Music is open-ended.
Whenever someone starts learning an instrument, it is a new beginning of infinity,. 10000 hrs is a joke in that context. There is no such thing as moving closer to the end, only farther away from where you started. A beginner who starts playing the piano today could invent new music, discover novel ways of interpreting other people’s music or a new way of learning the piano. It is the beginning of a unique trajectory in the world of music. This fact proves that no matter how many people learn the piano, they can do so without competition and comparison.
But also it isn't
This might also be discouraging in one way.
When some student asks a jazz teacher:
"when will I know how to improvise?"
and the teacher says
"oh, you never know that, it is a lifetime of study, I am still learning every day".
Fine, but some things are of the form "if you know this, you are basically competent". Just as it is good to point out how we can all embark on our infinite journeys, it is good to know that some things are finite.
Things related to piano could be:
- Do you know all the major scales?
- Can you play even sixteenth notes in a tempo of 120 bpm?
This also goes for improvising jazz. It is open-ended, for sure. But some things within jazz have an end.
- Do you know all the modes of the major scale, the harmonic minor, and the melodic scale?
If you do then you know how to find notes that sound consonant against any chord in western tonal music. It is good to point this out because it can be nice to check some boxes when you learn such a profound language as jazz. If you know all the modes, will you sound like Lester Young? Not really. Did Lester Young even know any of that? Maybe not explicitly. But he did know it in the sense of how he used consonance and dissonance in solos. They use mostly consonance and dissonances are resolved.
So we can learn those scales and be done with that. After learning it, we have solved the problem of "what note goes with what chord?". Since there are only 12 keys, it is not so much to learn. It is 36 scales, if you learn one a week you can be done in half a year.
So to that end here are some things that would make my list of "once you know this, you are competent in jazz"
- 100 common jazz standards
- The modes of the major, melodic and harmonic minor
- Rootless A/B voicings on piano
- Basic rhythmic articulations in jazz
I will go into detail about these topics in upcoming posts. If you want to start learning jazz, this great post by Ethan Iverson would be my recommendation.
I made a Spotify list with the music he recommends learning in the post.
Recommended Recording
This week I was listening to this by Monk:
The intro is so great with the awkward chords on the top. Cool idea to work with.