Customer Reviews

DVD-The Blues/Rock Piano of Johnnie Johnson

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Johnnie was Chuck Berry's piano player for years, Chuck pretty much copied Johnnie on his guitar and made a bunch of money. This is another DVD from Homespun. I bought Dr John's 2 DVD set. It is the benchmark now for all these instructional DVD's I seem to be accumulating.
Dr. John plays solo, Johnnie has a back up band.
The sound on this video is good, the band is too loud in some spots.
What it horrible is the camera work. In Dr. John's DVD's the camera is fixed above his head, you get optimal view of both hands. The camera guy for Johnnie is all over the place, creating angles and missing the second hand, or both hands way too much, also, when Johnnie is cooking, I don't care what the other players look like, let me see his hands!!! Too much time spent wandering around the room. The included booklet is too small and has lame transcriptions (all the homespun dvd's come with this). I gave it a 5 rating because of Johnnie, the man is an American Music Icon and $20 is a bargain to watch him play up close.

Unfortunately, this Homespun vid fell below expectations. Other products had much better camera views and repeated licks so they could be learned. This one had a slanted view of the keyboard, very little instruction and as a result, I was very disappointed.

If you want to get the sound of blues and early rock n' roll on the piano, Johnnie Johnson is the one to go. Johnnie is hugely under-appreciated. He's so down to earth, he patiently plays the tunes slow to show people how it's done. I find the several pages of sheet music really helpful. Couldn't believe the sound I was getting, it's really great. You also get an appreciation of the intuitive nature of this kinda of music and the greatness of Johnnie

I love this DVD, and have played it a number of times and will in the future as I try to learn Johnnie Johnsons approach to piano.
I've found it impossible to buy music scores of Johnnie Johnson piano.
This DVD came with 20 pages of music as an added bonus.
The DVD was delivered to me in Australia within two weeks.
Excellant value for money for any one interested in this type of piano blues as it evolved into Rock and Roll.