Scales are an essential part of musical study and are a vital part of an effective practice routine. But as you develop your musicianship, scales can also lead to better improvisation and understanding of melodic structure. This course will provide you with a new look at practicing and using scales to guide your musical creativity. You will start by learning standard and non-standard fingering for scales commonly used in popular music, before using these scales to create new melodies. In addition to the examples covered in the course, you will also be given extra exercises and backing tracks to help you improve your playing and improvising.
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At the end of this course, you will have improvised using scales such as major and natural minor, major and minor pentatonic, the Blues scale, as well as several modes. You will be able to develop a practice routine to continue memorizing these scales, and be able to identify which scales would work best for a specific genre and chord progression.
What You Will Learn
- Construct and play a variety of scales used in contemporary music
- Identify scales in multi-genre melodies and harmonies
- Compose and improvise melodies using scales
- Utilize effective practice routines to quickly improve your piano playing
Syllabus
WEEK 1
Welcome to Piano Scales for Modern Music! Before you begin, we will cover all the details about the course and what you'll need to know to get the most out of your experience.
Lesson 1: The Major and Natural Minor Scales
In this first lesson, we will begin by discussing the structure of the major and natural minor scales and identifying the fingering used to play these scales. We will learn how to make the most of our practice time by including a short warm up, practicing with proper posture, and creating daily practice goals. We will then identify how to use the major and natural minor scales in a jazz style and to improvise.
WEEK 2
Lesson 2: The Major and Minor Pentatonic Scales
In lesson two, we will switch over to major and minor pentatonic scales. You will learn how to notate and play these scales and we will cover a very simple practice tip that will simply how you memorize scale fingerings. We will then identify the major and minor pentatonic scale in various popular musical settings and learn to play pentatonic melody over a funky groove. Finally, we will practice improvising using a new chord progression.
WEEK 3
Lesson 3: The Modes of the Major Scale
In lesson three, we will move on to something that might be a little less familiar but is widely used in all styles of music. We will take a look at the modes that can be created using a major scale and then focus in on a few that are most commonly used in popular music. We will talk about playing with different dynamics and how to develop an even playing tone on the piano. We will also play and improvise a melody in a jazz setting.
WEEK 4
Lesson 4: Playing the Blues
It's time for our final lesson and we are going to focus on playing the Blues. We will learn how to build the minor and major blues scales before practicing them. We will also identify how common it is to hear Blues notes in popular music. We will then combine all of our practicing so far to compose your own melody using a Blues scale before our final improvisation practice over a 12-bar Blues.
