2 Essential Jazz Piano Exercises

In this video, I show you two essential exercises for developing your jazz piano skills and technique.

Exercise 1 is all about diatonic 7th chords. This is great for improving your ability to see all the possible chords within any given key, as well as your general technique.

Exercise 2 is all about shifting between different scales smoothly. This exercise can be infinitely developed but this is its most basic version. This will help with your technique as well as your general navigation of the instrument.

Use these as a warmup for the next 3 months, and you'll continue to see huge benefits across your playing.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

00:00 - Intro
00:45 - Exercise 1: Diatonic 7th Chords
03:19 - Exercise 2: Chromatic Scale Shifting
06:17 - Summary

[bootsieragansings]

I love diatonic 7 chords- they so soothing to my ears. 💜

[mrmadamhy]

Great set of exercises well explained I'm in!

[jdiaz]

Thannks I will try these and see how I like it!

[culturedslob]

These exercises have utterly humbled me

[richarpadilla]

Great video as always Simon ! I'm following your advice, trying to make melodic lines using the notes of a scale, i'm practicing this over some progressions from your own tutorials !, i'm a classical trained pianist, this have been hard for me, thanks for your advice !

[ShenSang]

Very useful information. 👍Great lesson . Thank you 🌹🙏

[lekingm]

very nice video and interpretation well done my friend good evening leking m

[fnfmvlw]

As with all Jazz exercises, how fast should you play these to still be able to apply the technique in actual playing ? I feel like if you play the arpeggios as quickly as you in the video, it just becomes muscle memory for this one exercise. Thanks

[Joepack]

Simon, great tutorial. You packed some really powerful exercises into a short and concise video. Bravo! My only problem, I'm Jewish, we don't eat pork, is Piano Turkey or Duck ok?

[coloaten]

Great, everyone's favourite, scale exercises! 🤣 j/k...these do actually look interesting :)

[debford]

Thx Simon. In terms of using the exercises as a warmup - assume I don't have any other warm up exercises - how long would you suggest doing this each day before starting in on whatever else is on the practice agenda?

[Joepack]

I noticed that when playing the appegios in exercise 1, it appeared that you were alternating between using your middle finger and ring finger. So it's ok to use either fingering?

[jade]

Hi Simon -- quick question: On exercise # one, in your left hand you ascend using the fingering 1-2-3-5, but descending you're using 5-4-2-1. Any particular reason for the switch? (Love your site!)

[jonahdavid]

Would you alter the fingerings for the diatonic 7th chords as you changed the keys?

[maestrodito]

The struggle to "think" the chord starting with the 7th always make my brain stop to figure what chord I'm in.
like start with B but you're in c7+ chord, not B something
So brain pain

[emmykeys]

How can I learn jazz to be part of me?

[marcopepe]

This is candidate for the most boring exercise you've ever recomnended! Lol Sorry Simon!