GovernorSilver

Heard lot of good stuff about P90X. I guess a towel would work on a wood or tiled floor too, in place of furniture sliders. What the Power Wheel buys you - when its strapped to your feet - over furniture sliders/paper plates/towels under your feet: 1. It's inherently less stable, so your core, particularly the obliques, have to work more to keep the wheel from tipping over to either side. 2. Pushups are more difficult because the body is already doing extra work to maintain a stable alignment 3. Some exercises are just better suited to the wheel. 4. The wheel can be used on grass, sand, carpet, etc. 5. Elastic bands can be attached to the wheel to increase resistance for some exercises (eg. Hip-Ups, Pike Ups).

Lifeline Power Wheel, which comes with a DVD that shows you how to use it: http://www.lifelineusa.com/power-wheel.html It works best, imo, with the wheel strapped to your feet. If you can't afford $60 US for a Power Wheel, you could try similar exercises with paper plates or furniture sliders under your feet on a suitable surface (obviously, not carpet/rug). This is a quick tutorial with sample exercises: http://rosstraining.com/blog/2011/02/24/slider-exercise-tutorial/ After you have developed some core strength with a Power Wheel or furniture sliders, you can further develop your core strength with gymnastic rings. This is a good home training course, with a link to a place you can buy rings: http://www.goldmedalbodies.com/products/rings-one/ I worked through Level A, Phase 1 of the Rings One program. I gained some upper body strength but my lack of core strength held me back from advancing to the next level.

Sorry about your arthritic toe. Have you looked into glucosamine supplements? Unfortunately, the info out there is confusing, other than the NIH GAIT (NIH's trial study): http://nccam.nih.gov/research/results/gait/qa.htm Some tweaks to your diet might help too - eating foods that are naturally anti-inflammatory (berries, omega3-rich foods (fish, walnuts, etc.), etc.) and avoiding those that are inflammatory (anything high in processed sugar, potato, etc.).

I'm not a runner, but have gotten back into doing a yoga routine almost every morning before heading off to work. I look forward to doing pullups on the monkey bars outside our office building again too.

I've been peeking ahead in Tim Richards' blues piano book and saw why blues stuff isn't in his jazz piano book(s) - they're in the blues piano book. Bag's Groove and Blue Monk are in the blues piano book - probably other jazz-blues tunes lurking in there.

Just started working through the Improvising Blues Piano book. I think Lesson 1 (Beginner's Blues) is the only one in which the reader is not asked to improvise. It's a basic triadic arpeggio-based groove, following a I-IV-I-V-I progression. From Lesson 2 onwards (not 100% sure because I haven't looked at every single lesson), the reader is asked to try some improv. One difference I see right off the bat compared to guitar-oriented instruction is that the reader is NOT introduced to the blues scale or even the pentatonic at the outset. Instead, the reader is asked to improvise just using the chord tones. I'm sitting here listening to the included CD, and with each new track, I hear more elements introduced to the basic triadic framework - eg. more trills, more grace notes, etc. Everything I hear so far seems to also emphasize a strong, steady left hand bass line. The youtube vid that I posted was indeed a performance of the author's transcription of Meade Lux Lewis' Honky Tonk Train Blues and it is indeed the final track on the CD. I figured I'd share an update based on actually starting on this book.

One thing Youtube has brought about is people posting clips of themselves playing stuff out of whatever book/CD/DVD they're learning from. Here's a guy who learned a piece out of the Tim Richards book: Looks/sounds like a fun piece to learn!

So far Improvising Blues Piano looks impressive - covering a wide range of blues styles, lots of little profiles on great blues pianists, historical information, etc.. I am a believer in learning via music pieces and this book has plenty of them (60). I disagree with the negative reviewer on Amazon who said "never discusses soloing". Every lesson in the book has a "now YOU improvise" section with a suggested pool of notes to use. http://www.timrichards.ndo.co.uk/bluespianobook.html This book is so focused on the blues, Richard's jazz piano book series reportedly has no blues at all.

I have this book as well and must admit this has also been a turnoff for me. "Advanced training" could mean different things to different people. I'm just grateful to Bobadoshe for turning me on to Bach's Two-Part Inventions as a means of improving my keyboard technique AND studying these great compositions from the inside. I got the Alfred Masterworks Edition (Inventions and Sinfonias) with included CD. It clearly shows the fingerings for each trill too - very helpful! I also just got Tim Richards' "Improvising Blues Piano" book after seeing the rave reviews on a jazz piano forum.