Homespun

Sit down at the piano and start to boogie! This easy play-along course will have you rockin' and rollin' in no time -- even if you have never played blues piano before. David Cohen (The Blues Project, Country Joe and the Fish, etc.) starts you at the beginning, quickly getting you into the elementary theory needed to understand chord progressions and the 12-bar blues form. Then it's right into setting up a solid left-hand rhythm in the bass to create a bedrock for the right hand improvisations to come.

David helps you to systematically build coodination between left and right hand. After learning a variety of shuffle patterns, he gradually adds right hand rhythms, accents and licks until you are into your own soloing. As he teaches, David passes on invaluable information on blues scales, turnarounds, ending licks, rhythm parts and other elements which, when put all together, comprise the real blues sound.

By the time this lesson ends, you'll be jamming and improvising fast and slow blues in major and minor keys, and have a number of rhythmic variations in your left hand to add drive and pulse to your playing. Most importantly, you'll have the solid basis from which to go on to more complex and demanding techniques in this fabulous American musical form.