Why "Cocktail Piano" Is Lamer than Jazz Piano 😱 

A lot of people called Hank Jones a cocktail pianist because of his smooth and relaxed touch. It’s not until you try to duplicate it that you realize how impossible much of it was.

As someone who, on their best day, rose to the level of passable cocktail pianist, this is explaining the self-loathing I felt after gigs 😅 What a great video, Jeremy.

Jeremy I would love to watch a tut where you take this song, break it down slowly and explain different approaches how to perform it in such elegant way like you. This was wonderful 😊

Very clear explanation! Thank you 😊

Critically important lesson about ballad playing, Jeremy! Never heard it so well articulated! Thank you again!

Good stuff JS, and gave me a few good laughs too !! I've really enjoyed how you teach, and are also entertaining to watch at the same time. in fact I can't stop watching this it's so hilarious.

Ever inspiring, my friend! Time to practice💃🕺💃

Nice one Jeremy, your deliberate demonstration of mistakes and bad practice is a great way to show us what we should be doing instead!

This video couldn’t have been more perfectly timed…. I’m on a cruise this week with my family and discovering these differences up close!! I appreciate your textbook-like perspective of the matter! The cocktail pianists who are *really* interesting are the ones who fake having a full band by using backing tracks or the iReal pro tracks. The atmosphere feels cheap and cheesy, but I’d rather have it than the alternative of just reading the chart without proper arranging or even improvisation!!

Great lesson!

Great video. Explained a lot for me.

Jeremy, it would be great if you made a video about how to practice and use these arpeggiated run ups to « fill » the entire piano. I hear them many times but struggle to learn how to practice and integrate then into my own playing

Thanks Jeremy. Im 61. Just started piano 3 years ago. Learned a lot from this...

You are so amazing. Great explanation

Jeremy you play so fast that even when I slow down the video I still can't make out what you are doing exactly, 😊regarding the runs mainly. Would be great to see a tut and explanation of those runs you were doing. Thanks for the lesson

That was really useful!

Good lesson. I'm working on adding all the cocktail piano runs now, figure that might get me an entry into your amazing OP version someday.

It's so HARD for you to be UNHIP! Even when trying to. 😍Love this!

You’re a marvellous and very talented pianist.

A Piano Colada, please!

Don't pour me a martini please - I'm Old Fashioned. Really appreciate how you distilled the difference here.

I like La Campanella during cicktails but I end up interrupting guests with the loud trill and with the coda. Moonlight sonata is good too for this situation but then you turn heads when getting to third movement.

Pour me a martini I'm not a pianist but I used to hear Teddy Wilson, Dave Mckenna Adam Mackowitz and many other greats playing in Hotels and cruise ship lounges...I don't think they were playing any less ..they were great! Art Tatum used to play in a supermarket! My friends used to use playing in Hotels to try new voicings and try new reharmonizations...since many times nobody appeared to be listening... The only drawback in playing in hotels is you might have to entertain requests for "feelings" (that dates me!) or some pop song...but why not use that to create a fresh new take on whatever trite melody is requested. By the way fantastic playing on Can't get started!

Whats the secert to playing all the arpegios ???

Fantastic tutorial, Jeremy. Buying a martini and leaving a fat tip for those non-cliched solo pianists. 4 hours per night:ouch.🌹🌹🌹🌹😎

the twelve step plan for a recovering cocktail pianist step 1: Bach step 2: Bach … step 12: Bach

Your cocktail demonstrations kinda reminded me Liberace.

Really interesting comparison. I only would have added another important point, namely listoning to oneself when playing piano. If you are bored by your playing yourself, you will hardly create emotions in your audience. I think this applies more to cocktail pianists than to jazz pianists, although there are certainly also exceptions from this rule.

Thank you, Bobby! 😊

I have always wondered what the difference was...but I never would attend cocktail affairs so the only reference I had was from movies/TV. Thanks for showing us...and yes, stay off the sustain pedal.

I'm not even a cocktail pianist (certainly not a professional pianist), but the "bad"cocktail pianist you describe is me!. But the tips you give about what the proper jazz pianist does are really useful. Thanks.

Clear as bell Jeremy … thank you.

Great to listen to some real (albeit a little uncharacteristic for you) criticism, especially after the most recent podcast from Peter and Adam went out on Kenny G! Maybe you need to change the bmc link to bmam (buy me a martini)--headed there now.

For those who are not aware... I think it would be remiss to NOT bring up the incredible work of Jonathan and Darlene Edwards in light of your video. NOTE the pianist's hand in THIS album cover ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-NySAbB2JLII.html&pp=ygUdam9uYXRoYW4gYW5kIGRhcmxlbmUgZWR3YXJkcyA%3D Jonathan and Darlene Edwards were a musical comedy double act developed by American conductor and arranger Paul Weston ( March 12, 1912 - September 20, 1996), and his wife, singer Jo Stafford (November 12, 1917 - July 16, 2008). The routine was conceived in the 1950s, and involved Weston playing songs on the piano in unconventional rhythms, while Stafford sang off-key in a high pitched voice. The couple released five albums and one single as the Edwards, and their 1960 album, Jonathan and Darlene Edwards in Paris won that year's Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album.

Nice ! Your interpretation of cocktail piano sounded soooooo schmaltzy. Martini, shaken not stirred.

What's the goal for the jazz/cocktail competition?

Seems like both versions were played somewhat Heavy handed with frills. It’s been my experience that most people enjoy hearing a good jazz standard with lush chords and not straying too far off the range in terms of the melody. The “artsy” jazz pianist can also get carried away and completely butcher the song till the melody is unrecognizable….in a jazz bar setting that might be cool but most people would pay you to stop playing… hahaha

Mocktail, please 😀🍓💚

If I could only achieve 10% of this gorgeous standard I would feel quite accomplished! Often jazz players are too intent on showing off their chops with no regard for the melody. IMO without melody you got nothing! BTW would you consider the great Liberace whose style used so much flourishing arpegio a cocktail pianist?

Brilliant.

i like the stereotyped cocktail piano example ha! But then after he explained it, i realized i would grow bored with it, because the frequent flourishes tend to homogenize the melodic content and diminish the novelty of each piece.. and then listening to him play authentically was so much better

Martini please!

I havnt even got the sound up on this video, and i can see his hands are flying all over the place ,, how can this be a tutorial?

This is very lowbrow, but my best memory of a Cocktail Pianist is Bill Murray on SNL and his “Auto Train” skit!

Ohhh my favourite martini/cocktail is a Monkey Gland... interesting etymology and also delicious!

I play cocktail piano and I don't play an arrpegio as frequently as you showed. As a cocktail piano player I don't play to entertain I play to set the mood for whatever event., A jazz piano player plays to entertain. As a cocktail piano player you're there to be in the background. not the focus of attention.

Playing bad cocktail piano ain't easy. I would much rather play bad cocktail piano than work my crappy low paying job. Ever onward!

Ah, a martini sounds great ;). I'm still considerably beneath the level of "bad" cocktail playing demonstrated here. I've had to learn (and am still learning) as an aspiring artist and musician to allow myself to pass through the "bad" techniques and not avoid progress simply because it's leading me toward styles that have been (rightly) criticized by others. If we're lucky, our tastes and ears will improve before our technical facility will be able to catch up. Some of my favorite artists gnash their teeth in interviews at their "low" level of skill, because they know where they want to get, and they're not there yet. A lifelong quest!

German pianist Christian Fuchs says cocktail piano requires a lifetime of experience to play with style and taste.

Please pour me a pineapple juice.! Thank you for the thoughts on OP and no p (edal).

Any good examples of beer jazz out there?

You don’t even play bad when you try! I’d be happy if I could be as good as your version of a bad cocktail pianist

Yay martini!

Gonna spend this rainy Sunday to start my journey to become a bad cocktail pianist.

2:46 😂😂😂😂

“ Good pianists think like an arranger… ”

If someone once called Red Garland an out of tune cocktail pianist what do u think people will say about any of us?

🍸🍹

Jazz is the art of surprise and fresh avenues of cerebral stimulation… don’t go stale baby🎶

"...nobody, of course, would sing it that way" Madeline Kahn (Blazing Saddles) begs to differ.

Since you forgot the lyric, allow me to remind you. It goes “I can’t get started with you…”

to me it sounds like eubie blake vs art tatum

Pretty much any solo gig is a cocktail gig and some are really long - eg six sets switching between rooms. The main distinction is that you solo less and you're not supposed to draw people's attention when you do. You're not "the act", you're not much more than a waiter. The main problem is "turnaround tune tedium". I used to use those soul destroying gigs to learn new repertoire and practice unfamiliar keys - you're not supposed to scare the horses but you can modulate pretty much anywhere without calling attention to yourself. Down by steps or semitones are options but you also move by minor or major thirds as well. A great example of major third modulations - though definitely not cocktail - is Bill Evans on Rainy Day. Even good ears might not notice that he's Giant Stepping between choruses.

haha if coctail and even te so callcd solo pianists in my coutry were better..this place would be different

you might flunk your cocktail piano audition due to "YECCH face"

what about cocktail piano as interpreted by the Keith Jarret that lives within us (Kohn Concert style)? and not the typical songs, try Steel Dan cocktail...YA BABY!!

Lol it actually sounded good in the cocktail version. Just appreciate different styles because they are beautifull in their own way instead of labelling "good or bad". Sometimes as a musician you forget that most audience dont know shit about music so they just hear and see if it feels good to them.

Pour me an old-fashioned!

Cocktail piano was a huge part of what got me into studying jazz piano and it makes me sad that people look down on it. We all occasionally indulge in cliche blockbuster movies and we can enjoy them. Those films try to follow the same guidelines of filmmaking that the masters do, but they just overdo it or they ignore certain rules when perhaps they shouldn't. It doesn't mean it's a failure. Sometimes you want to eat a bag of Cheetos because you don't feel like cooking a proper meal. Don't hate on Cheetos and don't hate on cocktail piano. That's what I say, anyway.

Interesting but you really need to treat your room.

Actual real jazz (true Scotsman logical fallacy)

The terms “Jazz Musician” and “Cocktail Pianist” were used to separate the classical musicians by race. Black classical musicians were called jazz musicians because they “didn’t respect tradition” and were called cocktail pianists because they “couldn’t cut it in the orchestra” (they weren’t *allowed* to play) and had to play for the after hours instead of just enjoying the party

I like the title of this video. Why cocktail is LAMER than jazz piano. Jazz piano is also lame! But cocktail piano is EVEN LAMER!

Wow, you could've said basic or beginner rather than bad. People need somewhere to start!

Pour me a martini!

I would like a small glass of fernet. 🍻

This video would have been helpful in the 1940's... Now, I'm afraid it might be too late. Not sure.

Pour me a martini please

Well, your crappy cocktail playing was actually pretty lush to my ears and way better than anything I can play!

Can you please pour me a double scotch?

Jeremy.....I am one of COCKTAILERS.....and you simply exaggerate with those "arpeggios" and PEDAL.....please...some of us have a little TASTE...

I call the bad cocktail pianist a "Nordstrom" piano player. You can't even tell what they are playing. Overdone and annoying. They add constant flourishes and frills to show off their lame style. I would never add those lame frills, which are always overdone.

Depends on the pianist. Bored guys who would rather be playing a jazz gig give it a bad name. Your patronising attitude doesn't help either. Playing piano in public should always be entertaining and not just a drone in the background.

If you're gonna clickbait in the title, get to the point within 30 seconds 👎

Cocktail version is better. Jazz version sounds wrong

I feel personally attacked. 🫣😬 🤣😅

You sound great regardless. But I do hear the difference that most people wouldn't have picked up on, had you not explained. You're awesome on the piano. You demonstrated Oscar Peterson's style so well. 𝕋𝕙𝕒𝕟𝕜 𝕪𝕠𝕦 for 𝓼𝓱𝓪𝓻𝓲𝓷𝓰 this 𝕧𝕚𝕕𝕖𝕠.