Do you have a fake book? Just one of those songs could be the source of many meaningful exercises that will help you grow as a musicician and as a pianist.

What is a fake book?

A “fake book” contains songs written in a concise format that includes only the melody and chords, letting you interpret the song’s performance according to your own taste.

The songs in a fake book have a single melody written out in notes with the lyrics written beneath the notes. Above the notes of the melody you’ll find the names of the chords to play.

This format is very compact. You will often see fakebooks containing 500 or more songs. Here are some suggestions on how to use one of these songs for increasing your improvisational skills:

1. Chords. The suggested chords are often very rudimentary. Most jazz pianists spice up the songs with more elaborate chord progressions. Try to find more chords to use in the song. This exercise will increase your skills in chord theory.

2. Scales. When you have elaborated upon the chord progressions in the song you can choose scales that work with the chords you have chosen. If you find this hard to do you can buy scale books with scale suggestions for different chord progressions. This is an exercise in scale theory.

3. Practising piano chords. Start with the first chord in the song, play it in different positions on your piano and in different combinations.

4. Practicing chord progressions on the piano. Take a couple of bars of the song and practise to play the progressions over and over again varying the chord voicings.

5. Practicing scales on the piano. Begin with the first chord and the scale you have chosen with it and start by playing the scale up and down the keyboard with the right hand and the left hand.

6. Practice piano improvisation with scales. As soon as you master playing the scale up and down the piano it is time to create music with the scale by playing around with it, creating patterns and inventing melodies.

7. Practise piano improvisation. Take a couple of bars and play them over and over again with chord voicings in the left hand and improvising with the appropriate scales with the right hand.

It is also good to practice piano improvisation with your left hand and voicings with your right hand.

There are of course many more things you can do with a song in order to develop your skills in piano improvisation. Help yourself and don’t forget to have fun and to also play the song in its entirety with the melody.

Peter Edvinsson is a musician, composer and music teacher. Visit his site Capotasto Music and download your free piano sheet music and learn to play piano resources at http://www.capotastomusic.com

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How would you like to spend 4 years in a University learning how to play other peoples music? If you think this is ridiculous, you’re right! Because that’s what thousands of piano music students do each day.

They sit in front of their piano or keyboard with sheet music of a dead composer in front of them. Then they are told to “play it right.” Have you ever heard of such nonsense? Imagine a budding writer forced to copy another novelists work? In essence, this is what classical piano students do. They copy.

Although many think this is a creative act, it is not. It is a re-creative one. It’s purpose? To give people who are told how to listen to music a chance to hear what is considered “good” music. Only in classical music is there such pomposity. And it exists because a very few people wish to hear the classics.

Let me tell you something. I love classical music. But I don’t spend my time trying to recreate what has already been created. No. Instead, I want to connect with my own source and allow the music that is inside me to come out. I want to be creative too! And my philosophy is that anyone can be “a composer.”

All it takes is the desire to create - to want to hear ones authentic self expressed through music. Difficult? Not at all! It’s as easy as putting fingers to keys and playing. Hard to believe but true. You see, music students have been cheated from the get go by an academic snobbism that destroys the spirit and the will to create.

The suggestion is that the best music has already been created so why bother. The answer is crucial to our own well being. We bother because it makes us feel good. That is all that is required and that is all that is needed to make music.

Edward Weiss is a pianist/composer and webmaster of Quiescence Music’s online piano lessons. He has been helping students learn how to play piano in the New Age style for over 14 years and works with students in private, in groups, and now over the internet. Stop by now at http://www.quiescencemusic.com/piano_lessons.html for a FREE piano lesson!

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Form to give shape to something. Yes, form is about giving music shape. Odd as this sounds (because we can’t see music) there can be a definable shape to our creations. One of the more frequently used forms is called ABA.

This means we play a section of music 1 or 2 times, we play another (B) and then we return to our first section. Seems simple enough right? Yet many students have trouble creating their own piano compositions using this simple form. Most likely, this has to do with thinking too much.

Many students over think things and make their job of music creation that much harder. It doesn’t have to be that way. Not if you think in phrases! For example, take the lesson Rainforest Revisited.

Here we return to Lesson 3: “Rainforest” which is basically an extended improvisation. In Rainforest Revisited, you’re shown how to add another section of music - a contrasting (B) section to create a new piece of music in ABA form.

Now most of you have no trouble when it comes to improvising and just playing the piano. Your music flows out of you and this is how it should be. The problem comes when students try and think about what comes next. Wrong approach! Don’t think! Continue your next section the same way - by using your intuition.

Here’s how I came up with the (B) section for Rainforest Revisited. I simply sat down at the piano, played the original “Rainforest” piece and allowed my intuition to guide me to the next section. I didn’t ask “what should come next?” No. I felt my way through. I knew the (B) section would be 8-bars or so long and just came up with something contrasting to the original “Rainforest.” I now had a (B) section and could turn the entire thing into an ABA form piece of music!

Edward Weiss is a pianist/composer and webmaster of Quiescence Music’s online piano lessons. He has been helping students learn how to play piano in the New Age style for over 14 years and works with students in private, in groups, and now over the internet. Stop by now at http://www.quiescencemusic.com/piano_lessons.html for a FREE piano lesson!

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