In my latest solo piano pop arrangement, I decided to focus on one my absolute favorite songs, God Only Knows by the Beach Boys.  This song never fails to give me the chills and it's one of those tunes I can't just listen to once.  I have to hear a few times just to soak it all in.  It's such a beautiful marriage of harmony, melody, and lyrics, a true masterpiece.  For this arrangement, I didn't touch the harmony at all!  No need to reharmonize this beauty!  

For the left hand, I was working on a ballad stride feel.  I mostly play root/5th or root/7th on beats 1 and 3.  On beats 2 and 4 a played crunchy cluster voicings (lots of 2nds!).  I love to use this sound, especially on pop progressions.  For a major triad, I'll often play the root and 9th right next to each other.  For a minor 7 chord, I'll play the third and 9 next to each other or the third and 11 (or all three!).  

For the improvisation, I decided to vamp the IV, I/3, II-7, I progression and treat it like a little mediation.  I was really inspired by Bill Evan's beautiful solo piano improvisation called "Peace Piece."  You may be able to hear the influence?  

I hope you enjoy it!  

During these difficult times, it's incredibly important to find the silver linings and always remember to count our blessings.  One of the upsides of social isolation from my fellow musicians in these past several months is that I’ve been really enjoying shedding some solo piano! 

I was wanting to learn some more tunes but instead of trying to expand my repertoire of jazz standards (which is never a bad thing!) I decided to work on songs that really resonated with me and the music I grew up listening to.  I was finding myself more drawn to pop tunes with strong melodic content which I thought would make great vehicles for solo piano arrangements and improvisation. 

One that I’ve been having some fun with recently is the Beatles’ "Michelle."  I tried to keep the main elements of the harmony in tact to not disrupt the beautiful play between major and minor resolution present in the original.  However, I wanted to sneak a few surprising changes in there to give the arrangement its own identity.  When I arrange a piece, I like to incorporate some concepts that I’d to more fluidly include in my solo piano playing -- in this arrangement I was trying to sneak in some atypical drop 2 voicings (with a crunchy diminished sound), some hybrid chords, 4th voicings, along with melodic counterlines in the left hand.  See if you can spot these different techniques in the arrangement!

This is a fairly advanced arrangement so instead of the typical tutorial I usually do, I decided to perform the arrangement (along with an improvised solo) and transcribe it note-for-note!  This was a labor of love for sure and an experiment in learning some new technology.  Let me know what you think!  

You can show your support for all things Piano Shed by purchasing the sheet music by clicking HERE.

Thanks for checking it out and happy shedding! 

For my latest youTube tutorial, we'll be digging into a Stevie Wonder classic -- You Are the Sunshine of My Life.  I play this tune all the times on gigs -- it's great one to play with both vocalists and instrumentalists.  The inspiration to teach this one came from a Skype student of mine.  So...this one is for you Cara!  Cara decided to learn this song and sing it to her father for his birthday...how sweet is that!  

I hope you enjoy learning this one.  It has some great piano voicings which mostly utilize root notes in the left hand with 7/3/5 or 3/7/9 in the right hand.  It has some great examples of how simple voice-leading moves with one finger in the right hand can lead to whole new chords and sounds!  It also has a few "hybrid chords" (where we have one chord in the right hand and a different bass note in the left).  Check out the G/F in the 2nd measure -- wooo!!   And of course, a beautiful mini-modulation to A major from C major.  What I can say -- it's Stevie Wonder.  It's perfect.  

You can click on the button below to purchase the sheet music transcription of the arrangement I play in the Part 1 video as well as the Part 2 video which completes the song.  

Happy shedding!