Georgia On My Mind - Introductions, and looking for feedback

Practice Inspiration
1

Hi everyone,

I’d like to start with a bit of my musical background. I grew up in India learning Indian classical music on sitar and tabla. High school and college were rock / pop, then I moved to the US and took (European) classical lessons for a decade+. I started playing some jazz and blues from sheet music, but I had no idea what I was doing, and I knew that wasn’t how this music is supposed to be learnt. Most YouTube lessons were too basic or too advanced. A few months ago I found PianoGroove, and a couple of weeks ago I found Band-in-a-Box, and I’ve been having a lot of fun.

Here’s my recording of Georgia On My Mind. It’s nothing special, and I’ve played many different versions of this before. But this is the first time I’m not playing someone else’s sheet music, and I’m happy about that.

Now on to the feedback part. To me, this still sounds more like classical than jazz :slight_smile: Here are some things that I think I should work on, I would love to hear others’ feedback.

  • I need to stop playing the roots that low, it’s interfering with the bass. I’ve never played in a jazz band, and I’m adding the drums and bass in a DAW, so it sounds “empty” when I’m recording the piano portion if I don’t play the root notes that way. Plus that’s how I’ve always played. Maybe playing along with iRealPro might help me change that sound?

  • It feels too lilting / lyrical to me, doesn’t really feel like a jazz ballad. Over pedaling? Too many notes / not enough gaps? Something more?

1 Like
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Hey @sauravsengupta :wave:

Thanks for sharing the recording.

Firstly, I notice that you are not reading the lead sheet and so you have internalised the harmony and the chord changes which is great. That’s a very important first step to playing any jazz standard with freedom. Great job there.

Secondly, I see that you are adding melodic embellishments and making the melody you own - which is also brilliant. You have moved beyond reading the notes from a page and you’re starting to play more spontaneously. You’re off to a great start here!

Now onto some very important feedback with your backing track setup…

Backing Track Settings and Configuration:

As pianists, when playing with a backing track we generally have 2 options:

  • We keep the bass in the backing track and play rootless voicings.

  • We remove the bass from the backing track and we play rooted chord voicings.

For the style that you are playing here (rooted voicings in your left hand) it’s very important that we remove the bass from the backing track.

Otherwise the bass notes/root notes of our chords will clash with the backing track, and it will sound very ‘heavy’ in the low end.

Band In A Box & iRealPro

I’m unsure how to remove the bass in Band In A Box, but I’m positive there will be a setting for it.

Using iRealPro App, you can see the slider on the right hand side which allows us to adjust the volumes of the backing track elements (drums, bass, and harmony).

iReal Pro
iReal Pro1758×1662 412 KB

Find the same setting in Band In A Box to disable the bass, and immediately your performance will sound a lot less heavy in the low frequencies.

Solo Piano - The Full Band At Our Fingertips

Remember that the piano is effectively a full band at our fingertips. When playing solo jazz piano, our job is to play all the roles of the band:

  • the harmony (chords and voicings)
  • the bass notes (this is what the bass player would play in a band setting)
  • the melody (this could be a vocalist or lead instrument)
  • the fills and runs (this could be a lead instrument such as a sax or trumpet)

For the style you are playing here - you must disable the bass element of the backing track, or alternatively play rootless voicings.

Here’s a demonstration of rootless voicings and backing track for “Georgia”.

This is more advanced and so first I would recommend to learn the tune solo piano without a backing track - please see my recommendations below.

Here’s what I’d recommend for you:

Firstly check out the lessons in my course “Bluesy Stride Piano For Beginners” which focus on the song “Georgia”:

This course is designed to be played without a backing track.

You will learn the following areas:

  • Spread Voicings (I can hear from your recording that you already understand spread voicings well and you are comfortable with the basic harmony)

  • Stride Left Hand - I think this will be very useful for you. When playing a stride style for ballads, our left hand is essentially the bass player, and the harmony, and this gives the right hand much more freedom to embellish the melody and to add fills and runs.

  • Turnaround Variations - “Georgia” is a great tune for applying turnaround variations. There is a dedicated lesson for that in the course. Here is the link.

  • Passing Chords - we also explore passing chords which is when we add additional chords into the song to create more harmonic interest.

Also check out this seminar where I explore fills, runs, and adding improvised touches to the song “Georgia”:

I hope that helps - check out the lessons I reference above and I think they will be a great fit for your current level.

I’m here to help if you have any further questions.

Hayden