Latin Jazz: Jazz Piano Solos Series [Paperback] Review

This book is absolutely wonderful! I am an 18-year-old piano student and I have been classically trained for 10 years. These arrangements were perfect for me because I needed a large amount of quality jazz songs to play in a hotel lobby just before most people went to bed. These pieces are fabulous because they dont require all the attention from everyone in the room (many people like to read while listening), yet if someone wants to just sit and actively listen to what I'm playing, they have a lot of interesting melodies and chords that keep their attention locked and invested in the music. Often times, people will walk in the lobby and just stand and listen to the beautiful melodies these arrangements create before actually going to the desk and checking in. It's very rewarding for me to play this music because they speak to a huge audience, and I find that my listening audience will grow every time I pull the book out and start playing.
But Beyond the fact that the original melodies are wonderful, it's even amazing to me the great flexibility that the arranging allows. They are superb when plays them simply as they are and just marvels in what is written on the page, but if you like to changearound things and play them your own way, you have the freedom to move things around and put your own "feel" to the music. Even the different styles of songs in this book are very flexible and broad,too. Songs range from slightly melancholy, to pensive, to light and upbeat, all the way to a couple that are loud and boisterous. I can only find two songs in the entire book that written in a similar style and mood.
I dont want to lead you on that these pieces are just the sort that simply find a good groove and then uphold the same simple thing the whole time, either. These are good, melodious SONGS that anyone could make up lyrics to and singly along with if they wanted to.
But anyway, I just wanted to let it known how thankful I am to Hal Leonard and the arranger, Brent Edstrom, for putting together this book. I am SURE that anyone of medium to advanced piano skills will find this book creeping its way into their everyday, multipurpose repertoir for use at any gig, and that they will probably end up considering buying all the rest of the books in this series, as I'm doing too.

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Product Description:
17 Latin jazz classics, including: Adios (Perez Prado, Astor Piazzolla) * Brazil (Xavier Cugat, Django Reinhardt) * A Day in the Life of a Fool (Stan Getz, Paul Desmond) * Desafinado (Stan Getz, Antonio Carlos Jobim) * Mambo #5 (Perez Prado, Xavier Cugat) * Manteca (Dizzy Gillespie, Cal Tjader) * Mas Que Nada (Dizzy Gillespie) * Perfidia (Perez Prado, Nat King Cole) * Samba De Orfeu (Paul Desmond, Vince Guaraldi) * Triste (Antonio Carlos Jobim, Cal Tjader) * and more.

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