Foundations Tuesday: Turnaround Progression

A week or two ago, I went through Lesson 2 of the Lead Sheets course, which focuses on the popular "turnaround progression" (I explain it a little here, before getting rudely interrupted.)

My Struggle with the Lead Sheets Course

I am having trouble connecting this course to my piano goals of playing and writing/arranging blues, ragtime, and gospel. This course seems more focused on cocktail jazz piano, which I am not interested in. I do think it's good to learn the progressions, though, and learning to play (without thinking) in inversions is valuable time spent. Also, if I decide to start playing at nursing homes, it will be good to know how to play anything from a lead sheet.

So, I am sticking with this course. It's been slow going because I have so much other stuff going on (in both life and piano). On Saturday I bought some colored sticky-tabs and started marking pages in my three giant real books so songs with different progressions are easy to find. (Part of my lack of motivation with this course has simply been not wanting to dig through literally 1,000 pages to identify all of the Cycle of Fifths and Turnaround songs.)

Recognizing Progressions

As I drove my daughter to Athens (GA) Sunday afternoon, I let her listen to her music for the whole ride over. She played a Phoebe Bridgers cover of a John Prine song, "Summers End." As I listened, I thought, "That's a turnaround progression." So when I got home a few hours later, I played it ... and it was indeed a turnaround progression.

I've identified these progressions (both Cycle of Fifths and Turnaround) several times listening to music in the car. They're very easy and basic, and I've always sensed when one song sounded a lot like the other ... but I didn't have the language to describe it, and I didn't understand the theory behind it. Now I'm beginning to do that, which is a big deal.

Making Progress with Progressions

Yesterday morning I picked up a new lead-sheet piece, "The Way You Look Tonight." I played through it for about 15 minutes and ended up with this video. It's definitely not perfect, but it's not terrible. Most importantly, I'm not playing broken chords in the left hand, and I'm not going to the root position every time. So that's progress!

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The Rusty Lock and Key

I'm in a room. There's a door in front of me. On the other side of that door is a whole world of adventure and imagination and joy and delight, but for the moment, I'm locked in this gray little room. The door itself has a lock that is all rusted. I've tried to open it in the past, but I've never gotten very far. Sometimes I try to scrape the rust off the lock. I also have a rusty old key that I occasionally try to polish. Each time, after I've made a little progress, I'll put it into the keyhole in hopes of opening the door. It turns a half a millimeter or so, but the brief excitement at my progress dies quickly when I realize, once again, the lock isn't opening. I set the old key aside, and from there I can forget about the door, the lock, and the world outside, for months—years, even. But then something happens—I hear birdsong, or I catch a glimpse of color—and I pick up the key and start picking away at the stubborn rust. That dark little room is my ...

The Amazing Practice Tracker 2.0: Leveling Up My Piano Game

(Apologies for the cheesy clip art. I needed to come up with something, or the Blogger template would show a fuzzy, overly-enlarged snippet of the first chart below.) When I showed my husband my piano practice tracker, he said I should market and sell it. Ha. It’s not for sale, but I’m excited to share how this tool has transformed my practice—and why it might inspire all three of my readers. Since my last post about the Amazing Practice Tracker, I’ve made it even better. Here’s a peek at how it works, using my June data. All The Pretty Colors, All the Pretty Winners My tracker now sparkles with color: darker shades for active pieces, lighter ones for maintenance, technique, and sight-reading. Each day, the piece I practice most gets a bright yellow highlight—a little “gold medal,” if you will. (Click image for a slightly larger view.) A leaderboard automatically shows the day’s top piece and time. And if that isn't enough, I keep track of the month's leaders--specifically, ho...

March Goals Recap/Looking Ahead to April

It's April 1, and time to revisit the goals I set for last month. I practiced a total of 50.45 hours in March, averaging 1.62 hours (or just over an hour and a half) per day. Realistically, I practice about 45 minutes to an hour a day on weekdays, and I usually get at least one longer practice (or multiple shorter practices) in on one or both days of the weekend to bring the average up. CLASSICAL GOALS Chopin, F Minor Nocturne March Goal: Have entire piece by memory and performance-ready. I have about 90% of the piece by memory, but I still have some work to do before it's performance-ready. The only two sections that I don't quite have are "The Agitation" and the "stretto" section with the seventh chords. I'll work on both this week and will have them both memorized before the weekend. April Goal: Finish memorizing, and polish, polish, polish! My focus now is really on phrasing and dynamics. I have the notes down, even in the difficult passages. Fro...

Picking Up the Pieces

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