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Do you want to play amazing jazz piano solos like the legendary Oscar Peterson? In today’s Quick Tip, Jonny May breaks down 10 Amazing Oscar Peterson Piano Licks that many piano students will find surprisingly accessible. You’ll discover:

• Essential Scales for Oscar Peterson Licks
• 10 Oscar Peterson Piano Licks That You Can Play!

Introduction

Oscar Peterson’s musical gifting and commitment to his craft were of the highest caliber. In fact, Duke Ellington fondly referred to Oscar as the “Maharaja of the keyboard.” Even though his sound and swing are absolutely irresistible, piano students sometimes become discouraged when listening to Oscar’s playing. That’s because his towering talent can be rather intimidating. While there’s certainly only one Oscar Peterson, that doesn’t mean that the rest of us should despair. On the contrary, today’s lesson demonstrates that many of Oscar Peterson’s jazz piano licks can be learned and played by aspiring jazz piano students everywhere.

Essential Scales for Oscar Peterson Licks

Before we dive into the specific Oscar Peterson licks that we’ll be learning, let’s start with an overview of some essential blues scales in F. As you’ll soon see, this melodic material forms the basis for much of Oscar’s blues vocabulary. This section covers 3 essential types of blues scales:

• The Major Blues Scale
• The Minor Blues Scale
• The Mixo-Blues Scale

F Major Blues Scale

The major blues scale is a versatile, six-note improv scale that is constructed according to the formula 1–2–♭3–♮3–5–6. Therefore, an F major blues scale contains the notes F–G–A♭–A♮–C–D. The major blues scale is usually used over major or dominant 7th chords and produces a balanced sound that is not too bright and not too bluesy. Other names for the major blues scale are the gospel scale and the major pentatonic ♭3 scale.

As a warm-up for today’s lesson, try playing the F major blues scale in 8th notes and triplets as shown below.

Great job. Now, let’s turn our attention to the minor blues scale.

F Minor Blues Scale

The minor blues scale is a six-note improv scale that is constructed according to the formula 1–♭3–4–♯4–5–♭7. Therefore, an F minor blues scale contains the notes F–A♭–B♭–B♮–C–E♭. Minor blues scales are frequently used over dominant 7th and minor 7th chords and are described as having a “funky,” “down-home,” “earthy” or “bluesy” sound.¹

Try playing the following F major blues scale exercises with 8th notes and triplets as shown below.

Well done. Now, let’s consider one additional type of blues scale.

F Mixo-Blues Scale

The mixo-blues scale is a 9-note hybrid scale that gets its name from combining the mixolydian scale with the minor blues scale. However, another way to understand this scale is to recognize that it contains all of the notes the major blues scale and the minor blues scale. For example, the notes of an F Mixo-Blues Scale are F–G–A♭–A♮–B♭–B♮–C–D–E♭. To construct a mixo-blues scale, use the formula 1–2–♭3–♮3–4–♯4–5–6–♭7.

Try playing the F mixo-blues scale with 8th notes and triplets as demonstrated in the example below.

Great job. Now, let’s learn some Oscar Peterson piano licks!

10 Oscar Peterson Piano Licks That You Can Play!

Alright, we’re ready to dive into some tasty Oscar Peterson piano licks. Surprisingly, over 95% of the notes in these licks come from the blues scales that we covered in the intro to today’s lesson. However, you won’t sound like Oscar Peterson just by noodling around with a blues scale. Rather, Oscar’s irresistible sound has more to do with his innate melodic sensibility and his impeccable sense of swing. The great news is that you can develop these musical instincts as well as you practice playing the 10 Oscar Peterson licks in this section!

Since today’s lesson focuses on Oscar’s right hand playing, the left-hand voicings shown here are more suggestive. Jonny is using standard 3-note rootless voicings that contain the 3rd and 7th, plus one additional note, which is typically a chord extension like the 9th or 13th, or a chord alteration like the ♭13. Honestly, these Oscar Peterson licks will sound great over any voicing technique that is comfortable for you. For additional information on these suggested voicings, check out Blues Chords for Piano: The Complete Guide (Beg/Int).

Due to publisher’s restrictions, the lesson sheet PDF that appears in Jonny’s featured tutorial for this lesson is available from our partners at MusicNotes.com. However, you can use the links below to easily navigate through this lesson.

A Note About The Form

“Reunion Blues” uses a 12-bar blues form in F with a 2-5-1 chord progression in the last four measures of the form (Gm7→C7→F7).

To make these licks easier to apply to the blues form, the licks from the 2nd chorus are shown with measure numbers that correspond to their place in the 12-bar form. In other words, measure 13 has been reset to measure 1, and so on.

Alright, let’s check out lick #1!

Oscar Peterson Lick 1

Lick #1 comes straight from the F major blues scale and is a lick that any beginner piano student can master. However, it’s important to notice that it doesn’t start or ends on the note F. Instead, Oscar begins on a C and outlines an ascending F6 chord in 2nd inversion (C–D–F–A). Before the final note, Oscar tastefully ornaments the 3rd of F6 with a chromatic approach from G♯, which gives it a decidedly blue flavor.

Oscar Peterson Lick 2

Lick #2 in another Oscar Peterson lick that is suitable for all levels of students. It features six consecutive 8th notes with a meandering descent over the F minor blues scale.

Oscar Peterson Lick 3

Lick #3 is a concise 8th-note motif that uses just 3 notes from the F major blues scale. This lick is appropriate for all levels and can be used in isolation or tacked on to the beginning or end of a longer improv line (as in Lick #8).

Oscar Peterson Lick 4

Lick #4 illustrates an advanced phrasing technique that we call “playing over the barline” or “playing across the barline.” As you can see from the notation, this lick begins in the last measure of the first line of the blues form continues seamlessly into the second line of the form, even as the chord symbol changes. Even though this phrasing is quite mature, you may be surprised to discover that first two bars of this lick use the F minor blues scale almost exclusively. In fact, the final the C♯ in measure 5 is the only exception, which functions as a chromatic passing tone to the D at the beginning of measure 6. Next, measures 6 and 7 are a good case study on how to use the mixo-blues scale to combine fragments of the F minor blues scale and the F major blues scale.

Oscar Peterson Lick 5

Lick #5 is another lick that is suitable for all levels and features an ascending F6 outline from the note C, just like Lick #1. However, here Oscar incorporates a triplet rhythm. If you are an intermediate or advanced piano student, try starting this lick on different beats of the measure. You can even experiment with using it as a launching point for an extended phrase like Oscar does in the broader context of this solo.

Oscar Peterson Lick 6

Oscar Peterson Lick #6 is an advanced bebop phrase that features the sound of upper and lower neighbors, chord outlines, and enclosures. For example, measure 9 contains two F♯ notes that are both chromatic lower neighbors to the note G. In the upper register, the F♯ is proceeded by an A♭. These two chromatic notes together are the upper and lower neighbors to the G that follows in measure 10, which constitutes a melodic shape that we call an enclosure.

Between the chromatic notes in measure 9, Oscar plays 8th notes over an ascending Gm9 chord outline (G–B♭–D–F–A). For the first half of measure 10, Oscar continues to outline a descending Gm7 chord outline over C7, which implies a C7(sus4) sound. The latter half of measure 10 segues into an F minor blues scale fragment. Measure 11 begins with notes from the F major blues scale up until the E♮, which serves as the lower neighbor to the F. The remainder of the lick represents another example F mixo-blues scale material.

Oscar Peterson Lick 7

Oscar uses Lick #7 to launch the 2nd chorus of his solo. This intermediate-to-advanced level lick uses the F minor blues scale and features harmonized quarter notes followed by a descending 16th-note run which terminates on an A♮ from the F major blues scale.

Oscar Peterson Lick 8

Lick #8 is an intermediate level Oscar Peterson lick that begins with an F minor blues scale idea in measure 2. However, when Oscar gets to beat 4 of measure 2, he transitions to an ascending F major blues scale idea which terminates with the exact same notes as Lick #3, albeit up an octave.

Oscar Peterson Lick 9

Lick #9 is another advanced bebop lick that represents “playing over the barline.” This lick begins with a G minor triad outline in measure 4 over an F7 chord. The most likely explanation here is that Oscar played this G minor triad in anticipation of the B♭7 in measure 5, since Gm is a complimentary upper structure triad for B♭7 that produces a dominant 13th sound. In the back half of measure 4, the notes C♯ and B♮ form an enclosure around C♮, which is the 9th of B♭7. Then, the final A♭ in measure 4 is the 7th of B♭7.

The first half of measure 5 is rather interesting in that it combines notes of the F minor blues scale with top harmony from the F major blues scale. In the back half of measure 5, Oscar is essentially outlining chord tones of B♭7 with the initial C♯ serving as a chromatic lower neighbor. Measure 6 most easily understood as an F major blues scale lick that begins with an enclosure on beat 1, which targets the D on beat 2. Similarly, measure 7 is also an F major blues scale idea that includes an enclosure around the note A.

Oscar Peterson Lick 10

Lick #10 is another advanced level lick that that features “over the barline” phrasing. For instance, measure 8 features an ascending Gm9 chord outline that anticipates the Gm7 chord that arrives in measure 9. Like in Lick #6, the F♯ in measure 8 is a chromatic lower neighbor that resolves to G. While all the note of measure 9 belong to the F mixo-blues scale, it’s more likely that Oscar is simply thinking of the G Dorian scale here (G–A–B♭–C–D–E–F). Next, bar 10 begins with a descending F mixo-blues scale fragment that targets the root of C7 on beat 3 and then continues down a C Dominant Bebop Scale. Then, measures 11 and 12 are primarily drawn from the F major blues scale. The only exception is that beat 4 of measure 11 contains interval rocking on a B♭ major triad, which produces a gospel connector chord sound.

Conclusion

Congratulations, you’ve completed today’s lesson on 10 Amazing Oscar Peterson Piano Licks. As a result, you can now incorporate some authentic Oscar Peterson licks over an F blues. Also, be sure to check out our full-length courses on The Bible of Blues Riffs (Int, Adv) which contain 120 authentic blues piano licks!

If you enjoyed this lesson, then be sure to visit the following PWJ resources:

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¹ Aebersold, Jamey. Jazz Handbook. , 2013, p 31.

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