My Funny Valentine - Bill Evans, Jim Hall

Working the jazz piano requires to make transcriptions of great pianists. It's the best to understand what they play, to acquire their phrasing, and to learn new licks.

One of my favorite jazz pianist is Bill Evans.

The first solo I wanted to transcribe is a version I love of My Funny Valentine. You can listen to it on album Undercurrent where Bill Evans plays in duo with guitarist Jim Hall.

The entire song is very long to transcribe so I advise to transcribe Bill solo at 3'20.

But if you feel comfortable with transcription, the entire song is good and you can learn many things : 

- Bill's phrasing is beautiful. And it's rare to hear this standard ballad played medium swing. Believe me: when  gigging I can't no more play it in ballad swing, and other musicians are often surprised when I ask to play it medium swing. 

- If you want to train yourself to left hand walking bass transcribe Bill's left hand when he accompanies Jim Hall at 1'40. I learned a lot from this walking bass !

You can listen to this record on Grooveshark here:
http://grooveshark.com/s/My+Funny+Valentine+alt+Take/438biY?src=5

Good luck and good transcription ! It's very long when you're a beginner but believe me it pays !

Circle of fifths

When I work a new voicing, a new chords progression or a new lick I try to work it in all tonalities. For this I use the circle of 5ths (or circle of 4ths, depends on the direction you play it)

It presents many advantages:

- It's more melodious and more interesting than playing all tonalities half-ton by half-ton. And it helps your ear not getting bored too quickly.

- It's very utilized in jazz. You can hear this progression in lots of standard. And in lots of style : pop, rock, blues, jazz, country... If you work like that your finger will find easier their way when you play a standard. you can notice that II-V-I is itself a fifth progression ! Plus the order of sharps and flats is base on the circle of 5ths.

Take a look at the Wikipedia article of the circle of 5ths which is very complete.

Use it when training you will see benefits very quickly.

Left hand rootless voicings on II-V-I

The very first things I want to share with you are the left hand rootless voicing. I began my piano jazz work with those voicings. I trained many days to master those voicings and they're still my most used voicings today.



Why "voicing" ?
Because there are lots of ways to play chords. If you see a Dm7 in a sheet it is not mandatory to play strictly D-F-A-C: you have other notes to play on a Dm7 to enhance it and give it a "jazzy" color.

Why "left hand" ?
Becauser those voicings will be used to make hear the changes while your right hand plays the melody or improvise.
Why "rootless" ?
Because when playing in a jazz band the pianist doesn't need necessarily to make ear the root of the chords: it's the bassist job ! It makes him free to color his voicings with others jazzy notes.

Those voicings are declined in 2 versions: one beginning from the 3rd and one beginning from the 7th. You'll have to make the choice between both according to the tessitura where you are.

On a minor chord with minor 7th:

beginning on the 3rd: 3rd - 5th - 7th - 9th
or beginning on the 7th: 7th - 9th - 3rd - 5th

E.g on a Dm7: 

On a dominant 7th chord:

beginning on the 3rd: 3rd - 6th - 7th - 9th
or beginning on the 7th: 7th - 9th - 3rd - 6th

E.g on a G7: 

You can see that in this voicing you don't play the 5th but the 6th. Actually the 5th of a dominant 7th chord is not the most beautiful note to play. It's more interesting and colorful to make ring the 6th.

On a major 7th chord:

beginning on the 3rd: 3rd - 5th - 6th - 9th
or : 3rd - 5th - 7th - 9th
or beginning on the 7th: 7th - 9th - 3rd - 5th

E.g on a CMaj7 : 

On the voicing beginning on the 3rd it's possible to play the 6th or the 7th. Try both: the color is very different and you'll have to adapt according to your taste.
I use the 6th when I want an "old jazz" sound (old big band like Glenn Miller's used this type of voicings). The 7th color is more modern.

Work on II-V-I :

The best way to learn this voicings is to train on the most used progression in jazz: the II-V-I (see my thread regarding II-V-I )

Let's take a II-V-I example in C tonality: Dm7 - G7 - CMaj

For the Dm7 chord let's take a voicing beginning on the 3rd : F - A - C - E
For the G7 chords let's take a voicing beginning on the 7th : F - A - B - E
You can see that with this choice you only have to move one finger !
For the CMaj7 let's take the voicing beginning on the 3rd because it's the closest to the previous G7 voicing: E - G - A - D

Variant:

The other possibility is to use the voicing beginning on the 7rd for Dm7 voicing and you get this :

Work:

I advise to work this voicing II-V-I progession on all tonalities and following the circle of 5ths (ascending and descending). If you can work with a bassist it's the best way to work without being bored and to have fun.

Good luck and good work !