Phraseology

Versatile veteran multi-keyboardist Ricky Peterson has a high profile and stellar reputation, particularly among his peers. According to Eric Bikales, himself a veteran multi-keyboardist and longtime Neil Sedaka band member, “Ricky Peterson can fit into any playing situation. He’s got great R&B and jazz chops. He’s equally facile on piano, organ, and synths.” Ricky’s supportive, creative, and dependable session and touring work with such varied artists as Billy Joel, James Taylor, Jermaine Jackson, Jimmy Buffet, Boz Scaggs, Dave Koz, Sting, Sergio Mendes, Chaka Khan, Sheryl Crow, and David Sanborn confirm Eric’s enthusiastic endorsement of Ricky’s talents. Even with all his inherent talent, you can be sure that Ricky put in some serious shedding time to attain his consistently high standards. But, it’s not only time that’s required to get you to your musical goals; it’s also optimizing that time by working on the right stuff. A lot of that “stuff” can be heard in Ricky’s “Oh Da Manitee” organ solo; let’s take a look at some of the components that go into creating these amazing musical moments.

Ex. 1. In the totally burning transcribed solo from “Oh Da Manitee” on pages 50–51, you’ll find that Ricky Peterson draws on several scales for the raw materials for his improv. The blues scale (1a) is the foundation of Ricky’s opening phrases in E minor. Ricky uses the relative major mode of the E blues scale as well, which contains the same notes but emphasizes G (1b). This works great over a G7 chord. Ricky uses this scale in the key of C, over a C7sus chord later in his solo. It’s also a favorite of one of Ricky’s musical collaborators, saxophonist David Sanborn. Another scale Ricky uses over the E minor chord is the E Dorian (1c), which is the second mode of the D major scale.

Ex. 2. The opening four-note phrase of Ricky’s solo uses the first three notes of the E minor blues scale (2a). You can explore sounds like this by isolating notes from the scale, and then adding syncopation to the rhythm (2b). If there are multiple scale choices for a chord, as we have on E minor (E minor blues and E Dorian), you can create a phrase that uses notes from each scale. Here I start a phrase as Ricky dose in his solo using the E Blues Scale, but I use E Dorian for the second half (2c).

Ex. 3. You can expand and develop a simple phrase (3a) by gradually adding notes (3b and 3c) until you complete your idea and it becomes a memorable phrase (3d).

All files performed by Scott Healy.