Jazz Singers’ Lab
Learn the basics of music theory and notation used in jazz and popular music. Discover popular song forms, read notes on a staff, and transpose songs into your preferred key. Explore chords, scales, and intervals, and play simple chord progressions on the piano. This course is suitable for jazz singers and instrumentalists, as well as singers of other popular genres. Enhance your understanding of jazz and improve your ability to communicate with other musicians. Start your journey into the world of jazz and expand your musical knowledge.
What you’ll learn
- You will learn how to read and decipher the notation found in “Lead Sheets,” a type of score used extensively in jazz and popular music.
- You will learn all about the most popular song forms, like AABA or ABAB
- You will be able to read notes on a staff
- You will learn how to find your key and how to transpose a song into your key of choice
- You will learn about common chords and scales and intervals
- Learn to play simple chord progressions on piano, useful to learn and practice songs and to accompany yourself
This basic music theory course, although specifically aimed for jazz singers who wants to understand basics of music theory and common usage as it applies to jazz – scales, chords, lead sheets, transposition etc., it can also be used as a basic course in jazz focused music theory for any musician. Although the example music used is from the jazz repertoire you will find that it can apply to other styles as well. So this course is valuable for all singers – beginners, amateurs, as well as professionals who want to understand the mechanics of the music. However, this is not an in-depth music theory course, but simply the beginnings, beginnings that will help you navigate the world of jazz. We start from the very basics, learning about the notes on a staff, scales, chords and chord progressions. We will also look at transposition, to give you the tools to begin to understand how determine the key of a song and how to transpose that song into the key of your choice. Remember, make the song yours, begin by finding and singing in your key, not someone else’s. The road to personalisation and interpretation begins there, when you allow your voice to be itself.
This course is open to all who wish to expand their knowledge of the jazz idiom, to confidently converse about the music and to communicate ideas to other musicians. It will enhance your appreciation of the music and give you useful tools and an understanding of the direction you need to go in order to continue your studies. This is not the end but just the beginning. So whether you are a singer or an instrumentalist seeking basic knowledge this course is for you.
Who this course is for:
- Jazz singers wishing to better understand the language of jazz.
- Although much of the course has been developed with the jazz singer in mind, singers of other popular musics will also find the information helpful.
- Beginning Jazz instrumentalists who need some lessons on music basics
