Play "Beale Street Blues" Your Way! (PIYW #1, June 2025)

rsl12 · 2025-05-27T08:36:39+00:00

PIYW #1: Play "Beale Street Blues" Your Way Play It Your Way is a monthly event for beginners, professionals, classical, jazz, or pop pianists and everyone...

twocats

rsl12 I'm planning to use the free PDF (yay, free, thanks for doing the research!). Let's see if I can play the blues!

Good luck with the improv! 🙂

rsl12

rsl12 a barber commenting on closing early because no one had been murdered on the street that day.

Why would a barber close early because no one had been murdered???

twocats I'm sure you will have no trouble!

twocats

rsl12 Why would a barber close early because no one had been murdered???

I missed this part?! 😳

Maybe if someone had been murdered the street is closed for investigation and the barber can't go home??

Sophia

I am still trying to get the easy version in my fingers 😃 I too was a little too cheap to spend $6 on a one time piece… so I downloaded the first free page and then cobbled together the rest from YouTube. I definitely won’t be able to make the deadline, so I’m glad there is no time limit to our submission!

Thanks for organizing this, @rsl12 - it’s a fun project for sure!

Edit: oh wait, the END of June. Sorry I thought it would go live the first of June. I think I can get it ready before then 🙂

rsl12

Sophia If you level up to the "Easy version", it's only $1.99.

On the other hand, cobbling together a piece using your ears is a great skill, so I don't want to stop you from trying that!

Sophia

Oh not by ear, I found the YouTube video that plays the whole thing - mechanically, but good enough to use as my template 😃

rsl12

Sophia I'm glad you found a way! $6 seems very steep for something that was probably easy to arrange!

WieWaldi

Thanks for organizing this fun event, @rsl12 👍

What about renaming the titles of both threads, so they match the same way as the regular recitals do?

I am loud thinking about something like one of those approaches:

1. fullblown with tag, long-name and date (will be two lines, anyway..)

PIYW #1 — June 2024 Meta Feedback
Play "Beale Street Blues" Your Way!

PIYW #1 — June 2024 Submissions
Play "Beale Street Blues" Your Way!

2. with tag, short-name and date (has more space for longer titles 🙂)

PIYW #1 — June 2024 Meta Feedback
(Beale Street Blues)

PIYW #1 — June 2024 Submissions
(Beale Street Blues)

3. with tag, short-name, no date maybe still too long?, so it makes probably no sense to shrink it that much. Probably option 1 or 2 is better.

PIYW #1 "Beale Street Blues" Meta Feedback

PIYW #1 "Beale Street Blues" Submissions

(compare with our current longest one liner, line break with many titles is very likely):

Holiday Themed Recital December 2024!

rsl12

WieWaldi At some point, once the recital is made public, I'll change the names to match. But for now, I want to make sure that the title for this discussion is more interesting than the submission one, since this is the discussion that has all the important information and the more interesting conversation. Navindra does something similar--he changes the titles during the different stages of the recital (announcement phase, acceptance of submissions phase, and publication phase).

Simonb

Hi rsl12

Thanks very much; I will attempt to record something for this.

Cheers

WieWaldi

rsl12 The lead sheet linked above is in Bb, but the actual blues portion is in Eb, which strikes me as a hard

Same problem here. So far I played blues only in C. My current lesson teaches me to play in G, which costs already a lot of my attention. To play another blues in B_b / E_b would kill me. (And probably screw up Christians learning schedule.) I need to find a solution...
Well, this is the problem of tomorrows WieWaldi.

Simonb

Hi WieWaldi

Blues in Eb is fairly easy, as the blues scale in Eb is all the black notes plus an A natural.
Perhaps play the melody on the Bb section, and only play solos on the Eb section?

It's all relative of course, and if you're still mainly playing blues in C, it's probably asking a lot.
That said I haven't looked at the music at all yet!

Cheers

rogerch

WieWaldi Would it be hard to transpose the sheet music to C?

WieWaldi

Simonb Thank you. Good to know. The thing is, I only want to learn one thing at a time. And my new key to learn is currently G (lessons of blues tutorial), including scale, chords, thirds, sixths and new LH.

I think I follow rogerchs approach and transpose it to G / C. Hopefully it won't lose too much of its character, then.

rsl12

WieWaldi I think I follow rogerchs approach and transpose it to G / C.

I'm doing the same thing! Partly for the same reason as you (the licks I'm learning don't fit under the fingers nicely in Eb, even though Eb is an easy key for the blues scale many beginners learn) but also because it will be easier to sing in G/C (I haven't decided to sing yet, but just in case!).

diretonic

I've not heard this before but have been digging out a few versions on YT - there's a rather sweet recording by Fats Waller on organ with Alberta Hunter singing the last refrain. I can't imagine Fats being shy of Eb so I guess he's playing this in G/C to suit Alberta's vocal range?
Apparently (I didn't know this) W C Handy referred to himself as the father or the blues and yet the score (original?) seems to play more like ragtime which ties in with him being something of a bridge between the two (I didn't know that either!).

WieWaldi

diretonic Apparently (I didn't know this) W C Handy referred to himself as the father or the blues and yet the score (original?) seems to play more like ragtime which ties in with him being something of a bridge between the two (I didn't know that either!).

Makes absolutely sense. If W C Handy really "invented" the blues, or at least if he was one of the first blues musicians, the blues of that time wasn't developed that much. Means, he baked in a lot of the music of that time, like ragtime. Good to know I am not the only one, hearing some ragtime elements between the lines.

rsl12

diretonic there's a rather sweet recording by Fats Waller on organ with Alberta Hunter singing the last refrain.

Found it! This remastered version sounds gorgeous.

diretonic For sure, Dr John has a vast library of licks and so many ways of playing any one of them, and in any order, so he always maintains an element of surprise.

Yes, having a big library to choose from would give a freer feeling. I feel like stealing a couple of licks and using them has the danger of sounding very canned. But I've got to start somewhere!

diretonic Frankie and Johnny is an underlying 8's feel which I guess Beale street could adapt to very well. Hmm....

Yes, I think it will fit nicely! At least for the blues portion. I may do something simpler for the rest.

diretonic

WieWaldi Good to know I am not the only one, hearing some ragtime elements between the lines.

Great minds Wiewie.

diretonic

rsl12 Going through Frankie and Johnnie, what strikes me is how similar it is to learning Latin rhythms. It's basically the first half of the clave in the left hand, and very little swing, and trying to coordinate left and right hands seems to be the majority of the challenge. Also, Dr. John's improv is quite limited in terms of harmony and hand placement, and it's more like he chooses from a selection of licks. Which makes sense because trying to coordinate LH and RH is challenge enough!

I think it's mostly about licks, much less about improv in what I would call 'traditional' blues. 'Modern' jazz blues (post 50s maybe?) goes out of its way to break the mould hence the drive to produce something different and 'truly spontaneous'. For sure, Dr John has a vast library of licks and so many ways of playing any one of them, and in any order, so he always maintains an element of surprise.
Frankie and Johnny is an underlying 8's feel which I guess Beale street could adapt to very well. Hmm....

rsl12

diretonic

WieWaldi Good to know I am not the only one, hearing some ragtime elements between the lines.

Great minds Wiewie.

Since @WieWaldi is German, he might not know the English proverb: "great minds think alike". It means that, since both of your minds had the same thought, they must both be great.

The same is true of WieWaldi's and Sophia's sheet music!