Get While You Can (Janis) - Help With Intro

[To B3]

Any of you have played this song with the studio version intro? I know it's gospel/blues based, but I simply couldn't figure it out by ear other than the inicial chromatic run. I know there are piano sheets online, apps and stuff, but I'd like to really know and understand what's happening there in terms of scales, notes choices and things like that to apply in my playing, as I'm entering a band that does a Janis tribute set.

 

There's a lot of embelishments and grace notes there that distracts me from the "basic" notes. My idea is to understand that and build it my style, as it's clearly improvised.

 

I'm not a very good music reader, so if you can simplify it whit the A-B-C note schematics would be great.

 

Thanks in advance!

 

[video:youtube]

[Outkaster]

Well I know Full Tilt Boogie Band recorded the song. They were the touring band and Richard Bell played on this in 1971. It is improvised for sure. Richard knows that southern gospel influenced style. Kind of like what Billy Payne does. Richard passed in 2007 and it's funny he lived over the border in Toronto not far from me across Lake Ontario. You have to take each part of the intro and dissect it. That's what I always had to do. The chords aren't hard it's the passing runs and getting there.

[SamuelBLupowitz]

I had never heard this tune before, but I really dig it, and the piano parts sounded right up my alley, so I took a minute before my wife's next voice lesson to jump behind the piano and figure it out. I think I got pretty close, but what I figured out here might not be exactly what's on the record -- either way, I'll try to give you the theory that backs up my interpretation of his licks.

 

Basically, it's a mix of pentatonic lines and different chord inversions with some passing tones, nothing too fancy, just (as you pointed out) lots of bluesy grace notes and stuff to dress it up. The tune is in C, but the intro starts on the V with that chromatic octave lick in the right hand and an octave G root in the left; the left hand walks up chromatically to the VI and the right hand lands on the corresponding Ami7 chord, sounds like it's voiced bottom to top E-G-C-E. Then he reinverts the chord in the right hand as a C major triad, but rolling over some black keys to get there (sounds like maybe his thumb hits the C and he uses the rest of his fingers to roll up D - D# - E for the middle voice and F - F# - G for the upper voice).

 

Then it's another G chord, and I think he's playing a harmonized blues lick with both hands (or he's just got more dexterity in his right hand than I do based on the fluidity of the grace notes; sounds like something Josh Paxton could do with one hand when he rolls out of bed in the morning). That first run over the G sounds like D - Db - C - B in the upper voice and G - E - Eb - D in the lower voice. Then the second run is G - E - Eb - D in the upper voice and B - Bb - A - G in the lower voice.

 

After that it's even more straightforward: an F7 chord, big fat octave F in the bass I think, and he plays descending 6ths, so two different inversions of the F7 with passing tones to get from one to the other. Sounds the upper voice line is A - G - F, and the parallel harmony line underneath is C - Bb - A. Then the restatement is C - Bb - A upper / Eb - D - C lower.

 

Then a D7 with an F# in the bass, same principle in the right hand over those chords. F# - E - D upper / A - G - F# lower, then A- G - F# upper / C - B - A lower.

 

Note that he plays the bluesy Bb in the lines over the F7 (a IV chord in our home key of C), but we get the leading tone in the D7 since it's a secondary dominant of the V chord, so we're borrowing from the key of G.

 

Of course, he really milks those grace-note rolls up to these voicings to give them style and make them sound more intricate than they really are. I like to play the sixths with my pinky on top and my index finger on the bottom, and roll up to the lower note with my thumb a whole step below and then flam my index finger onto the target note from the black key a half step underneath. Again, this is the kind of thing Josh Paxton does in his sleep, so I don't know if I'm really the authority on this technique. I've just copped a lot of licks from Nicky Hopkins over the years.

 

Anyway, the last chord is a nice gospel-tinged F/G (maybe a G13?); it sounded good to me when I voiced it with octave Gs in the left hand and my right thumb hitting both the G and A below middle C, with the C, F, and G above it. Might be an E in there but I think that sounded more jazzy than what's on the record.

 

If I have a little time later tonight or tomorrow I'll try to take a little video, but hopefully this is helpful! Either way, I had a good time. Way more fun than the hour and a half AV meeting I was sitting through when I read your post :grin:

[Morrissey]

I've just copped a lot of licks from Nicky Hopkins over the years

 

Speaking of Nicky Hopkins, I've been spending some time with this album this week. Plenty of opportunities for Nicky to really stretch out:

 

[video:youtube]

[To B3]

Thank you for taking the time to answer this, guys. Live, it seems that they did not do that same intro, as every version I found was somthing different and much simpler (looks like they didn't trust the monitoring nor the booze and drug level to pull this off LOL).

 

Samuel, I'd love to see a video of you doing that song part, would be great. I'm not in front of any keyboard, so will try later.

[Steve Nathan]

Might be Dickie Kermode on organ. He was also kind of a neighbor Outkaster as he was a Buffalo or Niagara Falls boy as I recall.

[SamuelBLupowitz]

Here you go. Those two-handed licks over the G kept tripping me up -- trickier than I thought! I don't quite nail the left hand on the second half of that G, and I accidentally hit a Bb over the D7 instead of Mr. B Natural, but you get the idea. Thanks for giving me a fun little thing to learn.

[video:youtube]

[To B3]

Whoa, great playing, nailed it! Thanks so much for the help!