Playing the piano involves several things going on at the same time including: playing with both hands, having hand independence, using the foot pedal, performing with expression, and of course, playing the correct notes at the correct time. All of these things happening at once, sure, at times can be a challenge, but the beauty of the instrument makes it all worth it. 

It is a journey for pianists at all levels to achieve their ideal sound and proficiency on the instrument. This journey takes time and patience. It is easy for one to feel stuck or demotivated when they reach a challenging piece or piano concept.

This article will provide you with tips and tricks on how to stay motivated and inspired to overcome any challenge that you may face when playing the piano.

Piano location

The location of your instrument can help keep you motivated. Try to set up your keyboard or piano in a prominent part of your living space if possible. This could be a bedroom, or a living room. If your instrument is set up in an accessible space, you will be compelled to sit down and play more frequently.

You will find yourself playing for short periods of time throughout the day. These short moments of spontaneous practice will keep your playing sharp and your musical mind stimulated. This will allow for more moments of inspiration and discovery. In the process of learning an instrument, it is important to be able to play when one feels the impulse. 

Warm-up routine

It is important to develop a consistent warm-up routine before you sit down to play for an extended practice session. The warm-up routine should be a piece or exercise you know and can play easily and with confidence. This will warm your fingers up and bolster your confidence in your playing. With warmed fingers, and strong confidence, you will be able to tackle what you are trying to accomplish more efficiently, as your mind and body will be in-tune with each other. 

Take breaks

Playing piano is as much a physical activity as it is a mental activity. You want to try to be cognisant of both your physical and mental state while practicing. If your hands and fingers feel tired, you want to listen to your body. Take breaks. Stretch. Drink water. Take deep breaths. If you find yourself getting frustrated, it is good to do the same.

The best way to accomplish something on the piano is to make sure your mind and body are comfortable. Taking a break during intense practice sessions will ease the tension in your body, and the frustrations of your mind! A short break from your practice will keep you feeling fresh and motivated as you work through a piece of music or new technique. 

Don’t ignore your mistakes

Making mistakes is an integral part of learning piano. They happen while learning any piece of music, technique or exercise. When you make a mistake, take a moment to recognize it. If you make the same mistake more than once, it is important to internalize what it is.

Take the time to slow things down and work it out. If you do not do this, the mistake can become a hard-to-break habit! It is important to correct the mistake, or make your best effort at correcting it. If a mistake becomes a habit while playing a piece, you can find yourself frustrated and unmotivated. 

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Dissect and analyze the music

When you decide to learn new songs on piano, it is great to understand the reason why you are learning it: are you learning it because it is a song you love, or are you learning because of a technical or piano educational benefit?

Once that answer is clear to you, listen to what you are learning, with that in mind. Think about the moments of the song that might be the most difficult. Internalize that and analyze it. Mentally prepare yourself by listening to and reading it before you begin playing.

Learn in segments and increments

When you sit down to learn a piece of music, you want to try to learn it in chunks and segments. It is wise to not always start at the beginning of a piece. Locate a section of the music that might be most challenging. Start there, it will make the rest of the piece easier to learn. 

When you pick out any segment of a piece to begin playing, you want to try to accomplish something. Try to be able to play a measure or two cleanly. Each measure learned is an accomplishment, or a win. If you take this approach, you will stay motivated throughout the learning process. Feeling that you have accomplished something will keep you inspired, and should provide the ultimate push you need to learn a piece. 

Stay motivated and keep practicing

What’s most important is that you enjoy the process of learning to play. Coming up against some challenges is all part of the journey. Sometimes purposefully choosing a new challenge to help bring you out of your comfort zone may be exactly what you need to push forward. Remember, challenges aren’t a bad thing. With a little determination and dedication, you can overcome any challenge!

The post How to stay motivated while practicing piano appeared first on Playground Sessions Blog.

Sadness is an emotion that is effectively conveyed through the piano. The delicacy of its harmony and dynamics can bring forth a tangible feeling of sadness. Sad piano music listeners and performers can use the energy of the music to feel: Nostalgia, Grief, and Empathy.

Sad songs and piano — a perfect match

Playing sad piano music can be therapeutic. As a beginner, you likely have the desire to accomplish the emotional expression that some of your favorite sad songs accomplish. The question is, where do you start? How can you effectively convey emotion at a beginner level?

Luckily, I have created this list of 10 Sad Piano Songs that are relatively easy for beginners to tackle and begin to develop their ability to express emotion on their instrument. Let’s get started!

1. Yesterday by The Beatles

This is one of the timeless ballads of the mid 20th century. A song about losing a lover, heartbreak, and the feeling of longing for better times with a romantic partner. This song effortlessly presents feelings of sadness. The instrumentation is just an acoustic guitar and string accompaniment. The song translates to piano well, and can be played with ease for beginners.

Yesterday by The Beatles sheet music

2. Good Riddance (Time of Your Life) by Green Day

This is a song about memories, bringing forward the feeling of nostalgia. Similar to Yesterday, the instrumentation is an acoustic guitar and some string accompaniment. It is simple, straightforward, and translates to piano well.

Good Riddance (Time of Your Life) by Green Day sheet music

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3. Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door by Bob Dylan

This tune is a folk-rock classic. A song about coming to the end of the road, and moving on. It is simple, and like the other selections, is mainly an acoustic guitar driven song- which translates to piano well!

Knockin on Heaven’s Door by Bob Dylan sheet music

4. Ain’t No Sunshine by Bill Withers

The title alone presents sadness. Bill Withers sings about his woman leaving, and missing his counterpart. The song is sad but the tempo gives it a “moving forward” sound. The piano part perfectly coincides with Withers’ acoustic guitar, to create a groovy, yet melancholy sound.

Ain’t No Sunshine by Bill Withers sheet music

5. Imagine by John Lennon

This song might not seem as sad, but rather hopeful. Right from the iconic piano intro, the listener is brought to the feelings of hope at the forefront of this song. The sadness comes from the lyrics, Lennon singing about what is wrong in the world. But the hopefulness reveals itself in the simple, yet sophisticated piano riff. I recommend all pianists learn this 1970’s classic!

Imagine by John Lennon sheet music

6. Let it Be by The Beatles

This sophisticated tune by McCartney captures a certain feeling of solitude. In the key of C major, it is a simple but convincing piano piece. It is built around delicate chords and melody. It works well with a band, or as a solo piano piece. It is an excellent song for beginners to work on developing their chord shapes, using the white keys.

Let it Be by The Beatles sheet music

7. All of Me by John Legend

This is a beautiful ballad that is filled with feelings of love, loneliness, and longing. The piano part perfectly accompanies Legend’s emotional vocal performance. This is an excellent choice for a beginner to learn, especially for that special someone. An excellent choice for Valentine’s Day.

All of Me by John Legend sheet music

8. Stay With Me by Sam Smith

The title says it all. A song about longing for a lover to stick by your side. The lyrics challenge loneliness. The piano perfectly accompanies the soft spoken vocal part. The vocals are heard in light of vulnerability. The piano intro will help a beginner improve their chordal skills and movement effectively.

Stay With Me by Sam Smith sheet music

9. Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd

This guitar ballad is timeless. It builds slowly, and once again presents feelings of longing and nostalgia. This song translated to the piano, actually can make it sound even more sad, delicate, and melancholy. It is in the key of G major, which is an excellent key for beginner players.

Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd sheet music

10. Creep by Radiohead

This 90s rock power anthem conveys sadness, but the original recording has a loud, heavy, exorbitant edge to it. When this tune is translated to piano, it is less angsty, and more sad and introspective. The whole tune is built around 4 chords, which will make it a great easy sad piece for a beginner to tackle.

Creep by Radiohead sheet music

Ready to learn some sad piano songs?

Sad music is compelling, comforting, and expressive. The piano is the perfect instrument for conveying this emotion in an effective manner. To improve your emotional expression, try to learn the songs above and other songs in similar light. Keep in mind the lyrics of the songs, and try to play the piano as if you were speaking these vulnerable words. You will be able to improve your playing and your expression simultaneously!

The post 10 sad songs every piano beginner should learn appeared first on Playground Sessions Blog.

What most beginners don’t know is that music theory isn’t some challenging abstract concept – it’s actually very simple to understand, straightforward, and best of all it comes with added benefits! In this post, we’ll take a look at six major benefits of why beginner piano students should learn music theory.

So if you’re new to piano playing and are curious about music theory, read on! We promise that it isn’t as scary as it seems.

What is music theory?

Before diving into the benefits of music theory, let’s take a second to first talk about what music theory is. Music theory, in simple terms, is all of the elements used to create the language of music.

A great way to understand it from a conceptual standpoint is to compare the language of music to another language – like english. To understand english, you must understand its various elements – like the alphabet, consonants vs vowels, how to string consonants and vowels together to form words, how different words sound and what they communicate, grammar rules and how to form sentences, speech prosody, rule exceptions, etc.

All of those individual elements combine to form the English language, and the more comfortable you are with those elements, the better you’ll be at understanding and speaking the language.

This is the same concept with music theory.

To understand the language of music, you must understand how notes are named (alphabets), understand how pitch, loudness, and rhythm work (speech prosody), understand how to string notes together to form melodies and chords (words), understand rules for how to form melodies through the use of key signatures (grammar), rule exceptions, etc. It’s all of music’s little structural things that are designed to help you understand what’s going on in music.

Now, when it’s listed out this way it can seem like a lot, but like learning a new language, you don’t need to learn it all at once but instead you pick it up cumulatively — with each element building on the next until you fully understand how it all works.

Music theory helps you better understand how music works

Growing up, I enjoyed listening to all kinds of different music. Pop, R&B, Gospel, Rock, and many other genres. The music would often leave me either energized, excited, happy, sad, or a mixture of many other emotions. But before I learned music theory, the different genres of music I listened to felt like clusters of seemingly random sounds mixed together to form songs.

That all changed when I began to learn music theory.

After learning music theory, I began to understand, at a deeper level, what was actually happening in the songs I listened to. I began to identify which songs were major, which songs were minor, and how those modes impacted how I felt while listening to those songs. I began to understand how the key, tempo, and song structure across the genres were either similar or different. I began to understand how the same chord progressions were recycled in different genres, by different artists, to create chart-topping hits.

Needless to say, after learning music theory I felt like I was Neo in The Matrix – I wasn’t seeing binary code when listening to songs, but I did obtain a completely different perspective of what was happening in them beyond just instruments being played to support a singer. Best of all, I began to identify trends in what I liked from song to song, for example, thanks to understanding music theory I now know that I’m a sucker for a song that includes a slow 1 to 4 chord progression.

You, as a piano beginner, should learn music theory because it will help you understand how melody, harmony, and rhythm cooperate to produce the music you love, and the music you would love to play. You will be able to make sense of the music you are listening to, playing, and learning. This knowledge will also make it easier to learn new pieces and memorize them more quickly.

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Music theory will make learning piano songs easier and faster

When you understand how music theory works, you’ll also understand how to read music that’s written down on sheet music. And similar to how reading English books becomes easier the more comfortable you are with the English language, reading sheet music becomes easier the more comfortable you are with the language of music. As reading music becomes easier for you, learning songs becomes faster and easier as well.

And the benefit extends beyond just reading music — once you better understand the language of music, you’ll also more easily be able to learn songs by ear, or even create your own compositions!

You’ll be able to communicate with other musicians more effectively

If you ever decide to form a band or join an orchestra, the ability to communicate with other musicians effectively is essential – and learning music theory will help with that!

Everyone in a band should be self-aware of the music, and how it was written, and the musical intricacies within the song. This awareness and knowledge will help you effectively communicate with the other musicians, to create an enjoyable ensemble experience and sound.

You’ll be able to play piano more expressively

Knowledge of simple music theory terms will also help you play piano more expressively by teaching you how to use dynamics, tempo markings, and phrasing markings while you learn a piece. These markings are placed in sheet music by composers to help you understand the intention of the composer’s writing, and how to make it sound as they envision.

You’ll have greater appreciation for the music you listen to

When you have knowledge about music theory, listening to music becomes a whole new experience because you’ll start understanding what’s going on in the song as it’s being played.

You’ll start hearing things that you never noticed before. You will be able to contextualize what you hear in terms of harmonic and rhythmic theory. Your appreciation for all types of music will certainly deepen as a result, especially in appreciation for both performance and composition.

Learning a little music theory goes a long way

If you are a beginner piano student, it is highly beneficial to learn music theory. Music theory will help give you a strong foundation for your musical education and will make learning new pieces easier. Additionally, understanding music theory can improve your sight-reading skills and help you become a more well-rounded musician.

If you’re ready to learn music theory, there are many great resources available online that can get you started. With just a little bit of effort, you will be on your way to becoming an accomplished pianist!

The post Six reasons why piano beginners should learn music theory appeared first on Playground Sessions Blog.

What is the 1 4 5 Chord Progression? 

The 1 4 5 chord progression consists of three chords. Each of these chords are played in succession, beginning with the 1, followed by the 4 and the 5 chords. The 1 is the chord of the root note, and the harmonic center of the key which the song is being played. The 4 is the chord of the fourth scale degree. The 5 is the chord of the fifth scale degree. These three chords in succession create one of the most common chord progressions. This progression is commonly used in pop and rock. Additionally, it is utilized in jazz, soul, R&B classical. It is also the foundation of the blues. The diagram below displays this progression in the key of C Major. The 1 is a C major triad (C, E, G). The 4 is an F major triad (F, A, C). The 5 is a G major triad (G, B, D). 

Fortunately, there is not much music ability or knowledge required to play this progression. What is required is a basic knowledge of the notes that make up the chords, the ability to navigate the keyboard to play chords correctly, and rhythm that fits what your song of choice is trying to convey. With this knowledge, the progression can be executed effectively in any key. For example, if the tune is in the key of G major, the 1 4 5 progression will be three triads of the 1, 4 and 5: G major (G, B, D), C major (C, E, G), and D major (D, F#, A).

The below video will break down the 1, 4, 5 in the key of G major. This key is very commonly used when songs are built around this chord structure. It is a basic chord progression that remains fun and satisfying for all ears.

Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds by The Beatles

Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds by The Beatles uses this progression. After the psychedelic and harmonically dense verse, the drums hit four quarter notes. The song drops into the iconic chorus, where Lennon and McCartney sing “Lucy in the sky with diamonds.” This classic melody is sung over a 1 4 5 progression in G Major. It begins with a G major chord on the downbeat. They sing the melody, “Lucy in the” over the 1. On the word “sky” the harmony moves, and the 4 is played (C major). On “diamonds,” the progression shifts to D major (5 chord). The use of this progression underneath the fantastical melody makes for a lasting effect of a timeless classic. 

Like a Rolling Stone by Bob Dylan

Legendary folk rock singer and songwriter Bob Dylan utilizes the same 1, 4, 5 in his classic track Like a Rolling Stone on the chorus of the tune. As he sings “How does it feel,” the tune drops in on the 1, which is a G major chord, for 2 beats. This classic melody is followed by the 4 chord (C major) for two beats, and the 5 chord (D major) for a full measure. Then it repeats. The melody picks up on the last two beats of the 5 chord, making the downbeat on the 1 chord ever satisfying. This simple chord progression once again has a lasting effect.

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Keep learning and keep practicing!

The 1 4 5 chord progression is a progression that can be utilized in any key. It has been used both in major and minor keys. Once the progression is learned harmonically, it can be easily recognized and applied in one’s playing. It is a quick and easy way to sound adept, while simultaneously fulfilling musical needs. Challenge yourself by learning more songs that use the 1 4 5 progression, as well as other different progressions and melodies by downloading sheet music, watching YouTube videos, or using a piano learning app like Playground Sessions. Have fun learning, playing, and expressing! 

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