Variations on Jerry Lee's piano parts

Variations on Jerry Lee's Great Balls of Fire

Okay, so let's look at some variations of the material that Jerry Lee plays on Great Balls of Fire. As we said, he's got lots of these kinds of things. What can we do with that?

Natural Additions

• Octave Addition: Adding the octave at the top feels very natural to me. Just to fatten it out a little bit, we can roll it. I'm kind of using the 6th there as well.

  • We could maybe use that on the IV chord.

• Fifth Variation: That's just one little idea.

  • Instead of the C, we could bring a fifth down at the bottom and make it a G.
  • This creates a slightly different sound.

Developing Our Own Approach

So, it might not be something that Jerry Lee Lewis would actually play himself, or maybe it would, but it's about looking at an idea and doing something different with it. Hopefully, we can develop our own approach to the music that way.

Outlining the Chord

Here's another little idea that's kind of related, especially since we've put that G down, outlining that C chord. That's a nice riff we could use over the solo section.

• First Time Playthrough:
  • That's it. "Goodness of gracious, great balls of fire!"
  • Now I've just combined it with the C as well.

This could be a nice variation to experiment with:

• You could change it with each chord, but I think it's kind of hipper to stay on the same note.
• Why not just keep it consistent?

Solo Feature

Again, that could be quite nice in the solo. If you're singing or someone else is singing during the verse, it might get in the way. However, there's a bit of a feature in the solo that could be really cool.

• Try It Out:
  • "Goodness of gracious, great balls of fun!"
  • Why not change the top note there?

I'm actually landing on both the G and the A. It's a nice big fat sound! Perhaps you can go up to the B flat, but that's pretty tricky, actually.

Recap

So, that's another little idea to explore!