Book Reviews: Jazz Piano For Kids

It's a been long time since a book has filled a hole in the music education canon like this one. It has to be said, Richard Michael's Jazz Piano For Kids and its accompanying video training course, provides the ultimate guide to becoming a jazz pianist. It has been wonderful to watch his videos and play with his backing tracks, complete with jazz ensemble. I have been genuinely inspired by his outstanding step-by-step pedagogy and friendly yet empowering manner.

Michael personally presents all 45 videos (around 2 mins each) with practical activities that build systematically to enable students to become jazz literate rhythmically and harmonically; it also encourages students to use jazz scales such as modes. This resource provides all the tools needed to start effectively improvising.

Don't be put off by the title of this book – this is so much more than just jazz piano for kids. This is jazz piano for everyone including teachers, teenagers and adults; I would argue that the book teaches jazz training generally too. I have now used a selection of Michael's videos in my classroom and piano lessons and the children loved them. The videos are an essential component of this offering, so be sure to access them (easily via the code on the title page) immediately so you understand what it's about. The book design and presentation don't go anywhere near effectively communicating this treasure trove of content. It is worth noting that a child would need a teacher's support to understand and utilise the book.

The content is split into sections: Groove; Singing a Groove; How We Hear Chords; Strengthening the Fingers. The Playing Tunes and Solo sections then systematically trains in the following: Anticipation; Inversion; Repetition; Scales and Tone Transposition; Chords and Sequences; Guide Tones and the Sequence; Augmentation and the Blues Scale; Diminution; Jazz Harmony and Space; and Putting it all together.

Popular traditional folk melodies such as She'll be Coming Round the Mountain and When the Saints are used to showcase your new skills along with more traditional blues pieces and pieces based on classical repertoire by Paganini and a march by Tchaikovsky.

Music is around Grade 2 level or below and fingering is detailed and very helpful. The harmony is always given above the bar in addition to useful keyboard charts for scales and notation. The individual ‘Skill’ highlighted sections explain detailed techniques being used and the videos accompanying all of this are signposted throughout the book.

Michael is an honorary professor of jazz piano at St Andrew's University and is an active performer, which really shows in this resource. This book will take pride of place in my music library and will be used actively for decades to come.

© Ngupakarti/ AdobeStock 

ISBN: 9781540067807

Jazz Piano For Kids is priced at £12.99

Richard Michael is speaking on Day 2 of the Music & Drama Education Expo in September.

mdexpo.co.uk