How to Play Disco and Dance Piano: Left-Hand Bass and Syncopated Right Hand
To play disco piano, keep the left hand toggling between a root and its octave in steady eighth notes (pinky legato on the root, a short staccato thumb flick on the octave) while the right hand plays the chords in rhythms that build from held whole notes to off-beat hits, tresillo patterns and sixteenth-note syncopation.
Key points
- The left hand toggles root and octave in eighth notes: pinky legato on the root, staccato thumb flick on the octave.
- The progression is Em (E G B), Bm (D F# B), C (C E G) and Am (C E A), with roots in the bass.
- Build the right hand from semibreves to minims to crotchets, using legato-staccato contrasts.
- Syncopate with hits a dotted crotchet apart, then the slow tresillo on 1, the and of 2, and 4.
- Move on to sixteenth-note hits on the e, and and a, then the fast tresillo and clave patterns.
This lesson from Jason Zac at Nathaniel School of Music shows you how to build an 80s disco and dance groove on the piano. It suits pianists who know basic triads and want a stronger sense of groove and hand independence. The left hand keeps a steady eighth-note engine going while the right hand gradually takes on more syncopated rhythms.
The Chord Progression
The groove uses four chords from E minor, the relative minor of G major: Em, Bm, C and Am. To keep things simple, use these right-hand shapes:
- Em: root position, E G B
- Bm: first inversion, D F# B
- C: root position, C E G
- Am: first inversion, C E A
The left hand plays the roots: E, B, C and A. For a more Dorian colour, you can swap the last chord for A major (A C# E). Start by playing one chord hit per bar and holding the bass, just to learn the changes. Use all your fingers, especially the ring finger.
The Left-Hand Disco Bass
The left hand does not play the root and octave together. It toggles between the root and the octave in eighth notes: 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and. Quarter notes will not give you the groove.
The articulation is what makes it disco:
- The pinky plays the low root legato (long).
- The thumb plays the octave staccato, a short choppy flick.
If both notes are staccato, it sounds like a detective film score. If both are legato, it sounds lazy. Long-short, long-short gives you a kick-snare pumping effect.
Keep your wrist loose by turning it slightly, as if you were opening a door. A stiff wrist makes the forearm hurt, and this pattern is usually played at around 130 to 160 beats per minute. Do not flick the thumb too hard, and keep the elbow still. Let your head nod on the pulse and move your body. If you do not feel the groove, the audience will not either.
Building the Right Hand
The left hand stays the same throughout, so it needs to be completely comfortable before you add the right hand.
- Semibreves: hold each chord for the whole bar.
- Minims: two hits per bar. Try one long and one short, then flip it. The left hand keeps its own long-short pattern and must not copy the right hand.
- Crotchets: four hits per bar. Try three legato hits and an accented staccato fourth, or three staccato and one legato. Without this articulation the groove becomes a fast ballad.
- Inversions: more advanced players can move through inversions within the bar for a melodic effect.
Syncopation: Straight Charleston and Tresillo
Groove comes from latching onto the off-beats. Play two chord hits a dotted crotchet apart, a straight version of the Charleston rhythm:
- Beat 1 and the and of 2
- The and of 1 and beat 3
- Beat 2 and the and of 3
- The and of 2 and beat 4
Add a third hit another dotted crotchet later and you get the slow tresillo: beat 1, the and of 2, and beat 4. Experiment with staccato and legato combinations on these hits.
The Sixteenth-Note World
Sixteenths divide each beat into four: 1 e and a, 2 e and a. Practise hitting chords on:
- only the ands
- only the e's, which give the music a jolt of energy
- only the a's
- combinations of e, and and a
The fast tresillo uses dotted quavers instead of dotted crotchets. You can leave out beat 1 in the right hand, since the left hand already plays it, or shift hits onto the e for displacement. From there, Latin clave patterns such as son, rumba and bossa follow a three-hit and two-hit structure.
How to Practise
Master the left-hand legato-staccato bass first, slowly. Then work through the right-hand stages one at a time. Practise off-beats in isolation rather than machine-gunning every subdivision. It is fine if the sixteenth-note patterns take a few weeks, because the slow tresillo alone is a solid workout.
Questions about this lesson
What does the left hand play in disco piano?
It alternates between the root and its octave in steady eighth notes. The pinky plays the root legato and the thumb plays the octave as a short staccato flick, which creates a pumping, drum-like feel.
What chords are used in this disco piano groove?
The chords are E minor, B minor, C major and A minor, all from E minor. You can swap A minor for A major for a Dorian sound.
How do I stop my left hand from hurting at disco tempos?
Keep your wrist flexible by turning it slightly, as if you were opening a door. Do not flick the thumb too hard and avoid moving the elbow. The groove often runs at 130 to 160 beats per minute.
What is the slow tresillo on piano?
It is three hits separated by two dotted crotchets: beat 1, the and of 2, and beat 4. The fast tresillo uses the same feel with dotted quavers.
Practise it
- Groove MetronomeWork with tempo, accents and polyrhythms instead of a single unchanging click.
- Rhythm TeacherBuild accent patterns, divide beats and explore odd metres and polyrhythms.
- Piano classes at Nathaniel School of MusicLive online or in Bangalore, with a teacher.
- All free music apps40 practice tools for harmony, rhythm, ear training and more.
Related lessons
- The Advanced Tresillo Piano Challenge (Hand Independence and Inversions)The Tresillo Piano Challenge is an advanced exercise in which you play D minor, G minor (or Gm6), D minor and A7b9 over four cycles: the left hand keeps an oompa pattern, the right hand plays the tresillo rhythm through each D minor inversion, and every A7b9 bar adds a new kind of triplet or three-note grouping.
- Beginner Left-Hand Piano Workout for Melodic Independence (Part 1)To build hand independence on the piano, keep a melody in your right hand while your left hand plays steady root-and-octave rhythm patterns: a simple pulse, a toggling pulse, a disco pulse, the We Will Rock You rhythm and the Afro-Cuban tresillo.
- Piano Hand Independence: Melody in the Right, Chord Patterns in the LeftTo build piano hand independence, keep one simple right-hand melody fixed and practise the left hand through more and more demanding patterns: quarter-note pulses, eighth-note toggles, half notes, spread chords, syncopated rhythms and finally a sixteenth-note tresillo.
- Piano Hand Independence With Sixteenth Notes: Glam Rock Bass Riff (Part 3)To build piano hand independence, keep the right hand on steady quarter-note chords (D minor, F major, G major) while the left hand plays chord roots at offbeat hit points such as the and of two and the and of four, then adds a B–C pickup, with the C optionally pushed to the e of four as a sixteenth note.