Essential Elements for Jazz Ensemble – Mike Steinel | Piano Sheet Music Songbook | Jazz Improvisation Method with Play-Along Tracks | Beginner to Intermediate Music Teacher Resource

Excellent book with well thought out sequential practices and songs with variations. Having the two CDs with this one is ESSENTIAL. (I ordered from a secondary seller who guaranteed they were included. Many -say- they are, show the book on this product page that -shows- a CD included, but then send you the edition that wants you to download the music from the internet).Having the actual CD's made a huge difference to the ease of practicing. With jazz, you absolutely -have- to hear it. For example, one of the earliest exercises shows you the difference between playing "standard eighth notes" and "swinging eighth notes". They look the same, of course, in the sheet music, so hearing how the stress should be different when you play them is crucial.I don't have a "year or two of lessons" like the description suggests, but this book is not too difficult for me to go all the way through it. A lot of the practices are "treble clef only" and where the bass clef is included, it is either single notes or a repeating chord (that looks complicated until you remember what it is and that you are asked to play, maybe, three chord changes per song, all giving you the rhythm and harmony but just as a single chord, not separating a root note etc. So, despite the way it looks, the bass is not difficult either. You are not asked to play anything beyond eighth notes.The challenging part isn't reading or playing it--it's putting the bass and treble together with the expressiveness and "swing" that is characteristic of jazz. For that, the CD(s) were immensely helpful. They play through once with full band, then a second time with just the rhythm section so that you supply the rest.There's a little bit of jazz history and profiles of famous musicians included throughout the book. As you go along, you concentrate a lot on using blues scale and chords, learning about progression. You learn some riffs, get a good feeling for swing, and have some practice with Latin, rock and Be-bop.Really pleased with the book. If you already know all of the above, obviously it would be too easy. But if you're working with a teacher or comfortable working things out for yourself on the piano (especially with the help of the CD), this book does not require lots of prior knowledge to start you playing jazz piano.

Thankyou

My daughter used this book to get ready for middle school jazz band tryouts. It really helped her to listen to the rhythms.

GOOD