Not sure if this is a silly question or not. I have these volumes of jazz/pop piano standards. Some of them I really like and I find in general they make good sight reading practice and they also help teach simple jazz chords voicings.

Not sure if something like this will ever be ok for the site? Examples of these books are

http://books.google.com/books?id=APyTHn ... q=&f=false

or

http://books.google.com/books?id=g0j4vk ... q=&f=false

Anyway if this is completely silly I understand

Well.....I dunno, Stan. I like a lot of these pieces too and have several books with varying arrangements of them. Will have to think about this some more....

I don't know these 'standards' but it is definitely not silly to think about jazz. I see no reason why a good jazz piece should not go up on the site. However, what is 'good' and what is not will largely be determined by our classical ears, to avoid straying too far from what we believe to be 'classical'.

Why don't you record a couple Stan, and throw them in the pot.

Well this it the type of thing I was thinking of:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2oqkP_qQTM

My version is still very rough and uneven, as I haven't really practiced it enough yet.

This arrangement of over the rainbow is by Lou Stein who is actually a somewhat well known jazz pianist. He published a few books of these fun jazz arrangements, at least they are fun for me

Anyway if its completely silly I understand.

Wow, Stan - you Jazzman (who knew )! I loved this!! One of my favorite songs too. I think it sounds good already, but if you are open to any criticism - the only thing is that maybe you could take your time in some places. Sort of hold back more, which I think would make the piece have more of a magical, melancholy feel. But this is only my opinion - jazz is much more personal than I think even classical is, so it's fine if you like to play the piece this way.

I see no reason why we should not host music like this, a well-played good arrangement of an almost classic tune. But I think it will always have to be decided on a case-by-case basis. Someone comes along with a Britney Spears medley or Dixieland arrangement, we may have to frown severely

Good job Stan. Yeah you can be a bit more unbuttoned but that will come with practice.

How exactly to categorize this on the site is another matter . . .

No big problem there - we already have a different Over the Rainbow arrangement in the 'various' page. But I'm thinking that maybe we should make a new page for jazz arrangements, since there are already a number of them on that page and the table is getting pretty long. Then again, maybe we can make a page titled, "Jazz and Rags" or something like that which could also hold the miscellaneous Rags that are not by Joplin. Just thinking....anyone have any better ideas?

Stan - what do you think - do you want this recording to go up?

Not a good idea IMO. You'll now lump Jazz with Rags, and still have no place for anything that is neither of them. Plus that we don't know what is Jazz and what isn't. Plus that it's not fair to discriminate rags not by Joplin (we already have Bolcom rags e.g.)

I'd just create a category 'Various Non-Classical', and rename the current 'Various' to 'Various Classical', moving over items as needed. This seems the least work. It may be an effort to draw the line between classical and non-classical. Must be done on a case-by-case basis, and people will always be likely to argue.

Or, just leave the category Various like it is and put this recording in there. Yes the table will get pretty long, as any lump table is bound to get. I don't see that as a problem. But note that I sanitized that table a while ago - it was a real and proper mess internally.

I like that idea. Ok, you do it.




Maybe you cleaned up all the weird fonts, but I alphabetized this whole thing, so let's be sure to keep it that way.

It would certainly be nice to post my recording Should I post the mp3 to the audition room as per normal?

I was originally thinking it would go to the various page but creating a separate page is not a bad idea. Perhaps a separate page for non-classical as Chris suggested? Either way I would be happy.

I was thinking of recording a few other things, Bill Evans has some tasteful and easier to play transcriptions and arrangements. Lou Stein has a couple of other things I want to eventually get to.

b.t.w. Thank you Chris and Monica for your encouragement. You know I was worried my recording might have too much freedom. I guess if you listen to the original vocal/orchestral recording, it employs more freedom and hesitations then I do! I probably need to think about my phrasing in the context of jazz/pop.

Either way is fine - probably everyone won't know this is here, though, so you are apt to get more feedback besides from Chris and me if you post it in the Audition Room too.

It is my firm belief that the simplest ideas are most always the best. Especially when they're mine, of course The bummer is that now I get to do it, too. Ah well.


Fonts were only half the problem. This thing contained the most godawful mess of spaghetti HTML I had ever seen. Took quite a while to straighten out. Remember to never paste anything into Exponent from any Microsoft software, unless it is good old Notepad, or you end up with great lumps of goo buried inside the page. The messy way Exponent creates and maintains HTML does not help either. It's best done in raw HTML actually.