Remember the old ad...
"They laughed when I sat down
at the piano...but when I started to play..." ?
I remember very well the
first time I played piano for a group. They DID laugh. It was a
disaster. I overheard the leader say "Let's get somebody with some
rhythm in there to play".
Ouch!
That hurt. But I told myself
right then and there that I would learn to play the piano so well that
no one would ever laugh at me again.
They don't laugh anymore. And
they don't laugh at my students, either.
Why?
Because I discovered...
The BACKDOOR to piano playing.
What in the world is the
"backdoor to piano playing?
Chords & chord progressions.
Chords are a way in to the
world of piano playing without having to go through the front
door: years and years of scales, drills, rote practicing, etc. Chords
are really a shortcut to understanding and playing music without all
the formal training.
Formal training is fine if
you have the time and money. But most adults don't want to wait
forever before they can play something enjoyable on the piano. I took
lessons when I was a kid, but found it boring. Not only that, but all
I could do was play the written music exactly as it was written.
Without the sheet music in front of me, I didn't have a clue what to
do. So I lost interest in piano playing until the incident described
above.
But shortly after that, I had
the opportunity to play in a school combo -- the senior who was the
piano player in the group had graduated, and there was no one to take
his place except this little freshman -- me -- who played the piano by
reading music. But in order to join the group, I had to learn chords,
and learn them fast. It was a great opportunity, and I was excited to
have it, but scared at the same time, since I didn't know how to read
out of a "fake book" -- the book the guys in the band used when they
played. All it had was the melody and chord symbols of a song such as
G7, Fm7, C6, and so on. And I didn't have a clue what those meant.
My piano teacher didn't know
chords either, so I sent for a $2. chord chart advertised in Popular
Mechanics, and within hours after I got it I was playing the Dm7 chord
and the C6 chord in my left hand while I played the tune with my right
hand. Talk about excited! Within a few weeks I could play dozens of
songs using chords. And I discovered that my sight-reading speed
greatly improved at the same time, because now I understood what I was
seeing on the printed page!
So I came in through the back
door instead, and now I enjoy what I used to hate! Why? Because I
understand what I'm doing because now I understand chords and chord
progressions. I eventually went on to get my Masters Degree at
Southern Oregon University -- and it was easy because of all I had
learned about music theory and harmony due to playing and
understanding chords.
The understanding that you
get from knowing chords and how they work -- how they link together to
form chord progressions -- gives a person a huge advantage in piano
playing. You can learn to play the piano much easier and faster
because you understand what you are seeing -- chords and parts of
chords and chords stretched out into a string of individual notes
(called "arpeggios") and chord progressions -- one chord flowing into
another.
So if for one reason or the
other the front door of piano playing didn't work for you --
traditional lessons -- then do what I did and sneak in the back door.
If you're anything like me, you'll love it so much that you'll
eventually want to learn all the traditional things too, making you a
well-balanced and valuable piano player.
