How long did it take you to learn how to play piano (decent level)? What is your story?
I started piano at 13 and then I went crazy. I don’t know why, maybe I just have an obsessive personality, but I would practice 6–8 hours. I went to school for piano performance as well. Now I’m a teacher, blogger, and business owner.I didn’t get a teacher until I was 15. At that point I had already become comfortable with reading music. I wanted to play music my friends were playing, so I was working on Fantasie Impromptu and the third movement of moonlight sonata. The pieces were way too hard for me, but for some reason when I started with my teacher she kept me working on them.I’m actually grateful she did, because if she had moved me to music that was more on my level I probably would have not been interested, and quit. It took a lot more work but eventually I learned those pieces and worked on a lot of other music.After about 3 years I was playing some fairly advanced pieces, not that well mind you, but I was trying. I would say I was fairly decent after about 5 years. But remember, I was practicing 8 hours a day. I read probably a hundred books about piano technique, memorizing, pedaling, practicing, and anything else I could get my hands on.I had a practice plan that I wrote out every day, and I timed myself with a kitchen timer for each piece, making sure I put the time necessary towards each one. I video recorded myself (before good phone cameras) to make sure my physical techinique was right, so I wouldn’t get injuries. I bought hundreds of CDs of classical piano music.I fell in love with everything piano, I devoted every second I had to learning. It was quite the journey. It has changed my life.I recently wrote up an article about how long to expect it to take you to learn piano as well. Check it out:How Long Does it Take to Learn Piano?
What do pianists see when they play the piano?
Wow, such a good question! And one with an interesting answer.When non-pianists look at the piano it looks like a haze of black and white stripes. If you got most people to draw a piano for you, they probably wouldn’t distinguish the clusters of 2 and 3 black notes and instead draw alternating black and white keys the whole way along.So at a base level, a pianist looks at the piano and sees the notes that these keys represent.Once you begin to learn to play, you begin to see patterns based on what you’ve learned:when you learn about the clusters of black keys, then you notice them immediately when you look at the piano.when you learn about whole steps and half steps and other intervals, you immediately see these when you look at the piano.when you learn about chords and scales you see a mixture of the ones that first come to mind, as soon as you look at the piano.The more you learn in terms of music theory, the more you see when you gaze upon those black and white stripes.After you’ve played for a while, especially when you are familiar with a lot of different key signatures and have played many songs - you will begin to look at certain notes and immediately see the songs or riffs that feature those notes heavily and therefore have stuck in your mind to represent those keys.If I plonk my hands down on a random place on the piano, depending on which cluster of notes my hands fall on - a certain piece of music will come to mind!Another interesting point to note is that if you have delved into writing your own songs you will develop a preference for certain types of chords, or certain key signatures (scales) and therefore when you place your hands on the piano you immediately fall into that key signature automatically!Mostly though, I think when a pianist looks at a piano they see possibility! Endless possibility!If you have any more questions about the piano or learning piano feel free to come on over to my facebook group. Here I have available many answers to many questions about piano and as a professional online piano tutor, I’m always happy to answer any new ones! If you are interested in learning piano enrol in my FREE 7-day introductory email course! www.pianopicnic.com/free
I want to learn to play the piano. If I get a 61-key keyboard, how much would I be limited in my songs? Would it be better to get an 88-key keyboard?
More is better than not enough.It is extremely annoying to not have enough keys. However, if you're just learning to play, the likelihood you'll be needing those missing keys are slim. As you advance in your studies, you'll eventually want 88 keys, but that may be a few years from now.That said, if you want to learn piano, then I would suggest buying a piano right off the bat, if your budget will allow or if you don't have "too much noise" considerations. If you do decide to go with a keyboard, make sure you buy one with weighted keys (the touch emulates the touch of a real piano). If you don't, when you eventually transition to an acoustic, you'll will have to undo a lot of bad technical habits.Other considerations > Keyboard vs. Piano: What Do New Students Need?
How do some pianists transpose music so well?
Transposition is a skill that is absolutely essential to organists, and in the UK, the "Rolls Royce" Diploma for organists is the FRCO and an integral element to its acquisition is transposition.It is a USEFUL acquisition for piano accompanists, who may be asked by a singer to transpose the part higher or lower so that it lies more comfortably within their range. However, it is surprising the number of GOOD pianists who DON'T have the skill of instant transposition. I remember a couple of years ago being asked by a singer to accompany her impromptu in a particular song that I could fortunately play by ear (there being no music). she required me to put it a bit lower, so I obliged. Her reply was: "I've been looking for a pianist for years who could do that." Now, I didn't think that particularly unusual, but her comment revealed the case to be otherwise.In MY case, "playing by ear" in any key has never been a problem, and I think this stems from my earliest musical experiences when my mother sat me on her knee while she practised, and encouraged me to pick out nursery rhymes which I could play in different keys.However, transposing BY EAR is a different skill from transposing AT SIGHT. This latter skill, is acquired through practice, practice, practice. At first, you are taught to transpose up or down a tone (step higher or lower). It then progresses to harder intervals such as the perfect 5th and minor 3rd (these intervals being related to the common transpositions of certain instruments in orchestral scores).Whilst considerable facility can be gained through hard work, there are also those who have a natural flair for Sight Reading as well as transposition. I have quoted on a number of occasions that the British composer Arnold Bax had a phenomenal ability to play orchestral scores on the piano (which, as already mentioned, involve transposing instruments). He was once asked the source of such skill, and he got the questioner to throw up a handful of pebbles into the air. He could instantaneously identify the number of pebbles. He probably had some form of photographic memory, and I suspect that the most skilled sight readers and sight transposers are utilising a similar faculty. It is certainly a fact that GOOD sight reading and sight transposition requires one to LOOK AHEAD of what you are actually playing, so that in effect you are playing from memory what you have already seen.
Longest string quartets?
Longplayer by Jem Finer (1000 years) : Longplayer is a one thousand year long musical composition. It began playing at midnight on the 31st of December 1999, and will continue to play without repetition until the last moment of 2999, at which point it will complete its cycle and begin again. Conceived and composed by Jem Finer, it was originally produced as an Artangel commission, and is now in the care of the Longplayer Trust. Longplayer is composed in such a way that the character of its music changes from day to day and – though it is beyond the reach of any one person’s experience – from century to century. It works in a way somewhat akin to a system of planets, which are aligned only once every thousand years, and whose orbits meanwhile move in and out of phase with each other in constantly shifting configurations. In a similar way, Longplayer is predetermined from beginning to end – its movements are calculable, but are occurring on a scale so vast as to be all but unknowable. ORGAN2 / ASLSP (As Slow As Possible) by John Cage (639 years) The slowest and longest piece of music in the world John-Cage-Organ-Project in Halberstadt, Germany Since September 5, 2000, which is the 88th birthday of the avantgarde composer and artist John Cage, the slowest and longest concert that the world has ever heard has been playing: ORGAN2/ASLSP As Slow aS Possible that means this piece of music, for the organ, will be performed for 639 years in the church of St. Burchardi in Halberstadt. Deutsche Welle, July 5th, 2008 One Thousand Hear Change of Note in World’s Longest Concert The next musical change in John Cage’s slow masterpiece will happen in November More than 1,000 music-lovers showed up on Saturday, July 5, in a German town to hear a change of note in the longest-running and slowest piece of music ever composed. Eccentric US composer John Cage (1912-1992) planned his composition to last 639 years, meaning more than a dozen generations of musicians will be needed to play it on an automatic, as-yet unfinished organ at Halberstadt, Germany. Entitled ORGAN2/ASLSP, it began in 2001 and has so far reached its sixth note. The second part of the name means "as slow as possible."
What/why don't people "get" modern classical music?
Sometimes I hear people say that they "don't get" modern (or contemporary) classical music. I've always been confounded by this response: What specifically don't people get, and why don't they get it? (also what the heck does it mean to "get" a piece of music?) Here are two examples of pieces in which I've heard the "I don't get it" response: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMB9239-f... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usnIaA1Sn...