D Minor Scale for Piano Improvisation in C

Video Transcript

"Now we're going to play our minor scale, out of the C major that it is derived, so if we play our C major scale again, we're still going to use the same scale pattern. But D minor right, C, D, starts right here on D, and if we play a black chord, right, skip up a third, up a third, up a third, we outline our D minor chord, and you can hear how that is different from the C major. So now I'm in C major, D minor. So by starting out on the two and playing thirds up again, outline a minor chord, and you don't always have to play it like this if you say take these top notes and put them on the bottom, you still have the D minor chord, this sounds a little muddy 'cause it's low on the piano, but if you play it here, and you can hear how it still sounds like I'm going from D to C, so I took my D black chord and put the top notes on the bottom, then the same with the C, it's called inversion. But as long as you have that one, three, five and seven in there, it sounds gorgeous. So that's your D minor chord and you start on the second note of your C major scale and build off the thirds. And if we're doing stride piano with D minor, you want to go two to five, so, two, five, two, five, two... see how when you hit that A it sounds like it wants to go into another key. So you want to go between two and five, and then again, for C major you go one and five. So C major, D minor, C major, two, five for D minor. So that's your D minor, which again, comes out of that same major scale."