Ian Stewart piano parts

[SMcD]

Fellow ivory-tinklers!

 

I've been drafted into a Rolling Stones cover gig and have to learn a bunch of their tunes in the next week. Of course, the songs themselves are quite simple in terms of structure. Anyone can play a Stones song - the harder part, of course, is playing it right.

 

I find the Nicky Hopkins tunes on the setlist (Sympathy, Gimme Shelter) fairly straightforward: Nicky's style is more of that rollicking back-and-forth between the hands that feels so intuitive in rock piano. What's stressing me out right now is getting the Ian Stewart parts right. Stu had that legendary boogie-woogie left hand, and I can't pin down exactly what he's doing on every track.

 

Take Brown Sugar, for instance.

has been a good starting point to try and unpack the part, but I still have a few questions about it. I always assumed those high G quarter notes after the sax solo were being hammered out by Stu, but I can hear some more involved boogie-woogie stuff behind it. Either

 

1) Stu is hammering the G with his right hand and playing frighteningly well with his left up the octave (in which case, I'm in trouble); or

2) The G is some sort of percussion, and the piano stuff I'm hearing is actually Stu's right hand.

 

In case #2, I have no idea what his left hand is doing, because even in these "isolated" tracks I can't make out any piano buried in the lower/midrange.

 

Any insights? Sadly there don't seem to be many "how to play like Ian Stewart"-type resources out there, and my ear is failing me to an embarrassing degree.

[Shamanczarek]

Don't forget about Jack Nitzsche. He played on more Stones records in the 60s than any other Keyboard player. He is on "Satisfaction" although it's not very noticeable.

[SamuelBLupowitz]

Those isolated Brown Sugar tricks give an even greater opportunity to appreciate how horribly out of tune the bass is!

 

At any rate, I think your attention to detail is admirable, and I will say I'm having a hard time hearing exactly what Ian Stewart is playing in that section -- I hear the high octave Gs, I hear maybe some blues licks happening within them or underneath them? It's hard to say.

 

But if you want my two cents, I'd zoom out a bit. While learning the ins and outs of each Stones keyboardist's style will certainly help bring the correct flavor and more than a casual cover band approach to these (in some cases well-worn) songs, I think it's fair to say that any of these players, given another pass at the tune, would play something totally different. There are probably dozens or hundreds of live recordings of Brown Sugar, with Stu, with Ian McLagan, with Chuck Leavell especially, and while every single one of them is full of sick blues and boogie woogie licks (if you can hear them under the guitars), I think getting too hung up on what exactly is happening at any particular moment isn't necessarily in the spirit of the thing. So see what feels best when you play it with the band -- hammer out those octave Gs, throw in a little honky tonk lick to break it up, answer the guitar, or comp rhythmically for a bit. And as awesome as it would be to bring the full bore of Stu's complex left hand patterns and syncopated right hand licks to the tunes... how often can you *really* hear the left hand of the piano in the context of a Stones arrangement at all?

 

So none of this is to say "eh, why bother," because as Josh Paxton often points out, there is great benefit to be had from learning the ins and outs and details of a player's style and approach. But if your inability to figure out exactly what is happening on the studio recording is inhibiting your enjoyment or, even worse, your confidence in your abilities to handle the gig... remember, Ian Stewart would refuse to play on any song with a minor chord in it, so let your limitations springboard you to finding your creative voice in the context of a Rolling Stones tribute band!

 

EDIT: Chuck Leavell also has a lot of solo performance videos and tutorials showing the ins and outs of his style, and again, while he didn't play on the classic records, he's been putting his flavor into the Stones' catalog longer than any other keyboard player at this point, so there's certainly something to be gained from watching him play anything:

[video:youtube]

[Adan]

Sam already eloquently made the points I was going to make. While I have no doubt that learning the licks of someone like Ian Stewart would be a great experience for you -- and worth it for that reason alone -- I don't think authentically replicating the piano parts of a stones tune are going to matter to any audience. That's true in general but particularly true for any tune for which even you are having trouble picking out the parts. From the standpoint of making the gig successful, I'd focus more on the general spirit of the tune and playing something that fits with what your bandmates are doing (which may not be exactly replicating the recording).

[SMcD]

Thanks for the insight, folks!

 

I realize that I could pull off a "good enough for the audience" performance without much more than a single run-through of the songs. Hell, I'm sure the band will be satisfied as long as I don't make any outright mistakes, but I want to do my due diligence. Call it an ego thing.

 

As Sam pointed out, of course a cat like Stu (or Chuck, or Billy, or...) would do it a little different each time, but I've unfortunately found that the live recordings from that era also suffer from a lack of clarity that makes it hard to really scrutinize them. I keep hearing talk of Stu's legendary left hand, but (with few exceptions) I haven't been able to find any high-quality resources to better understand how he used it (aside from your standard books on boogie-woogie patterns, I suppose).

 

I've been sitting on those Dr. John instructional books for a while - maybe those will give me enough ideas to get reasonably authentic?

[mcgoo]

I wouldn't get too hung up on his left hand, other than just using it as a learning exercise. There's a good reason you can't hear those parts. They likely walk all over the bass and add unnecessary clutter to the mix. On Get Yer Ya Ya's Out, his parts on Little Queenie and Carol are perfectly placed. They're in a higher register, out of the way of vocals and guitars and low enough in the mix to not dominate... but man, does that jangling make those tunes come alive! My 2 cents is to focus on the vibe... don't miss the beauty of the forest by focusing on a few branches of a tree.

[synthizen2]

I would say, learn as much of Ian Stewart's piano style as is possible for you... Then, instead of outright copying his exact notes, incorporate that style into your playing style, making it fit like a glove, so you don't have to think about it too much. It's more important to stay in the spirit of the tune and get comfortable with it on your own, than to try to impress people by copying his exact passages note-for-note. Nobody in the audience will notice or care except for your other keyboard-playing buddies.

[Threadslayer]

I would say, learn as much of Ian Stewart's piano style as is possible for you... Then, instead of outright copying his exact notes, incorporate that style into your playing style, making it fit like a glove, so you don't have to think about it too much. It's more important to stay in the spirit of the tune and get comfortable with it on your own, than to try to impress people by copying his exact passages note-for-note. Nobody in the audience will notice or care except for your other keyboard-playing buddies.

Well put Synth, Sam and Adan. I completely agree and always have. After seeing this same discussion played out in innumerous discussions here and elsewhere, it seems to me that this speaks to different personality types - as in Meyers-Briggs personality classifications - those who just innately get this, and those who can never accept it.

[area51recording]

I would say, learn as much of Ian Stewart's piano style as is possible for you... Then, instead of outright copying his exact notes, incorporate that style into your playing style, making it fit like a glove, so you don't have to think about it too much. It's more important to stay in the spirit of the tune and get comfortable with it on your own, than to try to impress people by copying his exact passages note-for-note. Nobody in the audience will notice or care except for your other keyboard-playing buddies.

 

This, 100%. If you are in the right place stylistically, you're probably right where the real guy is, who's probably not going to play the same thing note for note every time anyway.......

[Daddyg3042]

Charlie's passing is driving lots of this...

 

I too will be playing a Stones tribute Halloween eve. We've got around 25 tunes lined up and I've been on YT for the last week trying to dig in. A few songs have no keyboards, but the group wants me to play on those anyway. That's been interesting. What's been tricky is adding string parts to Angie, Fool to Cry, Moonlight Mile, as well as the flute on Ruby Tuesday all while trying to hold down the keys part.

 

There's some things that require a note for note approach, but as Sir Paul just said...the Stones are a blues cover band, so that's the way I'm approaching it too.