HI

I have newly switched from learning classical piano to jazz piano.
My teacher thinks that if I was to do the grade 5 jazz piano exam rather than the classical one I could go on to do the grades 6, 7, & 8 without having to do the theory exam.

Does anyone know if this is true?.

I have not seen the syllabus and dont know much about the jazz exam, I know all the modes and scales for jazz but could I just jump right in at grade 5 having passed grades 1-4 on the classical exams or should I really have to start at a lower grade and work my way up to grade 5 being that the whole jazz idiom is totally different from classical?

Firstly, yes, it is true that a pass in a grade 5 jazz subject can be used instead of grade 5 theory to enable you to take later practical grades.

It probably is possible to jump straight in at grade 5 jazz but your teacher may have a better idea of whether it is beat to start from an earlier grade. It might be useful just to work through some things from earlier grades even if you don't take the exams as a way to get into the style of playing and become familiar with the supporting tests in the jazz syllabus.

Just to check, you do realise that there are no Jazz grades 6-8 with the AB so you would have to switch back to classical piano again to take the higher grades with them. There is, of course, the option of doing higher jazz grades with other boards, I think someone said that Trinity do them, if you do Trinity grades they don't require Jazz or Theory to progress beyond grade 5.

Aargh, duplicate post again, I seem to have lost the ability to hit edit instead or reply .

I would say the jazz syllabus should be treated like something new, whatever classical grade you have reached. Start from the beginning as if you were playing for the first time. You could get FRSM piano and find jazz best starting from grade 1.

Yes it is acceptable to progress to the higher grades.

Yup, AnotherPianist is right! I have looked at this issue before in the past as we are interested in jazz piano, too.

Hi,

I was once told by my first piano teacher that doing grade 1 jazz piano is a bit like grade 4-5 classical piano due to the requirement of improvisation which is quite hard and other elements.

If it were me I would start at grade 1 jazz if you intend to learn this type of music. I am doing grade 8 classical piano at the moment and after I have done that I may start at grade 1 jazz.

Whatever you do I wish you luck and I would be interested in how you get on.

Shelton

HI

thanks for your input guys, very helpful.

One thing I'm not shure about, what are the Trinity grades?

My teacher has always put me through the abrsm exams so I'm not that shure about other boards.

Where can I find out about Trinity exams, is there a webpage I can look at?

Try a google search for Trinity College of Music London, thats how I found their site. I can't remember it now though, sorry.
As Shelton says, Jazz is a different subject and Grade 1 Jazz requires a performance standard of approximately grades 4 - 5 classical.

I'm not arguing with this point directly because I've not seen the material for the jazz grades but I can't understand why this would be. Surely the AB intended the jazz syllabus to be for those who wanted to learn jazz; not to make those who want to learn jazz piano take classical piano exams first. Also I'm not too sure that they would want two exams named grade 1 to be vastly different in standard. I'd agree though that it's logical one cannot naturally translate grade 4 classical piano and go straight for grade 5 jazz because the difference in learning has occured; but I would have thought grade 1 jazz piano would be equally difficult for a jazz beginner as grade 1 classical piano would be for a classical beginner, is this not so?

Sorry I can't give you much further information about the Trinity syllabus, to be honest I know nothing about Trinity, I was just going off what other people have said on this board. I can, however, point you to Trinity's Website, although I find it difficult to navigate and find anything useful from....

Glad it isn't just me...!

I guess that the jazz exams do differ in that they have a much greater element of applied theory, and also they require that you improvise.

I wonder if anyone who started as a jazz pianist has then done classical exams, and where they started when they began classical studies?

Having looked at some of the jazz stuff, I would certainly not want to initially try for more than grade 1 jazz and even that looks a bit scary, though I can manage grade 3+ piano pieces and scales up to about grade 5 or 6...