I've just taken on a new piano pupil and they want to learn to play jazz. This is something I have never done before!

Does anyone have any suggestions as to how to go about teaching this?

Thanks

Can you play jazz? If not its a non-starter. Find another teacher for your student. As the jazz syllabus for piano has been here a little longer than the jazz horn syllabus it would make sense to get familiar with it, if your teaching anyway you should find the sight reading aspect fairly straightforward (only goes up to grade 5), you would then just have to work at your improvisation ability and jazz theory/syncopation studies.

Hi. How about trying the 'Squeeze the keys' series. There are three volumes. All by 'someone' Mitchell - I can't remember his first name. I am currently using volumes two and three, but have had the breifest of looks at volume one, though I'm not entirely sure what it is really like. They aren't very thick, and provide simple tunes to be learnt, with ideas of scales, moeds and note-patterns to be use for improvisation. In volume two, there is a sense of you, the teacher, having to give the pupil ideas for what can be done to these scales, modes etc.

Sorry but I'm with TenorClef on this one. How can you possibly think about "teaching jazz" if you haven't even started learning how to play it yourself?

The AB run jazz workshops for non-jazz playing teachers wanting to teach jazz; I'm sure they're well worth attending. But before you even contemplate this, buy some jazz CD's, go to some jazz gigs and decide you like jazz yourself before attempting anything.

I mean for goodness sake, what would you say to a jazz player/teacher who, say, couldn't read notation and was approached by a pupil wanting to learn to read music? Wouldn't you tell him/her to learn to read music him/herself, or just send the pupil to a teacher who could?

I get this all the time - teachers wanting to learn my jazz teaching methods so they can use them on their pupils, when they can't even play jazz or even improvise themselves! I've been playing jazz for years and years, have a vast collection of jazz CD's and have been to more jazz gigs probably than I've had hot dinners, and have devised my methods over years, altering them regularly as new ideas occur.

Then along comes a classical teacher/player who wants me to show them how to teach it, just like that.

My instinct is to tell them to b*****r off if they can't be bothered to make the effort themselves.

Violinia

I have a question for all the people here who are knowledgeable about jazz (a group which doesn't include me!). I frequently hear people saying that jazz is a completely different thing to 'classical' music, if you want to learn or teach it you should start again learning it right from the beginning (and even people saying that classical training is even a hinderance to learning jazz). On the other hand I also frequently hear people saying that jazz should be included more in the 'classical' ABRSM exams and people should have to learn it as part of their musical training; if the two are interlinked and are important for each other then surely the first point about someone with classical training being not able to do jazz can't hold (I appreciate that a jazz trained person would be better) and if they're not linked closely in this way it's unfair to demand that people learn two 'completely different things' to do the exams if they only want to learn one of the two.

If you think the two are linked and jazz pieces should be on the 'classical' exams should 'classical' pieces be put on the jazz syllabus?

Is this because the jazz syllabus is still immature at the moment and once jazz is fully supported you would be happy to never see another jazz piece on the 'classical' exams?

I'd be interested to hear your views because the two views seem to contradict one another.

QUOTE (AnotherPianist @ Oct 12 2004, 07:05 PM)

Is this because the jazz syllabus is still immature at the moment and once jazz is fully supported you would be happy to never see another jazz piece on the 'classical' exams? I'd be interested to hear your views because the two views seem to contradict one another.

I don't think a jazz standard put in the classical syllabus is really in the spirit of Jazz unless it contains bars for improvisation. So in that respect i think you will always have modern tunes that have been used in jazz music and written for jazz in the classical syllabus. The more serious aspect of jazz melodic interpretation and improvisation will be dealt with by the Jazz ABRSM syllabus.

What i think will be hard esp for youngsters who have followed the first 5 ABRSM Jazz grades will be switching to play classical grade 6-8 because they will not be inclinded to read the pieces strictly as written, rather being quite able to play with the melodic lines or in fact change the melody completely!

I do believe that you should learn how to play Jazz first. It is something I had to do and now after some time I am now beginning to teach jazz piano. A key element if not THE KEY element is being able to teach a child to improvise successfully. Have you though of going to jazz workshops as Violinia suggests. You could start of by first getting into jazz if you aren't already into it by doing some preliminary listening and perhaps 'Jazz from Scratch' by the Associated Board' as the basis of teaching yourself. These are all just suggestions.

QUOTE

Then along comes a classical teacher/player who wants me to show them how to teach it, just like that. My instinct is to tell them to b*****r off if they can't be bothered to make the effort themselves.

Get out of the wrong side of bed?!

Yes I have played jazz before, and I can improvise, and I am generally a classical teacher/player, but I have never taught jazz before. However, I was only after suggestions on a way to go about this, i.e any good books to help the process, what not to do too early on etc.

My view is everyone has to start somewhere, and surely we should try and help each other out and be supportive?! Obviously not everyone thinks this is the right opinion!

I will now go and crawl back from where I came from!!

Dear Natalie, here is a good place to start-


www.jazzbooks.com


Goodluck!

QUOTE

If you think the two (classical and jazz) are linked and jazz pieces should be on the 'classical' exams should 'classical' pieces be put on the jazz syllabus? Is this because the jazz syllabus is still immature at the moment and once jazz is fully supported you would be happy to never see another jazz piece on the 'classical' exams?

OK, no I don't think the two are linked, although classical music used to feature improvisation in a way it rarely does today.

I guess what I think is that the classical syllabus, which most candidates take (there isn't a jazz strings syllabus yet in any case, for the forseeable future), should contain a section where the candidate has to show that they can improvise/play by ear. It needn't be jazz; it could be any style of improvisation.

I just think it's very limiting for a student to be able to get all the way to Grade 8 without ever having had to play a single note by ear, or improvise a single phrase!

Because of this you end up with highly trained musicians who are lost without their books; I don't think this is making them into very well-rounded musicians, when a compulsory improvisation section could easily change this.

I hope this answers your question.

Violinia

Thanks to everyone who replied; that makes it a lot clearer now.