I need some direction for practicing...

[bigswole31]

I am a songwriter/producer who only dabbled at keyboards (been drumming for over 25 years). Now I am trying to really learn to play. Songwriting has been a chore because of my lack of playing skills. You guys who can play are like a secretary who can type well: able to produce output as needed with the only hinderance being your availability of source material (creativity, inspiration). I am like a student who has to type a 30 page report that's due the next day who hunt-and-pecks with two fingers!

 

My head is full of ideas, but I have to find each and every note of the melody, record it into a sequencer, then as the sequencer plays back I find each individual note of the harmony. You can imagine how long it takes to build a tune this way. Aaarrgh!

 

Years ago, I just used to farm everything out to keyboard players, but I then had to try to get the results in line with my vision for the tune. I am trying to develop the "bridge" between what's in my head and my fingers, but I need some direction. How do I develop the facility at the keyboard? How do I get to the place where just as easily as I can hum it, I can play it?

 

I am able to alot about an hour a day for practice, but what do I practice? I have been reading theory books for a few months and have a decent grasp on the concepts. I am able to read music fairly well (not sight-reading...the let me take it slow type), but the problem is my connection with the keys. Do I just play scales all day until the intervals fuse to my brain? Do I toil over "getting started" books and play nursery-rhyme tunes? Are there any books/videos that would help me in making the connections? Do I try to memorize chords and fingerings from a chord encyclopedia?

 

It was very hard to carve out the hour for practicing, but I NEED to do this. In the meanwhile I still need to service my clients, so the hunt-and-peck continues. Please help!

[Goldberg]

Hello. I honestly can't tell you if this is going to help you or not-but whenever someone posts a question about practising and such I always try and help them from my viewpoint-again, it might not be what you're looking for.

I have been playing 4 years and have advanced rapidly, not to boast. I have recently switched teachers due to a very abrupt change in my old teacher's life to a Ph.D highly accomplished professor at Rice University who is a former student of Richard Goode.

In other words, I am a classical pianist, not a Rock and Roll or jazz pianist and I've only "dabbled" a bit in the synth world myself. Also, my songwriting skills are at the bottom of the barrel.

If you're still reading, here's what I reccommend: scales-oh, boy yes. But scales alone won't teach you TOO much. It's essential, at least for classical music, to be able to zip up and down the piano in a hurry-and in order to do that you must master the fingering of the scale, which I'm sure you can find in books. So, yes, it's important. But, don't spend too much time in it right off the bat. I would personally reccommend 15-20 minutes for starters. Oh yeah-what kind of keyboard do you have? For starters-you only need to do 2 octaves, but if you do 4 octaves I think it goes better...or something. Anyway-don't let it get boring. Use different rythms. For example-an eighth note followed by a sixteenth note and so forth. Or triplets.

My professor has me do this: Do one octave of quater notes, then two octaves of eighth notes, three octaves of triplets, and then the whole enchilada with sixteenth notes.

Now congratulations if you've managed to stay awake. Next-and this is just me-but try and find a book of excersises by Herz somewhere. My previous teacher started me on the excersises and they are fabulous. The just of them:

Start with the "basic notes"-CDEFG-hold them all down (both hands). Now, lift up your thumbs (on C) and play the note repetitively. It's written down like this in the book: DEFG are all whole notes, and C has eight repititions as an eighth note. Tempo doesn't matter-start slow, get faster. Do it for all of the notes-hold down CEFG, and play D repetively. Same thing.

The next group of excersises goes like this: hold EFG and play C and D alternately (which are written as sixteenth notes). And so forth.

Finally it's hold down FG and play CDE as 32nd notes.

You get the idea. The Herz excersises build finger strength and independence. You WILL notice problems when holding down CDE and G and playing F with your fourth finger-unless your fourth finger is unnaturally strong...so don't push it too hard. But working on it pays off quickly-I reall have noticed a difference.

My advice (again, I don't know if you want to listen to all of this) is to practise at least 15-20 minutes of scales, 15-20 minutes of the Herz, and then whatever else you might pick up from this forum.

Also-don't develop bad habits. Again, I don't have a clear understanding about what kind of music you'll be playing, but I know I started out with horrible finger position and terrible fingering (not only in scales but actual songs) and it's been quite a process correcting that. In other words-practise hard, but make sure that you're not practising wrong because it can really come back and bite you later on.

Final word. As I said, my ability to compose music, while getting better, is really nothing special. So I can't really give you a fair reccommendation in that world-only physically playing the instrument. However I will just say that even though your sight reading isn't good now-maybe you should work on it. I have a huge book of "classics" or popular pieces and I occassionally take it out and open to a random song and play through it-it's not always beautiful but it's fun and I've developed a few techniques I guess-it gets easier as you experiment. Don't stick right to the books either-if you follow all the "rules" of theory I think your music sounds old and like everything else-just my idea.

And if you've made it this far-congratulations. And listen-good luck to you! Hope I wasn't too boring...

Oh but I am interested in what sort of keyboard/piano you'll be practising on? Just curious.

[alcohol]

You need to learn some repetoire. My advice is to take some lessons. The teacher can guide you and get your hands into the piano. He/she would assign you a book appropriate to your level. You could learn on your own, but since you're already expressing difficulty with techniqe I think a teacher is your best solution.

 

I like to play Bach Preludes and Fugues, Scott Joplin rags and Chopin etudes to keep my technique in shape. Learning repetoire will give you experience in fingering strategies that then become intuitive.

[Goldberg]

alcohol-which Joplin rags do you know? I like playing those from time to time as well. I've played The Crysanthemum, Elite Syncopations, Magnetic Rag, The Cascades, Orginal Rags, and most of The Entertainer. Other than that yeah the Preludes and Fugues are good and of course the etudes. But one more suggestion I have to make are the Bach Inventions-similar to the Preludes of course but I personally find them more challenging fingering-wise. The two-part Inventions are good to begin with and later on you can get into the three-part inventions. They really do help.

[Byrdman]

Originally posted by bigswole31:

My head is full of ideas, but I have to find each and every note of the melody, record it into a sequencer, then as the sequencer plays back I find each individual note of the harmony. You can imagine how long it takes to build a tune this way. Aaarrgh!

 

No help on the pratice but a couple of encouraging facts:

 

Irving Berlin, who is arguably the greatest American Songwriter ever, could only play the piano in one key (F#!). Nor could he read music. He had secretaries who wrote the music out. They would try a chord and he would say "no" so they would try another one and so on.

 

Professor Longhair, sometimes called the father of funk, was originally a drummer. Stylistically his piano playing was drum like. Its full of ruffs, paradiddles, and so on.

 

I have yet to find a really good theory book on popular music. That sounds like something you could use too.

[zatoichi]

Bigswole, we've got some in common - I've been basically a drummer since the mid-'60s (some guitar thrown in), just now giving in to the desire to learn piano. Though I wouldn't call myself a songwriter by any stretch, I've got tunes bubbling up & pouring out, too - and no skills for capturing them. Please consider me an avid audience on your journey!

 

Striker - thanks for the reference to Herz: I'll dig around for one of those exercise books

[burlingame2]

Learn a song with melodic and harmonic interest that you like for all time. Keep it in your repetory. Also, find a voicing in an arrangement you enjoy and move it in half steps to famiarize with the intervals.

[Dan South]

Try South; it's a lovely direction.

 

It sounds to me like you need to learn some theory. Faster hands aren't going to translate from your head to the real world. There are lots of adept keyboardists who can't do what you want to do.

 

You need to learn how scales and chords work together for form songs. When you understand this, it will be like having X-ray glasses that fliter through the keyboard and show you all of the right notes. You have to work on ear training, too, so you can associate what's in your head to your instrument(s).

 

Try to find a piano teacher who can help you in these areas. Ask specifically about theory and ear training. If they don't have the necessary background in these areas, move on to someone else. Keep in mind that the "Aunt Millie" style teacher who won't let you do anything except read music is not going to be much help (although you should learn some reading, too - it all ties together).

[alcohol]

Striker,

 

I play the Maple Leaf Rag, the Entertainer and the Peacherine Rag. The point I'm trying to make is that learning repetoire will increase your technique and that will transfer into making your own improvisation/compositions easier to play.

 

Dan,

 

I'm going to have to disagree with you. You are absolutely right, there are people with fantastic technique that are unable to play past the written page. Even though improvising and composing is more related to understanding theory and acquiring a vocabulary of sounds, and melodic harmonic ideas, I've watched talented people play stunted at the keyboard and unable to play what they desired because their technical approach was so inefficient. So I don't think it's an either/or situation.

 

Some guy wrote a jazz piano instruction book called "The Way of The Hand" where it was his belief that your fingers learn the piano topography via muscular memory and then when improvising jazz, your hands respond to your minds imagination in muscular paths that it has already learned. So, I'm suggesting that in the learning of written repetoire you will find a systematic way to increase your technical range.

 

A long time ago I read an interview with Herbie Hancock and within that interview I believe that he gave some credit to his abilities from his learning of difficult classical repetoire.

 

The only other thing is that I don't believe in one technical method. I find that peoples' hands are uniquely different and what might work for one might not work for another; but the challenge of learning a difficult piece provides a roadway to work out your own technical needs.

[Umbra]

I guess I don't agree with a lot of the responses here. The first thing we would need to know is what style your after. Depending on that your approach might be wrong, you may not need to play much at all but you might need better synth programming skills instead.