The first time I heard the music of Keith Jarret I wasn’t sure if I was listening to classical music or jazz. It was in fact a completely improvised piano solo played live in concert. This first piece from the 1975 Koln concert in Germany was the first piece I ever heard from this artist and to this day it still remains one of my all time favorite piano pieces. The simplicity of the haunting melodies is deceptive and there are times when I would swear that this man sounds as if he has three arms. How can one man make such rich music on one piano? There are times when he is obviously hearing the music he wants to play and has run
out of fingers to play it so he starts singing the missing parts joining in with percussive knocking on the piano with his feet.
This artist has been a great inspiration for me and simply listening to him makes you feel that playing the piano can be a really simple task when it comes down to it.
Beginners piano as it should be played
I was searching the web for some easy classical pieces to include in my soon to be released beginners piano course when I stumbled across this amazing video.
This is of the pianist Wilhelm Kempff playing Movement 1 from the famous Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven. This piece is not that difficult to play and is attempted by many beginners. They will not however be able to play it with as much tenderness and feeling as does the late Mr Kempff here.
You can tell that this man truly loves his instrument. See how he caresses the keys effortlessly in this extraordinary recording that brought tears to my eyes when I first heard it.
How To Play All Of The Chords On The Piano
Here is another quick video I made… This one shows you ALL of the major and minor chords and should enable you to play virtually any song you like.
Piano Lessons for Beginners
There are a lot of people looking for piano lessons for beginners who believe that they are really too old to learn piano. This cannot be further from the truth. The fact is that the older you are the more thoroughly you will learn and the less likely you will be to give it up.
I have written extensively on this subject before and will not go into it here (Am I Too Old To Learn The Piano) but if you are looking for a complete home study course that will serve as piano lessons for beginners then there are at least two that I can highly recommend. I have done a couple of extensive reviews on these piano learning products including a video sneak peek into the products. I have used both of these courses personally and apart form having hours of fun I improved my playing and learned to play in multiple styles.
Here is a quick review of the top two home study courses offering piano lessons for beginners.
Piano Lessons For Beginners – Best Piano Courses
This is my list of the top piano courses of the many I have checked out and tested personally.
This product consists of 7 books all with their associated audio and video files. They will teach you right from the very beginning how to play the piano or the keyboards and will go on to teaching you Gospel for beginners, Jazz for beginners and there are also some general technique books. You will get access to a load of software for MAC or for PC which includes several music learning games and a very useful metronome application. This course seems to be the current market leader for piano lessons for beginners. It is an extremely complete course which contains over a years worth of piano lessons. Great for complete beginners and intermediate level players too.
This really complete package comes with 10 books which all have audio and video embedded. You get taught how to read music and how to play by ear at the same time. Right from the outset you will be playing authentic sounding music. The course contains Innovative teaching methods which will hold the interest of most students and will have you playing great sounding music very quickly. The overall presentation of this product is not quite as smooth and professional looking as some of its competitors but the content is without a doubt far superior.
Both of the above products come with a 60 day no questions asked guarantee in case you are not completely satisfied with your purchase. They are both suitable for adults or young people though not really geared for small children to use. They are both a great way of getting piano lessons for beginners in your own home.
Am I Too Old To Learn The Piano?
Many people repeatedly inquire how old do you have to be before is becomes tricky to become skilled at the piano. This appears to be a regular question for persons over the age of fifteen. There seems to be a widespread misconception that once you get old then it is too late to learn the piano or keyboards.
Well the good
news is that this is false at all and in a number of cases it is in point of fact the contrary of the truth in that the older you are the more efficiently you will allow yourself to be taught.
When very young children are taught how to play the piano the advancement are generally really long-winded and frustrating for them. Regular practice is necessary and it can be really complicated for them remain interested. The children who take up piano at an early age do not go forward enormously rapidly at first but over time they get better at leaning and soon start to perform and practice without thinking about it and the entire process becomes normal to them.
It is much easier for a teenager to learn piano than a small child. It is a good time to learn the piano whilst in your teens if you can manage to stay to a schedule of practice and attend all of the lessons as it can be simple to become distracted by schoolwork or other projects. See the Piano Lessons For Beginners page for more info.
In my opinion, the best time to learn to play the piano or the keyboards is as an adult. You will be able to practice and get good at the instrument a lot better as soon as you have your schooling finished and you have more of a daily schedule established in your life. You will be more motivated as you have chosen to learn the instrument yourself and you will be able to arrange your own practice sessions.. Learning like this is more than likely one of the most significant components to success. As an adult you will be able to see the reasoning behind your lesson plans and your practice sessions which will make you less prone to give up.
Check out this in depth video review of the top selling home study course for piano Rocket Piano
It is becoming ever more popular as of late for elder people to take up the piano. Older people in their 70′s and 80′s are every day taking up the piano and enjoying it immensely. The Delight of learning is what these people are looking for and not so much the objective of becoming competent, though many of them do achieve this even though they have had no prior musical know-how
So to answer the original question, am I too old to learn the piano? then the response has to be a distinct “NO”. You have just as much chance of progressing to a high level of playing if you start to learn the piano as an adult as if you begin as a small child.
Best Piano Courses
I have recently checked out and reviewed many home study piano courses. Here is a list of the absolute best of the best.
This package contains 7 books with associated video and audio files. Apart from the basic teaching manuals there is Jazz for beginners and Gospel for beginners as well as a couple of general technique books. You get access to a bundle of software (PC and MAC) including a metronome and several music learning games. This is the leader as far as popularity goes and is an extremely good course containing over a years worth of lessons. Good for absolute beginners and intermediate level players.
This extremely full package has 10 books with embedded video and audio. It teaches you how to play by ear and how to read music. Right from the start you will be playing authentic sounding pieces. Innovative teaching method keeps your interest and has you playing good sounding music in a very short time. The overall presentation of this product is not quite so slick as others but the content is without a doubt superior.
This well presented course comes with tons of audio and video files. It also has a very good selection of software available. It is suitable for learning piano and keyboards in any style from classical through to Jazz and pop. You also get over 100 Jam tracks that you can play along to. The makers of this product however also specialize in music production and so there are a few bonuses including the Music Producer Multimedia Program and an online beat maker.
Another fine product, this one comes with a vast library of video and audio lessons. It is split up into styles with separate lessons for blues, Jazz, classical, bluegrass, rock etc. This also comes with quite a few jam tracks to you to play along to. It is suitable for absolute beginners and has a quick start section which will have you playing music from the first day.
If you want to learn several modern styles then this is the course for you. It is centered around electronic keyboard playing though can be used with a normal piano if needed. You will learn rhythms and chords and are set practice sessions with rhythm with both left and right hands to help discipline your playing. The course comes with a short introductory video and a few jam tracks to play along with. The bulk of the course however is the book itself.
For more information see the Teach Yourself Piano Page. All of the products listed here are geared to teaching you how to play the piano or the keyboards and will take you from beginners level up to intermediate or advanced level. Each product come with a money back guarantee should you not be completely satisfied.
Rocket Piano Review
Reviewer: Andy Penbram
Rating:
Website Reviewed: Rocket Piano
Here is a detailed review of Rocket Piano by Ruth Searle which is now one of the most purchased piano and keyboards home study course available on the Internet.
You might also want to check out the Rocket Piano Video Review where I show you exactly what you will find when you purchase this package.
The Rocket Piano package can be bought in a digital format which can be downloaded immediately to your computer or it can be purchased as a physical product which is shipped to your home.
The physical package consists of consists of seven books, a DVD and audio and software CDs. The digital pack has the 7 books in printable pdf format and over 60 high quality video lessons.
How the course works
To start the course you use book 1 the beginners book. This will teach you how to sit at the keyboards, how to hold your hands correctly, and general posture. It will show you where to find all the notes on the keyboard, and how to recognize those notes in written music. you will learn to play some simple melodies played with each hand and then some simple pieces with both hands. You will also learn some basic chords.
The books are nicely laid out and easy to follow. At certain points within the books, there are audio examples of how you should play that particular exercise and at other times there are video examples where Ruth explains a little more in depth and shows you exactly what she is talking about by means of example.
Negative Points
The main drawback with this package is that the audio and video files are not clickable within the books. This means that when you are studying and you get to an audio or video example then you have to stop and take note of the example number, then you need to search on your computer manually for that file. Until you have worked out your own system this can be a bit of a hassle but after a while you get the hang of it.
Positive Points
A very good feature of the books is the inclusion of jam tracks. These are in effect a type of music minus one. You get a written piece to play and a choice of two audio files. The first audio file contains the piano playing the piece in question with an accompaniment of guitar, bass and drums. This shows you how the piece should be played with a band. The second audio file is exactly the same as the first except that there is no piano included. This enables you to effectively play along with the band. This is a great way to practice as playing with other musicians forces you to play in time.
More about what you get
There are three main books, the beginners, intermediate and advanced. Once you gone through these then you can proceed onto the introduction to Jazz piano, or the introduction to Gospel piano. Both these are excellent books in their own right. There is also fingering technique and exercise book which can be used at any time and an interesting little bonus book called Advanced learning techniques for piano. This is a combination of techniques and psychology designed to help you get the most out of your learning experience. For more information see the Teach Yourself Piano Page.
The Software
In the sales letter there is a lot of attention paid to the software that is included with this product.
This is pretty basic but still can be useful. I myself wasn’t too impressed in general with the software but there are those who have found it to be fantastic.
There is JaydaMusica which is a little musical recognition game. You get notes flying across the screen and have to identify them. At first its easy but in later levels it speeds up and becomes really difficult. If you aren’t too comfortable with reading music the this game can really help you to familiarize yourself with reading.
Perfect your Pitch is an interval recognition game/ exercise. the computer plays a note and then you have to say which note it was. It then plays another and again you have to say which it was. This is excellent ear training material and in my opinion is the best piece of software in the whole package.
Chordinator shows you chords on the musical staff and gets you to identify them. Good training for those learning to read music.
Keycelerator is another note recognition game.
The Metronome very simple and straight forward but can be used whilst practicing the exercises. This is really important to do and so this piece of software is also a very important addition to the package.
Save one or two little niggles (like the fact that the audio files aren’t embedded into the pdf files) I give this product a 5 star rating. It is definitely one of the best products available at the moment and is a really complete package. They have a really helpfull support section inside thei members area and for piece of mind the product comes with a full 60 day money back guarantee.
Reviewer: Andy Penbram
Rating:
Website Reviewed: Piano for All
This is one of my favorite home study piano programs. It is not as slick looking as some of it’s competitors (Rocket Piano) but it has its own special character and on the whole I really like the way that the whole course is planned to guide the student through the learning process.
What You Get
The course consists of ten hefty work books in a printable pdf format, 200 video lessons and 500 audio lessons. No fancy software here but the lessons are top quality and extremely well planned out.
The Unique Learning Process
This course is a little different from the others in that it teaches you how to play by ear, how to use chord charts and how to read music all at the same time right from the absolute basic level.
Here is a Video Review showing you what you get when you purchase
The Books The first book is called Party Time – Rhythm Style Piano. This starts you off assuming you have no musical knowledge at all and have never touched a piano before. It teaches you how to find the notes on the keyboards, and by
means of simple diagrams it shows you how to place your fingers and has you playing simple melodies straight away. It then shows you how to recognize the notes you have learned on the musical staff. Then as you advance you get shown some chords. The whole basis of this book is to play like a pianist with real rhythms. You are taught how to play basic chords but also how to use them with authentic rhythms using both hands. The results sound reall
y great. The best thing about it is that as you progress you also get taught how to read music… little by little until before you realize it you discover that you are able to play by ear and read music or chord symbols.
Once you have learned the basic principle of these books, t
he rhythm method for want of a better name you can then progress onto the more advanced books.
There is the Blues book where you learn beginners blues patterns and riffs.
The next book is
called Chord Magic. This teaches you how to play the basic chords in different inversions and how to combine them in chord sequences with rhythm that is really superb and has you sounding like a seasoned pianist.
This is then followed by the Advanced Chords book.
By the time you get to the next book, Ballad Style you are really playing like a professional. In this book you learn how to take a melody and improvise around it giving a ballad style to your playing.
The final book is Jazz Piano Made Easy. This is just that, it de-mystifies jazz playing and with some quite simple chord progressions and runs you will be playing authentic sounding Jazz pieces in no time at all.
Each book contains audio and video clips which you can simply click on and they open right there.
The Negatives
The most annoying thing about this course is that the teaching material is all traditional songs and melodies. This is due to the copyright laws prohibiting them from using protected material which leaves only the traditional and anonymous compositions.
The Positives
The whole way of learning using basic chords combined with rhythms has you playing authentic sounding piano right from the start. You can easily start this course if you are at an intermediate level too as it progresses up to quite an advanced level at the end.
The absolute best thing about this course is that it has you playing great sounding piano from the start and enables you to advance extremely quickly.
To Help You Decide To help you make up your mind you can download a sample page so you can see how the course is laid out and how it works. There is also a 60 day money back guarantee in case you are not entirely convinced. For more information see the Teach Yourself Piano Page.
Conclusion
This course I give a definite five star rating. It is my personal favorite and although the look of the books is not as slick as some of the other courses the content, material and teaching method is superb.
Every beginner can use advice on how to Teach Yourself Piano. There are many different methods of teaching yourself how to play the piano. Some people use an instructor and others teach themselves. No matter how you learn to play the piano, some things will be the same. The basics of playing the piano are never going to change. With that in mind here are some tips and great advice to help you as you learn to play the piano.
Start with the Basics
No matter how you decide to learn, you will always start with the basics. You will learn about the piano, the keys and where the notes are on the piano. You will also learn some basic music theory, including how to read music. These basics are where everyone starts. It can sometimes be easy to think that you don’t need to go over the basics, but even if you already know how to read music and you already know about the piano keyboard, going over the basics is always a nice refresher and should be where you start.
Choose Easy and Short Pieces to Start Your first pieces should be introductory pieces that test you ability to read music and play that music on the piano. These pieces should be short and easy enough for you to memorize. You should aim to perfect them, which should not take too long.
Also do one or two pieces that you play by ear. This means that you hear them and then try to play them on the piano. You can learn a lot by just trying to duplicate what you hear on the piano. This is great ear training that will come in handy as you advance through your piano lessons.
Understand It Will Get Harder Too often the beginner student feels like things get too hard and they quit. However, advancing to harder pieces is the only way that you will learn and improve. You have to accept that there will come a time when you will really struggle with a piece and you will have to practice over and over to perfect it. This is just you becoming a better piano player and every player goes through this. If you never play pieces that challenge you then you will never get better.
Make It Your Own Have you ever heard the same song sang by two different singers? Did it sound exactly the same? Probably not. The reason is that each singer made the song their own. That is what you need to do with the music you play. One of the secrets to becoming a good piano player is learning to make music your own. Start playing from the heart. Be adventurous and willing to try new things. It will only help you grow as a piano player.
When you first begin to seek how to learn the piano you will probably feel it is very structured. You will have set lessons and you will be learning the basic things that you need to know to become a good piano player. Do not let yourself give up in these early stages. They really do progress quickly and soon you will be moving on to playing harder pieces that sound beautiful. The key is to just follow the advice above and to stick with it.
There is a list of home study courses to help you teach yourself piano on the piano for beginners page
Learn Piano Online – Complete Home Study Course To Learn Piano Online
Learn Piano Online for Fast and Easy Lessons
Taking piano lessons online has become a popular method to learn piano online. Online lessons have many benefits over hiring a teacher or attending classes offline. If you are someone who is looking to learn to play the piano and you are wanting an easy yet effective way to learn then you should look into online piano lessons.
Problems with Private Teachers. A lot of people have used a piano teacher to learn how to play the piano. It is nice to have that one on one attention from a teacher who is right there and can work with you hands on. However, using a piano teacher also has drawbacks.
Hiring a piano teacher means you will have a set class schedule. You will either go to the teacher or the teacher will come to your house. You will usually have an hour long lesson, so you will need to make sure you have that time in your schedule. Additionally, if you are having lessons at your home then you will have to have an hour of uninterrupted time for the lesson. For more information check out the Piano Basics page.
Another issue with using a piano teacher for lessons is that the teacher is in charge of what you learn and how fast you learn it. Most teachers will advance you when they believe that you are ready, but they also have lesson plans they follow. You will have to go at the pace the teacher wants and even if you feel you do not need to go over a lesson again, if the teacher says you have to then you will have to follow what they say.
Benefits of Online Lessons When you learn piano online there are many benefits over hiring a teacher. The first benefit is the flexibility. You choose the pace of your lessons, when you practice your lessons and how you advance through the lessons. You are in charge. You do not have to do your lessons at the same time every week. You do not even have to wait a week in between lessons. You are completely in charge of how you progress through your lessons.
The second benefit is that it is usually much more affordable. Teachers can charge quite a bit for that weekly hour of their time. Even if you have to cancel a lesson you will usually end up still having to pay. With online lessons you pay one set fee for the lessons and you know you will be getting the full benefits from the lessons.
Online piano lessons simply mean that you won’t have to worry about getting to a lesson or freeing up time for a lesson. You don’t have to worry about being stuck on lessons that you find boring or that you feel are teaching you nothing. You also get to go at your own pace and move through the lessons in a way that feels comfortable for you. There is nobody telling you what to do.
Choosing to learn piano online allows you to be in control. You can go over lessons that are hard and sail through the easy ones. You can also choose what you want to learn by doing only the lessons that you feel you need. Online lessons allow you to make learning the piano an enjoyable experience that is convenient to you. Learn Piano Online now
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Reviewer: Andy Penbram
