Talk about organic!

You may or may not know that there is a GrooveWindow Facebook page. It started out as a simple — and fairly infrequent — place where I could drop little quick news updates that weren’t quite worthy of a full blog post. A number of people have joined the page, and we’ve been having some good conversations there.

Then, along came Schmurze, who reminded me of an excellent video on youtube with a killer funk groove — not to mention shredding hammond player:

I posted this to the facebook page, and people really liked it, and starting looking for more videos of great music.

Since then, the page has become a fun place for everyone to post great links to piano players (and otherwise great musicians) that they’ve enjoyed. It’s been a great way to learn about new musicians that we may not have heard of. For example, I had never heard of the insane Hiromi Uehara until James Strong posted one of her videos:

So… come join in the fun! If you’re on Facebook, come on over to the GrooveWindow page, and post some links of musicians you really enjoy!

Due to several recent requests, I took a few minutes tonight to play through my old 30 Must-Have Blues Licks tune and capture the MIDI file for upload. I played some left hand as well, because many people have asked about things they can do with their left hand while working the solo licks.

This is awfully raw :) — I just played and recorded, and didn’t fix mistakes or timing errors — but if you want a straight up recording of how I play it (wrinkles and all), here ’tis. Also — I was playing from memory, and I varied a bit from the original. A couple extra ghost notes, some different octaves — but the general tune is the same.

I opened it up in Synthesia, and it looked right to me (left hand/right hand parts split correctly, sounded correct). I hope this helps you aspiring blues players out.

Here’s the 30 Must-Have Blues Licks MIDI FILE.

I’ve also added it to the 30 Must-Have Blues Licks page itself.

P.S. — You may not know this, but I recorded the very first Funk Groove and this blues licks series in one marathon weekend. By the time I got to the “performance” clip for this it was literally about 3:30 a.m. — I was exhausted and it shows. As I go back and watch this video, I look like I’m about to collapse onto the keys :) Good times.

A guy’s gotta have a little fun every once in a while.

After finally wrapping up the video edits and uploading the last parts for the tutorial for Funk Groove #4 in Bb, I decided to take a short break and put together a purely-for-fun arrangement to do some straight-up jamming. After all of that straight-laced instruction, I needed to let my hair down a bit.

But I may have gotten a little carried away.

If you’re looking for the actual piano groove from the tutorials — it’s buried down there in the clavinet part. I also added some nicely-distorted hammond organ parts, some authentic rhythm guitar parts and a screaming wah-wah monosynth lead part. I basically turned the volume up to eleven and improvised over the tune, while picking up the melody where appropriate.

I hope you have as much fun listening to this as I did playing it. I think I actually bruised my left heel, stomping it on the ground while working out the parts for this, and as the video will later show — I even busted out my old 1985 Roland AXIS (yes, it’s actually a “Keytar”) to play those lead parts.

I felt like a real rock star.

Well… at least as “rock star” as I could possibly feel amidst my three teenaged kids, five pets and suburban lifestyle.

Yes, there actually is going to be a video for this, it’s just not quite ready for prime time yet. With all of the delays around here lately, I figured it’d be best to just throw the audio up ahead of time. Rest assured the video’s coming soon.

I hope you like it, and you’re free to download this and spread it around as freely as you’d like. Watch for the video, coming soon — and, of course, the next tutorial series, which is the single-most-requested tune of mine: Funk Groove #3 in F.

Without further ado, here’s the audio version of Funk Groove #4 [CryBaby Mix].

Funk Groove #4 [CryBaby Mix] by groovewindow