Err uhh... Easy keyboard solos?

[Farren]

I've played guitar for 10 years and have always preferred to learn my favorite songs and play those til I'm up to speed rather than cycle scales. I realize theory is much more important for keyboards (I'm an OC member), but to maintain sanity, I still spend a lot of time playing stuff from bands I like on keys. I rather suck so I'd like to learn some easier keyboard solos. So far the only one I've transcribed has been the solo at 9:08 - 9:21 in Learning to Live.

I'm up for solos from pretty much any band, as long as they're interesting and newbie enough for me ;) Just name 'em. Thanks.

[Vlakey]

Try the solo in Dream Theater's Pull Me Under at 5:29.

[LithoJazzoSphere]

The 1st solo in "Endless Sacrifice" is very easy.

[merijn]

The 1st solo in "Endless Sacrifice" is very easy.
haha lol true.!

[kwstakhs]

you can always try satriani tunes...
The main melody of Just look up is an easy starter.
k.

[Berrido]

Try the first lead solo in The Glass Prison

[Rosie]

Damn I need an EQ pedal so I can control the analog tones on my board more XD

Anyway, try just improvising. It's the best way to improve yourself. When you learn stuff, it helps you to well, learn stuff, but you're only practicing applying memory to keys. That won't help you much when you have to improvise or write your won stuff. It'll shape your style alright, but it's a different bag from actually doing your own solos.

Hope I helped :)

[Farren]

Thanks for the suggestions. Woo, that 1st Endless Sacrifice 'solo' is blazing ;) Think I'll resort to transcribing some guitar solos to keys, too. I'm not worried about my style and writing and the like... I'm too much of a perfectionist to write my own stuff until I can consider myself really good. With guitar, I used to write stuff a long time ago. I'd think 'this sounds cool' and friends would agree, but a day later I'd overanalyze the hell out of it and think 'this is too simple... boring, scrap it'.

[ChrisMcCoy]

The intro to Asia's "Only Time will Tell" is a very easy keyboard solo :)

[Dan Casanova]

Hey Farren,

I'd just like to try and help you with the solo thing.

Scales do play a very important role, so it might be worth learning a few.
For solo stuff, I would suggest looking at some blues scales.

The simplest solo technique would surely be using the notes from the C minor 7th chord (with added f#).

Try this...

C - Eb - F - F# - G - A# - C

Just experiment, by playing this sequence of notes up and down the keyboard.

A simple, yet effective technique.

Hope that helps, Dude.

edit: thanks to 'lyngs' for the correction :) Oops!

[Liquid Shadow]

Anyway, try just improvising. It's the best way to improve yourself. When you learn stuff, it helps you to well, learn stuff, but you're only practicing applying memory to keys. That won't help you much when you have to improvise or write your won stuff. It'll shape your style alright, but it's a different bag from actually doing your own solos.



When someone wants to learn piano, would it be wise for a teacher to tell them to just go ahead and start writing and performing their own music?

[Farren]

Yeah, currently what I'm trying to do is work mainly on technique. Muscle memory associated with one song will improve overall playing for other songs. Sort of like typing... You remember individual words (I'm sure almost all of us could quickly type any word in the air with our fingers), maybe not sentences, but the words are enough to quickly put together sentences. Thanks for the advice, though. I'll commit the scale to memory.

[Liquid Shadow]

Hanon and Czerny excersises may also prove helpful to you...check those out if you're interested. There's definitely a lot to be gained from them that can't be gained from simple synth solos, and they have a learning curve to them, so you're not jumping into advanced excersises from hell while you have little or no experience at all.

[Rosie]

When someone wants to learn piano, would it be wise for a teacher to tell them to just go ahead and start writing and performing their own music?

I don't think he's in the same position, and a lot of classical musicians really can't make their own stuff, just play other people's, which really gets to me.

[Lyngs]

Hey Farren,

I'd just like to try and help you with the solo thing.

Scales do play a very important role, so it might be worth learning a few.
For solo stuff, I would suggest looking at some blues scales.

The simplest solo technique would surely be using the notes from the C minor 7th chord (with added f#).

Try this...

c - c# - f - f# - g - a# - c

Just experiment, by playing this sequence of notes up and down the keyboard.

A simple, yet effective technique.

Hope that helps, Dude.

c - Eb - f - f# - g - Bb - c

;)

[Rosie]

Blues scales were designed around guitar(I think), and are harder to play on keyboard(I find so anyway).

But a basic Blues scale would be:

A - C - D - D# - E - G - Ab - A

And er... how do you know when to call it a flat or a sharp...?

[Dan Casanova]

c - Eb - f - f# - g - Bb - c

;)

SHIT!

Sorry, yeah, that one :)

I meant D# (Eb), not c#.

[assassin]

The simplest solo technique would surely be using the notes from the C minor 7th chord (with added f#).

Don't you think that the D minor pentatonic is even more easier? :)
By the way, if you add a G# (making it a D pentatonic blues scale), you can almost play the whole Home solo using that scale.

[Rosie]

The easiest scale is A minor or C major ^_^ (all the white keys!)

Next most easiest is E minor... I use that one quite a bit.

[keys76]

B-scale also has a natural position for your hands.


Jeroen

[Rosie]

I can't always remember what white keys not to press >.< Not when I'm going fast anyway... I have to be really careful not to hit a bad note.

I'm probably one of the worst players here :/

[aquatarkus]

And er... how do you know when to call it a flat or a sharp...?
When the scale is moving upwards you use sharps:
C C# D and when it´s descending D Db C you use flats.
It´s depending on which note is the guide note.
D-flat is a guide note to C and C-sharp is a guide tone to D.

Hope that explains it to you

[Farren]

I don't think he's in the same position, and a lot of classical musicians really can't make their own stuff, just play other people's, which really gets to me.

I'm not worried about lacking creativity and annoying you. I don't lack creativity, but to maintain interest, I'll play whatever I find fun. That's my personal reason for playing instruments: fun.

[LithoJazzoSphere]

When the scale is moving upwards you use sharps:
C C# D and when it´s descending D Db C you use flats.
It´s depending on which note is the guide note.
D-flat is a guide note to C and C-sharp is a guide tone to D.

Hope that explains it to you

When you're playing chromatics or scales with chromatics, yes. Otherwise it's base on the key signature.

[aquatarkus]

Yes I know ! But I just answered the question when to use sharps or flats, it´s the same rule if you are playing in a Key. If you are going from A to G in D-major although D-major has 2 Sharps you´ll write A. A-flat G, not A G# G.

[LithoJazzoSphere]

Right, I was just clarifying for anyone reading through the thread.

[aquatarkus]

OK, I didn´t mean to be rude with you..:-)

[Dan Casanova]

Rosie, you're correct about C major and A minor being the easiest scales, but we're talking about BLUES scales, for solos etc.

Don't mean to offend you by correcting you - Just making it clear :)

xx

[deltagmc]

When someone wants to learn piano, would it be wise for a teacher to tell them to just go ahead and start writing and performing their own music?

It's an old post.... but...
When I started play keyboard the position of my fingers were badly placed (2 years).
When I started with the teacher.... uff.... you can imagine...
Thats why u need a teacher as a guide... later u can do what u want and start writing and performing your own music....
Thats why u need a teacher...

P.D.: I dont know if i understood very well the post by Liquid Shadow, but i think thats what he meaned.

[Liquid Shadow]

What I meant is that Rosie's advice to simply improvise your own solos may not be the best path for a beginner to take in learning to play the keyboard. There are other aspects (technique especially) to worry about before a keyboardist starts to develop their own distinct style. You don't want to jump right into everything with no experience, and the thread starter realizes this. Learning other solos will give him some background experience with those ivories, and along with other things, help lay a foundation for him to build on when he is ready to develop more as a keyboardist.

[Farren]

Yes, thank you.



-thread starter

[Rosie]

Rosie, you're correct about C major and A minor being the easiest scales, but we're talking about BLUES scales, for solos etc.

Don't mean to offend you by correcting you - Just making it clear :)

xx

You can solo in those. The scale I think I most use for soloing right now is B Minor, and it works nice for me. You don't need to solo in any particular scale.

Which Blues scale do you mean? There's the pentatonic scale, and the one that has two instances of having the flat and sharp of a note, and numerous others.

[Grey Loki]

While we're (roughly) on the subject of soloing, does anyone have any links to sites that would give some nice organ licks and such?

I'm trying to learn some so that my band can just shout 'organ solo!' and i can let rip, but i kinda suck at improvising something sorta jazzy/bluesy/funky, if you know what i mean...

[Liquid Shadow]

Listen to jazzy/bluesy/funky stuff and just immitate what's going on there.

[LDGuy]

While we're (roughly) on the subject of soloing, does anyone have any links to sites that would give some nice organ licks and such?

I'm trying to learn some so that my band can just shout 'organ solo!' and i can let rip, but i kinda suck at improvising something sorta jazzy/bluesy/funky, if you know what i mean...

I wouldn't go looking for licks, if i were you, cos most of the stuff you will find will be unoriginal bollocks, and it's probably infitately better to listen to music and try and formulate stuff for yourself.

Listen to Dave Weckl Band CDs up until "Synergy". They have some blazing solos on them.
Gadd Gang records - Larry Goldings does some sick stuff on them
Wes Montgomery records - some great organ playing
Anything by Jimmy Smith
and there's much more.

Ultimately: listening and picking stuff up for yourself is infinately better than looking for licks, because you formulate your own take on stuff rather then copying stuff note-for-note

[RudessFan1]

Innocence Faded is a pretty easy song as far as keys are concerned. The only key solo is pretty much the part between the verses and chorus. I'm not actually sure about the intro if that is keys or guitar. The rest is basic chords.

[Liquid Shadow]

Ultimately: listening and picking stuff up for yourself is infinately better than looking for licks, because you formulate your own take on stuff rather then copying stuff note-for-note


Just to balance things out, I'd like to point out that learning certain solos or just cool licks from them note-for-note can help you understand WHY it sounds good to your ear, and you can take that concept or a similar one and apply it in your own work.

[deltagmc]

I have made in midi an easy vesion of the piano intro in biaxident (only for beginners).
Open it with any midi player (like winamp, windows mp, etc.). If u want to see the scores open it with a MIDI-Editor.

http://ar.geocities.com/deltagmc1/BiaxidentPianoIntro-simplificado.MID

Other piano solo that I thik a beginner can play is the keyboard solo of the

Band: Spocks Beard
Album: Snow
Disc: 2
Song: All is Vanity
Time : 1:10

Bye

[deltagmc]

Any opinion??