Review of Stanford Summer Jazz Workshop Jazz Piano Course

After more than 30 years of “playing it by the ears” I have decided to take the Intermediate Jazz Piano course at Stanford Jazz Workshop this summer.

For those who are thinking about doing the same next year, or thinking about taking one similar to this in your area, here are some thoughts about this.

Mr. Franc Sumares taught this class. He is a very accomplished Jazz pianist. He has been teaching Jazz at various colleges in San Francisco Bay Area for decades.

The format was just 4 sessions over 4 weeks. So things go very (very) fast. To get the most out of this, you do have to have some basic understanding of Jazz theory. For example, you would need to understand major and minor scales, and you should have been exposed some common chords such as 7^th or Major 7^th, minor 7th and diminished, augmented etc.  You do also have to be able to read the music in all keys but do not need to sight-read.

In the class he will go over various scales, related modes and how they are applied in a Jazz progression. Most notably you will learn a lot about what to do with the standard II-V-I progression, and especially how V can be altered.

All the assignments are based on some well known Jazz standards and Franc will provide you with enough guidance on how to enrich the progressions by applying scales and chord notes that would go well. All of the examples are basically in the key of C. But Jazz as such a tune in C would have chords such as Db and F#m. You will need to write your solos and take turn playing. One big plus is that he is a very accomplished pianist so he will play the progressions and you will hear what he means and how they sound to your ears.

He provides you with his book (Contemporary Jazz Piano from Voicings to Improvisation in Three Sections) with a CD. You can consider the class as mainly someone taking 4 weeks to carefully explain what's in the manual. 

Rest, as with most music training, you would try to read the book, apply the tricks, practice voicing in all keys and apply what you have learned to the songs you already know. Honestly, the live instruction was essential to fully understand what's in the book, mainly because Jazz sounds are hard to understand out-of-the-context, and need someone showing it right in front of you live and ask question right when there is one.

The highlights for me were to finally understand the Alt chords (altered scale), tritone substitution, and various chord voicing on the same chord. I now fully understand the complex chords using b9, #9, b5, 11, #11, 13, b13 etc. and how to voice them properly with 80% of my 10 short fingers (hint you can often get away with just 3 of the notes, even 2.)

If you have taken a “Jazz Theory” class and still feel like you did not understand much of what was taught, then I think this is one of the most effective 4 weeks you can spend learning about it. This is much practical course than anything I have taken or learned on books.