How to play Boogie Woogie Piano
You'll need some musical knowledge and experience playing the piano for this. Boogie Woogie is very easy to play in theory, and if you're a decent pianist it's just as easy in practice.
Basically all you do is grab your bass line, stick it into a 12 bar blues chord progression (the basic one is C-C-C-C-F-F-C-C-G-F-C-C or I-I-I-I-IV-IV-I-I-V-IV-I-I). A good bass line is CG-CG CA-CA CG-CG CA-CA (CG-CG means play C and G at the same time for a Quaver and a half, then again for a semiquaver. CA-CA you can figure out. If you know what I mean by this, then you probably know all this already)
Here's that in manuscript. Just transpose this bar into whatever chord you're
at (ie F-C for F and G-D for G)
Play your 12 bar blues progression using this bass line once through. Then play it again, but this time play a nice, simple, easily repeated melody over the top. The melody should have a rest at the end of each bar. It should be repeated once for each of the first four bars, transposed up to F (or IV) for those two bars. The melody should be done on a blues scale.
This is a good scale to use
For the next three bars, use a more continous melody (ie no rest at the end of the bars). Play it in G, F then C (V, IV then I) and then play a simple ending melody-something like C-G-G-G (all quavers)
Here's some melodies to use-you can elaborate on these (which is half the
idea of boogie really)
Play what you just did once more, then go onto a solo...
To solo just keep the bass line going and play anything you want, so long as
it's fairly rythmical and fits the scale you're using (don't forget to
transpose!). Clashes (like M7 intervals) are good for a change and sound best if
you repeat them a few times to show you meant it...
Once you've done that, play your basic melodies again, this time an octave higher. To finish, just play a major chord from whatever key you're in (this sounds best if you make the highest note the 'middle' one of the chord and let that note 'slip' up from a semitone below...I can't remember all the proper terms for those, but if you can play the piano and you know what boogie sounds like, I think you'll understand what I mean)
Anyway, that's basically it. This isn't an 'official' guide to boogie woogie, this is just how to play a nice boogie song (on the spot too, if you get the hang of it). This is all just my ideas from listening to, playing and writing boogie.
If you want an example of this format listen to the Manky Cats theme song (here)