting part about all these
different techniques is they also can be easily applied to funk and rock you know
it's a course of music discovery yes we're breaking down these specific
genres and getting vocabulary but it's really about you just expanding your
musicality at the piano ah terrific well that that really is in a nutshell you
know I'm sure some of our listeners are jazz piano players or aspiring jazz
piano players in which case they definitely have to head to free jazz
lessons calm and check out this course but everyone else listening I wanted to
make sure we had Steve on the show because hopefully it's opened your mind
and your ears a little bit to this rich idea both generally speaking and for
Rachel's specifically that you can translate across your honor's that you
can tap into your instinct for music in a way that's fairly fundamental and
doesn't require starting afresh every time you want to learn a new style so
Steve for those who are listening with a piano next to them and they want to dive
in and do everything you just described where can they go to learn more and pick
up a copy of the course so on October 22nd 2018 is the first day the course is
being released and you'll find it all over free jazz lessons come on that day
just go to free jazz lessons calm you cannot miss it click on one of those
links you'll be able to get access to the course we're doing some really cool
stuff you know Bruce and I we come from a live touring background and you know
back in the day and we used to do CD release parties and things like that so
we like to turn a product launch into a party so we're doing some very very cool
stuff for the first week of the launch as well you know we'd like to just have
it be a reward for for everybody who participates in the launch we'll do some
nice special prizes and some gifts and things like that and I can't wait to be
sharing music further with your audience amazing well I I've certainly been
enjoying your pre-launch videos myself and you know I already
alluded to following your emails as subscriber and I fear you may actually
tempt me back to the piano with this course which is a dangerous part because
I'm something else but this sounds phenomenal and very exciting so just a
big thank you Steve for joining us today it's been a real pleasure to have the
chance to talk with you and thank you for sharing with our audience totally a
pleasure of mine thank you so much Chris were thank you for the audience for
hanging out with us and see you guys again soon
thank you for listening to the musicality podcast this episode has
ended but your musical journey continues head over to musicality podcast comm
where you will find the links and resources mentioned in this episode as
well as bonus content exclusive for podcast listeners that's musicality
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