Robert Rawlins

How To Play from a Real Book

All musicians should be able to sit down at the keyboard and make sense of a tune. With that goal in mind, every instrumentalist and singer can profit from this book. It covers many techniques for exploring, understanding, and performing the songs found in real books. You will learn how to analyze the form and harmonic structure, insert an introduction, interpret the melody, improvise on the chords, construct bass lines, voice the chords, add substitutions, and much more. Offering a theory-based approach, it addresses many aspects of solo and small band performance that can improve your own playing and your understanding of what others are doing around you. Playing from a real book is all about options. The material presented here will offer you a full range of techniques that you can put to use right away.