Hayden Hill
Hayden founded PianoGroove in 2015 with the goal of making the world a more musical place. He shares his love for jazz piano through his online courses and manages the community area of PianoGroove.
September 11 · 2024
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Seminar Description
Seminar Description
Master the sustain pedal in jazz and blues piano. You’ll learn essential techniques to improve your sound, maintain clarity, and create a more expressive performance.
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How To Use The Sustain Pedal
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I have been using Safari on my Apple iPad to download your seminars. Now it says that Firefox or Chrome is needed to download this seminar. Do you know what is going on? Is there a change in your software? Thanks,
Hi Edwin,
The seminars and lessons must be streamed through the website, not downloaded.
If it was possible to download the videos, it shouldn’t have been, so perhaps the website developers have made some security updates with regards to 3rd party video download services.
If you are having issues streaming the lessons – ie. the videos will not play for you – please let me know and I will assist further.
Talk soon,
Hayden
Seminars are always interesting, and gems appear throughout. Sorry to have missed this live.
Love the sus section in particular for Tenderly, and how best to pedal the changes when using the sus chord to transition was very useful.
On Body and Soul, could you use the sostenuto pedal for the bass chords in the stride?
Hi Ron,
Thanks for the comment and I’m glad the session was useful.
Yes Sus chords are a wonderful tool for filling space. I covered them in more detail in this seminar: https://www.pianogroove.com/live-seminars/sus-chord-for-beginners/ – including some useful drills.
Yes we can use the sostenuto pedal and it creates a much softer style. It’s not something I use a lot in my playing but it works well with how I was playing the tune Body & Soul in this seminar.
If we are playing background music in a small room, or on a loud piano, or both – then we could use the sostenuto pedal to make sure the music is not overpowering.
If you are just practicing piano I would say to avoid the sostenuto pedal and instead focus on playing softer to achieve that kind of sound so that you are working on your dynamics, but yes for sure it can be used in certain situations.
I believe it is more widely used in classical piano than jazz and blues piano.
Hope that helps and talk soon Ron!
Best,
Hayden