Any resources for non-classical scales and finger exercises for keyboard?

[Michael Lee]

A few years ago I took piano lessons to try and improve my songwriting skills (I'm a vocalist). After 2 years, and tons of Czerny exercises, I can play Beethoven and Mozart(slowly) but still don't know any of those groovy keyboard chords and runs used in rock,etc.

So I'm curious if anyone can reccomend books or online reosources that have scales and exercises that are rock sounding. Czerny is good, but my fingers are being trained for a 19th century world. If I'm gonna sit at the keys for an hour working on things, I'd prefer it applies to what I do now musically.

Thanks in advance
MLS

[psenior]

The thing with rock versus classical playing is that in rock and roll you do a lot of things a classical player would never do because it would be considered poor or incorrect technique. Thinks like putting your thumbs on black keys, sliding from a black key to a white key with the same finger, or holding down two white keys with the thumb.

A book that I have and like is "Improvising Rock Piano" by Jeffrey Gutcheon. It covers a lot of different genres and most of the examples sound decent and are usable in a lot of different settings. I think videos are better than books for learning since you actually see what the performer's hands are doing. The videos I have and like are from Homespun Video. They are "Learn to Play Gospel Piano" by Ethel Caffie-Austin and "Dr. John Teaches New Orleans Piano" by the artist of the same name. The gospel piano one is very basic, but ramps up to intermediate playing level. Dr. John's videos are intermediate to advanced.

If by rock you mean fusion type music, I really don't get into that style but I see a lot of educational material out there by Jordan Ruess that would probably get you going in this direction. From the little I've seen of it, it really doesn't look any different than classical style playing.

I see that you are located in Studio City, CA. You should be able to easily find several teachers in your area who excel at doing what you want to do and take lessons with them.

[Michael Lee]

The thing with rock versus classical playing is that in rock and roll you do a lot of things a classical player would never do because it would be considered poor or incorrect technique. Thinks like putting your thumbs on black keys, sliding from a black key to a white key with the same finger, or holding down two white keys with the thumb.

A book that I have and like is "Improvising Rock Piano" by Jeffrey Gutcheon. It covers a lot of different genres and most of the examples sound decent and are usable in a lot of different settings. I think videos are better than books for learning since you actually see what the performer's hands are doing. The videos I have and like are from Homespun Video. They are "Learn to Play Gospel Piano" by Ethel Caffie-Austin and "Dr. John Teaches New Orleans Piano" by the artist of the same name. The gospel piano one is very basic, but ramps up to intermediate playing level. Dr. John's videos are intermediate to advanced.

If by rock you mean fusion type music, I really don't get into that style but I see a lot of educational material out there by Jordan Ruess that would probably get you going in this direction. From the little I've seen of it, it really doesn't look any different than classical style playing.

I see that you are located in Studio City, CA. You should be able to easily find several teachers in your area who excel at doing what you want to do and take lessons with them.

Thanks for the very informative post psenior. I'm not looking to do fusion music, just want to get some pop/rock muscle memory into my fingers! There's probably some teachers around here for what I want, but my piano teacher was Randy Rhoads' mother, swear to God, and she took me down the classical path!

[Nystul]

The thing with rock versus classical playing is that in rock and roll you do a lot of things a classical player would never do because it would be considered poor or incorrect technique. Thinks like putting your thumbs on black keys, sliding from a black key to a white key with the same finger, or holding down two white keys with the thumb.

This part isn't really saying much, except that most rock pianists have shoddy technique. Classical fingering principles are a guide to playing effectively more than a limitation. Just playing one of Bach's little preludes we have thumbs on the black keys, thumb or pinky sliding from one white key to the next, one finger holding a key down until it can be replaced by a thumb or another finger, fourth finger crossing over the fifth. None of these are desirable fingerings, but they become the right technique because there is no alternative that allows all voices to be played with two hands. And all in one of Bach's easier works. I'd guess if one can play Bach and Chopin, one can find the right technique for any possibility.

Of course, being able to jam or compose in the rock idiom is another matter!