Jazz Piano School

I heard an amazing saying the military uses as a motto that goes like this..."Fast is slow and slow is fast." If I had to sum up jazz piano in a similar way I would say, "Theory & Structure is Freedom, and Freedom Is Theory & Structure." In this episode I show you why it's so important to learn theory concepts in a sequential manner and how it will translate into true freedom of self expression in your playing. Enjoy!

People will ask me, "Brenden, how do you play funk...how do you play latin?" Well when you learn the necessary foundational tools with Theory Sequences...you can play any style, any groove you want! At anytime! That is why our tagline is "Learning Freedom". In this episode I take a simple standard and play about a ten different grooves and styles through out the tune. Switching between each and every one as I explain. Enjoy!

I absolutely love gospel. I've been listening to it since I was a kid because I love the way it makes me feel! The chords and harmonies pull at my heart and soul strings because that's what it's meant to do! Give us an uplifting feeling, get us through hard times. The chords used in the chart do exactly that. I explain what types of chords do what and how you can use them in all different kinds of music to reharm whenever you want.

There are a ton of ways to implement rhythm into improv but...I've found these ways to be most effective at quickly upgrading your sound. Practice them alone at first before implementing them all into your solo at once. They're powerful tools so use them wisely and work hard. In no time your improvisation will be completely different...and for the BETTER! Enjoy!

So I'm going to say it...Jazz Piano is EASY...but...only after you have a plan to follow. I found this out the hard way after basically searching and guessing for most of my career until I finally developed my own plan. In this episode I talk about the foundation and TREE based concepts that splits off your foundation based on your specific goals. There is not much playing and demonstrating here but I truly believe the concepts I explain are much more valuable in the long run. Enjoy!

I think we can all agree Solo Piano is a NASTY BEAST! Even Bill Evans said it best to Marian McPartland, that he felt that he had a long way to improve, and this was AFTER he had recorded his first solo album which is ammmmazzing. Anyway, in this podcast I review the 7 most CRUCIAL elements to improving your solo piano and ensuring you're getting the sound that you want, dream of, and hear on albums! Enjoy!

I can't believe this wasn't a podcast episode yet but thanks to a member request here we are! So I will keep this one short and give you the basics of the pentatonic scale as well as show you a glimpse of how far into the rabbit hole you can actually go. I'll continue with a follow up episode on this as we begin to take this further but practice the basics of what I teach here first. Then you'll be ready for the next one! Enjoy!

We did an episode on walking bass lines part 1 a while ago and then I forgot to do PART 2! So here it is. Special thanks to one of our members for reminding me. :) In this episode we take it a step further and connect our roots and half notes with diatonic walking and approach notes. From here we can essentially connect any progression we want no matter how random it is. Enjoy!

So it's another new year. I waited till everything settled back down until I recorded this podcast. We've finally settled into our services and it's been a long journey. Listen here to find out what's next for JPS and how we're adding innovative concepts into our programs. Enjoy!

After amazing launch of our New LAB, we're switching over to a analysis series on how to use all the tools in the JPS Podcast and implement them into tunes. In the spirit of the holiday, I walk through different reharms and strategies on the tune Santa Clause Is Coming To Town. Enjoy!