The Big Book of Torch Songs 2nd Ed. (Piano/Vocal/Guitar Songbook) [Paperback] Review

I have a wide range... can sing soprano and alto quite easily, but when I sing torch songs or other jazz/blues standards, I prefer to sing them in my lower register. This book is great with offering these types of songs, but the keys they are in are HORRIBLE! They must be transposed down to even be comfortable for a woman to sing them in that "sulty-torch-song" style. I wouldn'trecommend it at all... instead, I found a book called "Belter's Hot Standards." This has been my Bible of music! Go find that book if you're a woman looking for low jazz songs.

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Product Description:
Features 75 heart-on-the-sleeve standards, such as: Angel Eyes * As Long as He Needs Me * Bewitched * Black Coffee * Crazy * Cry Me a River * Glad to Be Unhappy * Good Morning Heartache * Here's That Rainy Day * I'll Be Seeing You * Misty * Mood Indigo * My Man * My Old Flame * The Party's Over * Skylark * So in Love * Stormy Weather * When Sunny Gets Blue * and more.

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Piano Essentials: Scales, Chords, Arpeggios, and Cadences for the Contemporary Pianist (Book & CD) [Paperback] Review

I got this book about 3 weeks ago and already its improved my skills in a number of areas. Everything is organized in such a way that you just automatically progress. The incluion of every scale with chords gives you a good warm-up for every practice.
The really cool thing about this book is it doesn't overwhelm you with theory, but has just enough for you to understand (or remember if you forgot)the basics. I feel that even after you advance you could still use this book as a review and a warm-up. Great for beginners and those of us wanting a a good basis for review or practice. The only thing I wish they would've thought of was to use a ring binding instead of regular book. That way you can lay the book out on the music stand better.

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Product Description:
Learn piano basics, as required of every piano major at Berklee College of Music. The exercises featured in this book will help you improve your sight-reading skills, and memorize new material in less time and with more confidence. Scales, chords, arpeggios, and cadences will improve your tone, dynamic range, and sense of rhythm. You will become more comfortable with fingerings, develop speed and agility on the keyboard, and will build a foundation for further study.

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Mel Bay Jazz Piano Scales & Modes [Paperback] Review

What separates this scales book is that the author lays out each mode or type of scale by key. Not only does it contain all the "church scales" (Aolian, Dorian, Ionian, etc.,), it also has the major and minor pentatonic, the blues scales, Bebop, and many others including Neapolitan, Japanese, Hungarian Minor scales, again, all in notation form and in every key! I've been looking for this for a long time. My only wish is that it would be in spiral binding. Other than that, this is better than any of the other scales books I've purchased.

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Product Description:
Following the best-selling Jazz Piano Chords, this informative volume provides a scale reference and practice tool for any pianist wanting to learn to play jazz. Starting with diatonic, pentatonic, symmetrical and exotic scales, more advanced composer and jazz scales are introduced. The following discussion of polytonality, alternating scales, using scales with chords and scale chords represents the dominating concepts of contemporary jazz. The book ends with extensive 12-key libraries of scales, and scales arranged by chords. Learning to use these scales will help any pianist play with more tonal and modal variety, color, freedom and interest.

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