How to apply to Pop Styles and Blues

[Cheri Sykes]

I’m interested in how this can translate to learning pop styles and blues. Would the rules change, regarding color tones, chord family ladder?

[David Haynes]

I think blues is a little different animal. Suds has some discussions about blues in the Advanced Resources but I know it’s a topic he had hoped to expand upon. I think in the general sense of the geography of the keyboard David’s Method sets some groundwork for getting involved in the blues but I wouldn’t say it’s an obvious progression (if you will).

As far as pop styles, I’m assuming you mean more current popular music – and I’m probably not the best person to even know what’s ‘popular’ today. In my experience, songs with harmonic movement (or songs that you can add harmonic movement to) lend themselves better to David’s approach than more sparse or static progressions.

In the simplest sense, a good song remains a good song. But an iconic rendition of a song can be popular in the moment although perhaps not as amenable to a solo piano rework. The ‘style’ is open to ones own inclinations and abilities. Thus I can love Steely Dan (from my generation) but not really know how to deal with “Aja” (or want to) as a solo piano piece.

So to circle back to your question about color tones and progressions, I can only say that sometimes I find myself less adventurous with songs that I have a strong single rendition already in my head.

(P.S. – I moved your other post to the Sudnow Students forum because I think it deserves a broader audience.)

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