KEYBOARDS
Hannah Barstow is a Toronto-based pianist, vocalist, and composer. She has an ARCT in Piano Performance and a
Bachelor of Music in Jazz Performance from the University of Toronto. She released her self-titled debut EP in the
autumn of 2017, which features a mix of jazz standards and her original contemporary compositions.
www.hannahbarstow.com
By Hannah Barstow
Composing a Jazz
Standard-Type Tune
W
hen I was new to the art of jazz
piano 10 years ago, I wondered
how it would ever be possible
to compose a jazz tune. I
was fascinated by jazz voicings and eagerly
learned how one voicing can flow seamlessly
to another when comping, but I was still stuck
when trying to write jazz songs, where I had
not been stuck before writing pop songs.
Fortunately, I have since learned this skill
and I put it in practice regularly. A common
mistake made by inexperienced composers
is to arbitrarily choose chords for their piece,
which often results in chord progressions
that do not follow a logical path. This is not
to say that one cannot successfully write
tunes with unconventional chord choices, but
understanding the basic rules of jazz