Walking Bass: A Cocktail Pianist’s Right Arm (Ooops, Left)
When you know how to play a walking bass line on piano at any given time, you are in possession of a shining tool that you are sure to keep at the very top of that piano playing toolbox of yours. Unfortunately, far too many pianists never attempt them and only marvel at the ability of other pianists who have a handle on this very useful cocktail piano playing technique.
Walking Bass: It Doesn’t Have To Be Complicated
Walking a bass line on piano can be accomplished on many levels. There are certainly concepts that are more advanced than others. But you have to start somewhere! Great news follows: you see, it’s not necessary to have those more advanced skills under your fingertips in order to put your playing across in a very professional way. Remember this: It’s not necessarily WHAT you know but how you use what you know.
Are you familiar with playing simple triads on the piano, for example? That in its own right lends itself to your creating effective bass lines for a beginner. Playing a basic triad in an arpeggiated manner works marvelously well.
Learning To Play Walking Bass On Piano: Momentum Is Key
A main point that I would like to get across here is that you want to connect yourself with a musical idea that allows you to play with some momentum without distraction. In other words, if you have your left hand fingering a C Major triad in the bass area, it’s just a matter of playing those keys as quarter notes, one at a time. You are not distracted by the act of having to look for them. Once you get your momentum going with a simple technique, it becomes easier to graduate to turning that idea into a more interesting line. Master what comes easy to you. Then more creativity can blossom from there.
I created a video session for beginners devoted to learning how to play walking bass lines on piano. In that lesson, an emphasis is placed on this momentum I just referred to. Here is a small excerpt:
Know Your Basic Chords
When you consider what a bass player will often resort to while walking, it makes sense that focusing on those chord tones is conducive to nice lines developing. A professional bass player, although capable of playing more complex lines, will often gravitate back to these chord tones, often using the 1 and 5 of the chord (for C Major: C>>G>>C, etc).
If you are familiar with 7th chords, then you can feel free to play those 7th chords as arpeggios as well, trading off between them and just the triads.
As you begin to feel confident with playing these “broken” chords, take if further. You’ll want to insert “neighbor” tones in between them to make your lines more interesting.
The Left Hand Must Know Its Place
A key point worth mentioning is that, however you play those walking bass lines on piano, keep it in perspective. Remember the role of those lines. They are serving as support and accompaniment to a melody or improvisation which takes priority. So, focus on maintaining a balance with your volume. That left side of the piano will naturally resound more intensely. Therefore, play with sensitivity by playing those walking bass lines on the softer side. Their importance will stand on their own without being accentuated with extra volume.
There is much more that can be said of playing walking bass lines on piano but this short lesson is intended to serve as a beginning from which you can spring from.
Enjoy the walk!
Melodic embellishment is the one aspect of piano improvisation that lends itself to your sounding “pro” very quickly, considering how little effort is needed on your part. What you do need is to resolve to have some fun with a few very easy concepts. Impressive results tend to manifest faster than you might expect.
When it comes to playing cocktail piano chords that are the among the easiest to play while being extremely effective, what we’ll be looking at here will rate high on the list. If you know how to play some simple triads (three-note chords), this will come easy to you. In addition, you’ll discover for yourself that, even if you don’t have a specific tune in mind, you can compliment a nice ambience with these cocktail piano chords when played subtlety and legato.
Our focus on cocktail piano chords has included some attention on open chord voicings. As a review, let’s consider one way we can open up a chord like a Major 7th. We’ll use Fmaj7 for our example. This chord, in its most basic form (root position) is spelled like this:
Play this chord voicing as it illustrated above and listen. Just the way it is here, we have one of the most popular cocktail piano chords played by the pros. You’ll notice that the chord has all four of the basic chord tones, so it is complete as it is. That said, let’s make it a little “fuller” by doubling the root and playing it in between the 3 and 7. We will leave the 1 and 5 “open”. Our result looks like this:
Play this new chord voicing as we have illustrated it and listen. Then compare the one preceding it by playing them both back and forth. It’s interesting how making one simple modification can change the texture of the voicing we are playing.
When it comes to cocktail piano chords that you’ll use often, this one must be mentioned. It is one of the easiest to understand. That said, if your left hand is not used to playing 10th intervals, it may take a little getting used to. However, any effort put into this is well worth it.
In the second measure above, you will see that we are playing the C and G of this chord one octave lower. The E is played where it was originally on the piano keyboard (it’s just written in bass clef to be consistent with the lower two chord tones and to put everything in the context of the left hand). So, you see, we have taken the middle note (in this case, the E) and moved it an octave higher. This is often referred to as “opening up the chord.” The distance now between the C and E is now a 10th interval instead of a 3rd interval.
Time and time again, I have received emails from members of Piano Amore (www.PianoAmore.net) asking how someone at a beginner level can learn how to play cocktail piano from scratch, while having very little or no experience at all. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate those emails because when I read them, the enthusiasm of the person writing is always quite evident. So, if you’re one of those people who inquired, let me thank you because it’s people like you who inspire me to create ways of helping cocktail piano enthusiasts in any way I can.
The drop 3 voicing is one of those piano chords that can be endlessly explored… and well worth the time and effort, too! Adding this concept to your cocktail piano playing will most surely add more interest to those standard songs.
Okay, let’s turn this into a drop 3. Again, we will take that 3rd note from the top (in this case, the Bb) and move it one octave below:
Again, compare the original structure with this drop 3 voicing. Learn to really appreciate the differences in sound achieved by even little variations like this. You’ve got a whole world of sound to explore!
Of the many piano scales that you will want to familiarize yourself with is the Dorian mode. Let’s take a look at this special scale, which you will find yourself using frequently while improvising on piano.
We have already touched upon playing 12 bar blues piano as we focused on scale options for improvising. Here, we will acknowledge an easy way to accompany your right hand lines.
Here we will illustrate one of the most popular jazz piano chords of all time from the perspective of the pros. Yes, it’s another one of those “stock” voicings that you just have to be familiar with. Also, you’ll want to learn this one in all the keys. Not only will you want to but you’ll find it to be one of the easiest jazz piano voicings to execute as well
From bottom to top, we have F, B, E. In terms of scale degrees, these are the 7, 3, 13. Play this voicing and listen! Then play the G7 in its basic form above. Go back and forth and compare the sounds of the two. You’re likely to notice that the G13 voicing is quite contemporary in nature. This is due to the fact that it includes a tritone (F to B), a perfect fourth interval (B to E), and a Major 7th interval (F to E). So, there’s quite a bit of dissonance within this chord voicing! (Note that we do not use the 5 in this voicing)