Frank’s personal collection of killer Blues Piano Licks to add to you bag… by ear, intellect, eye, and muscle…
Table of Contents
Prerequisites
Basic music reading skills… basic piano technique… the LOVE of music… and the discipline to study and practice the right things the right way.
Study, Practice, & Performance Tips
- Never play these mindlessly and mechanically. Always aspire to play them musically.
- Don’t just play dots. Play sounds!
- Never think, hear, and play one note at time. Hear and play in complete phrases.
- Don’t merely memorize these. Internalize them using all four musical intelligences: ears, intellect, eyes, and muscles.
- Every time you practice something, you are programming your brain. So always play accurately.
- Practice with a Click Track or a Rhythm Track. Doing so will give you immediate feedback on any rhythmic misconceptions or places where your timing gets sloppy.
- Record Yourself, always. Listen to the playback immediately, and ask yourself: Is that what you intended to play?”
- If anything feels tense or awkward, stop immediately and experiment with alternative fingerings or choreography.
- Play in other keys you expect to play in. By the way, once you see the patterns (which is guaranteed if you know your scales and chords) finding the notes in other keys will be a piece of cake!
- When you feel stuck or overwhelmed, realize that anything can and will be mastered if you slow things down or break things down to small enough pieces.
- Although it takes time to talk about all the above practice habits, practicing them takes almost no time at all because they can all be done simultaneously!
- Mastering all this takes no special talent. All it takes is a wee bit of knowledge and the discipline to employ a very short list of productive study and practice habits.
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Your Feedback Matters
Questions about fingering, interpretation, technique, rhythm, practice habits, solfege, ear training, transposition, other? Suggestions for making these lessons more effective? Thanks a bunch in advance.
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Blues Piano Lick #001
In the key of C… A two-bar lick that kicks off with a yummy grace note, outlines the C Minor Blues Scale in a descending line in shuffle rhythm, and caps off with a touch of syncopation…
Listen to Frank demonstrate one way to play this (using a double chop left hand at 110 bpm)…
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Blues Piano Lick #002
In the key of C… a four-bar lick based on the C Minor Blues Scale that leaves you hanging on Fa in the second bar, but fully resolves to Do in bar four…
Listen to Frank demonstrate one way to play this (using a double pump walking left hand at 110 bpm)…
Technique & Fingering Tip: Simply “slide” off of F#4 onto G with your index finger going up and “slide” off of Gb onto F using your middle finger coming down!
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Blues Piano Lick #003
in the key of G… a single bar lick that uses the exact same chord structure sequence (3-8-b7) for each of the big three chords… delivered with some tasty syncopation…
Listen to Frank demonstrate one way to play this (using a double pump left hand at 100 bpm)…
Performance Tips: 1. Don’t forget to shuffle the eighth notes, 2. And no flams between the left and right hand, 3. To get the right feel, emphasize the syncopated b7s.
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Blues Piano Lick #004
In the key of E… a rhythmic, syncopated four-bar idea in derived from the E Minor Blues Scale…
Listen to Frank demonstrate one way to play this (with straight quarter notes in the left hand at 110 bpm)…
Performance Tips: 1. Don’t forget to shuffle the eighth notes, 2. No flams between the left and right hand, 3. Rests are notes, too. Give them their full value, 4. Play it the way you’d sing it and sing it like you mean it!
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Blues Piano Lick #005
In the key of A… a rhythmic, syncopated four-bar idea derived from the A Major Blues Scale…
Listen to Frank demonstrate one way to play this (with straight quarter notes outlining each chord in the left hand at 130 bpm)…
Performance Tips: 1. No flams between the left and right hand, 3. Rests are notes, too. Give them their full value, 4. Play it the way you’d sing it and sing it like you mean it!
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Blues Piano Lick #006
In the key of F… a rhythmic four-bar idea derived from the F Minor Pentatonic Scale… kicked off with a three note pickup into and emphasizing the blue note Me, and incorporating almost two full bars of silence…
Listen to Frank demonstrate one way to play this (with the “Further on Down the Road” bass line at 104 bpm)…
Performance Tips: 1. No flams between the left and right hand, 2. Play it the way you’d sing it and sing it like you mean it!
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Blues Piano Lick #101
Special Note from Frank: I have dozens more killer blues piano licks in my library (the one inside my head that I’ve been stocking there for decades), but I am sadly discontinuing this series for a combination of reasons: 1) General lack of interest (indicated by zero likes, zero TYs, and zero comments), 2) Producing each lesson take many hours of focused effort and attention to detail, and 3) The 80-20 Rule tells me to do something else with that precious time and energy. Thanks to the few sustaining donors whose uncommon generosity are keeping the wind in my sails. Please let me know what kinds of content interest you.
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