Ten Boogie-Woogie Studies

Description

The Boogie-Woogie style of piano playing has been mastered by many fine pianists, with some of its most well-known exponents include Albert Ammons, Jimmy Yancey and Count Basie. To me, this is one of the most exciting styles of piano music. The apparent simplicity of the harmony belies the technical and musical sophistication which characterises the playing of the best boogie-woogie pianists. The left hand provides a rhythmic and harmonic framework, over which the right hand can play a melody and/or improvise. Typically, the structure of this type of music follows that of 12-bar Blues. However, whereas 12-bar Blues usually employs the dominant in bar 12, boogie-woogie usually stays on the tonic.
These studies aim to introduce the pianist to some of the most commonly-found left hand patterns, harmonic structures, and melodic traits and embellishments. The pieces are carefully graded; this collection could be approached by pianists from Grade 3 to 6/7, and as such this first set is classed as “Beginner-Intermediate”. In all these studies, the left hand should be mastered first before attempting to add the right hand part. The pedal should never be used, except perhaps on pause chords at the end of the studies.   The pieces are quite short, and any 12-bar section (clearly marked by double bar-lines) may be repeated, either as written or with an improvised solo.