Lessons

[tpantano]

For all of you keyboard players out there, how'd you learn to play? Classical piano lessons, or from another keyboardist?

Basically, I have a problem atm...
First guy I went to for lessons was very unorganized. He was normally a piano teacher, but when he said he did keyboard lessons, I got excited... but by keyboard lessons all he meant was playing a virtual piano on his arranger.... nothing special for the keys. Between that and the fact he never really had lessons planned I decided not to take lessons from any longer.

The guy I'm currently taking lessons with is better. He's much younger so he's into much more contemporary music. He's also been helping me a lot with song composition (what he majored in for his bachelor of arts). However, the one thing that's getting a bit disappointing is that he isn't really teaching me much as for actual playing and improvising... it's a tad annoying. All of our lessons have basically been ideas for improving my music... nothing about actual playing of the instrument, really. I'd love to be able just sit at a piano, or synth, or organ, and just jam with it, just improv something on the spot... and I doubt I'm going to learn much of that with this guy. I'm thinking that because most of his other students just take lessons where he'll teach them how to play a song; I'm his special student in that I'm doing what he does for a living, music comp, but the problem is it's impossible to compose when you can't actually play!

Anyways, kinda sidetracked there. So out of curiosity, how did you learn to play? Did you have an instructor, was it through a parent? Did you learn on piano, synth, organ, Wurly, what? Was your instructor very organized in their lessons (did they always have something planned) or did they kinda wing it on your advice?

Right now I just feel like I can play songs, not the actual instrument, so I'm curious what you have to say.

[T-Dog]

Have you taken a look at www.Legacylearningsystems.com ? They have a Piano course on DVD. I've bought it but never got round to using it yet because I was into Guitar. It's very high quality but, whether it has what you are looking for i'm not sure.

[tpantano]

anyone learn without instruction but rather by videos like that or even by book?

[Synthoid]

I took organ lessons many years ago... not the type of music I liked, but my teacher was very disciplined and always had a song or two for me to practice and learn each week. From that experience, I learned music theory, scales, proper fingering and eventually composition of my own tunes.

Many years later I purchased my first synth--a Sequential Circuits Six Trak:

http://www.vintagesynth.com/sci/stk.php

It was a very basic synthesizer but with its built-in six track sequencer, I was able to write some original songs, and eventually started jamming with a guitar player friend of mine. We started a band shortly afterwards when I added two more keyboards to my rig.

The best way to learn improvisation is to do it! Take time each day to write a short piece of music--it doesn't need to be complex or "finished." Make sure you record what you've done, then let it sit for a day or two and listen to it again. Add more parts to it or develop the melody. If it works for you, great, if not--start again with something new.

Everyone has their own method but this is what works best for me.

[X-Trade]

I consider myself entirely self-taught.

I've had.... probably a total of three music lessons (not counting compulsory 'music' class for the first two years at the start of secondary school - I wasn't into music at that point, I enjoyed it but no-one really picked up on that...) in my life, which I arranged with a music teacher that my mum knew, just to brush up on a few things.
Most of what I learnt from those few lessons was actually from a music theory book, I can't remember the name now but is is pretty much a standard. At that point I was mainly looking for the correct terms for things and a bit of sheet reading skills in order to be able to converse better with my then vastly superior prog-rock bandmates.

I've always been into classical piano and organ, but it's just not my music, I've never really studied it. I have some J.S. Bach somewhere that I can hardly read...

You'll find you can improve your playing technique a lot when you have a full(ish) size keyboard. I used to like things like the MicroKorg but now I won't go on stage with anything less than 49 keys. The synths that I play all the time are all 61-key variants (but most of it is actually done through just one of them, additional controllers are only to expand keyboard realestate for spreading out live setups).


Play with a metronome or drum beat. It isn't a crime to tap your foot either. A lot of guitarists and even classical pianists do it to keep time. Organist's (and drummers) feet are usually too busy anyway.
Watch other professional players - particularly classical ones, this can be really useful too, see what they do with their wrists, posture, arms.

With regards to posture and technique I took a lot from two places:
- A great little book called Basic Keyboard Workout by John Dutton (go buy this. Now!)
I found it in Waterstones for £5 (also says US$7.95 on it), it's quite small (just a bit smaller than a PC hard disk drive. It has some rubbish on MIDI and Recording, but the great bit about it is all the tips on improvisation, keys, scales, etc. There are a series of other books on audio effect processing, recording, synthesis, etc in the same format, if you're interested.
- Tutorials online. You'd be surprised the amount of stuff you can find on youtube (probably not that surprised actually). In particular I found some Jordan Rudess videos (I don't know if they were supposed to be on youtube, so don't blame me). I didn't have much respect for him before, but just browsing a few I quickly discovered that he cares a lot about his sound design and his gear, which I believe is just as important as actually playing, and he actually has some pretty great techniques and explains them well. I also noticed that he has an 'online conservatory' for a fixed sign-up fee, where there are videos and tutorials and other lesson formats available...



The most important part of improvising is, just do it!
Yes, learn modes and scales and keys, it will help you to understand, but in the end the best way to see whether a certain note works in a melody is to try it (and probably get it wrong), you quickly get a 'feel' - it becomes intuition - as to which notes go with which other notes and when. It's what you hear that matters. All of the theory is only a guideline, not a rule.

And if you don't have one, get a 61key or more MIDI controller. Particularly if you want to use both hands. You'll develop excellent coordination for it if you just keep at it. I kept on trying the same bit (bass line in one hand, chords in the other) for a few minutes each day, until I just found one day that I had it! then tried another, and so on, it starts to get a lot easier. It will take a lot of time. And there will always be more to learn, it's quite often something you can continue chasing, finding new objectives around each corner.

[tpantano]

Alright, thanks very much. I'll look into getting a copy of that book. Also, we do have a large upright piano downstairs and two 61 key casio keyboards, so I can practice on those to get better.

[Synthoid]

we do have a large upright piano downstairs and two 61 key casio keyboards, so I can practice on those to get better.

Go for it. It's preferable to play with at least 61 keys so you can work with both hands. Also-- it's sometimes better to compose on something other than a synth, so you aren't distracted by editing patches!

The most important part of improvising is, just do it! Yes, learn modes and scales and keys, it will help you to understand, but in the end the best way to see whether a certain note works in a melody is to try it (and probably get it wrong), you quickly get a 'feel' - it becomes intuition - as to which notes go with which other notes and when. It's what you hear that matters. All of the theory is only a guideline, not a rule.

Excellent advice as well.

Play with a metronome or drum beat. It isn't a crime to tap your foot either. A lot of guitarists and even classical pianists do it to keep time.

This is what I like about composing with the Triton or M3--arp patterns and KARMA. It's like playing along with other musicians. Beats & rhythms get the creative juices going.

If you have the opportunity, jam with other musicians, preferably those who are more experienced. It will help increase your skill level.