GENERAL MUSIC

Instrument Show-and-Tell:

Piano

 

Perhaps the most versatile musical instrument, the piano can do it all! The piano has been an important jazz instrument since the beginning. In the early days of jazz, pianists would play “ragtime”, a form of written-down piano music that included syncopated sounds of the African-American tradition. Eventually, pianists would begin to improvise, or create their own musical ideas in real-time. As each era of jazz developed, the piano was front and center, leading the charge with its harmony, melody and percussive rhythms.

Tips:

  • Discuss with your students the difference between melody and harmony, or perhaps more simply, how to play many notes at one time as opposed to a single note at a time.

  • Play an early ragtime piece, such as Scott Joplin’s “Maple Leaf Rag”. Does this sound like jazz? Does it sound like classical music? Perhaps both?

  • Listen to classic “stride” pianists such as Fats Waller or Art Tatum to show students how a pianist can sound like a full jazz ensemble with only one instrument!

Famous jazz pianists (in no particular order):

  • James P. Johnson

  • Jelly Roll Morton

  • Fats Waller

  • Art Tatum

  • Duke Ellington

  • Count Basie

  • Bud Powell

  • Thelonious Monk

  • Oscar Peterson

  • Mary Lou Williams

  • Geri Allen

  • Chick Corea

  • Bill Evans

  • and many more!

 
 

Want to send this video to your students? Use this link: https://youtu.be/v59TgITnW34