Q. Now that it's summer and I have a lot of downtime, I want to learn a few new instruments. I'm 16 years old and I've been in concert band since I was 10. I've played Clarinet, percussion, and am currently playing Tenor Sax. I am also a semi-professional dancer.
I figure with my background, piano will be relatively easy to learn. I am self teaching, so if I practice about 1-2 hours every day, how long do you think it would take for me to get good? It only took me a month to get good a sax.
My second question would be for someone to explain to me guitar fundamentals? I am very familiar with music, I sight read quite well, but guitar is a lot different from concert instruments. Does guitar not use sheet music? If you could also tell me, seeing as I practice 1-2 hours every day, how long would it take me to get good at guitar?
Thank you in advance.
A. Hi, I think it's really just a matter of memorizing where the notes are and getting the muscle memory to play both hands at once. You probably already know scales and know what chords are, so all you need to do is practice doing scales on piano. BUT, make sure you do them with the correct fingering because that will help you a lot after you get used to the piano. I will add a website in the source section below. If you have a mac, I know Garage Band has some great interactive lessons on it. You plug in your piano to your computer and it helps you learn songs and scales.
As for guitar, there are two main ways people notate for guitar. Sheet music, and TAB. TAB is just like a staff, except each line is a string on the guitar, and you use numbers instead of notes (which tells you what fret to push the string down). TAB is easier to learn for some people, but there is one main problem with it. You can't really write down note duration or rhythms. For this reason, you often see guitar music written twice in the score (one staff written with notes, and one staff written in TAB). Because the same note can be played in so many different places on guitar, sometimes it's really helpful to have TAB to play the proper fingerings.
My advice would be, get the Hal Leonard Guitar Method Book 1, and the Hal Leonard Student Piano Method Book. I've used them myself and really liked them. The books will teach you all you need to know and work your way into using TAB and correct fingerings for piano. Hope that helps.
What beginner piano book would be best for a beginner at piano but an experienced musician?
Q. For instance I've played clarinet 8yrs.
and Sax for about 3 1/2 yrs
I can read notes in treble, alto, and bass.
I know all my major scales with a few minors
and I understand and can read basic chords
A. Run, do not walk, to purchase:
Bela Bartok: Microkosmos, Books I, II, maybe III.
Beginner's Bach, Schirmer publisher, or similar collection
Schumann: Album für die Jugend.
There you have an excellent base.
The Bartok are famous for being one of the best progressive sets of piano piece c_m pedagogy ever written. They are also ripe for delving into theory basics, a base for learning to transpose and improvise.
Bach is Bach, and independence of fingers (and brain-tracking) are essential - the Bartok, BTW, is also loaded with those necessary challenges.
The Schumann are brief, characteristic pieces, a variety of technical problems as well as an array of 'emotional spectrum' in a set of pieces for beginners.
Prokofiev's "For Children" is a suite of about fourteen pieces - some more difficult than others. They are also Very Nice music.
I'd generally avoid any collections like the John Thompson (American series) which often have simplified versions of pieces, or just completely banal music therein. Every 'method' book or graded collection I've seen is always lacking something - because it is just not possible to put it all together to make a method or graded collection without excluding much.
It seems to me you don't need a piece which has little motifs of melodic thirds alternating from hand to hand called "Butterflies," and all that horrible anti-music music which seems to abound in those earlier graded collections.
Enjoy. Get a teacher as soon as you start to have questions. Here is not that place, because you can't be heard or seen, and the questions that come up are of all sorts physical, and the answers are often precise and nuanced. You can only satisfy that in a one-to-one interactive relationship with a teacher.
P.s. You may have experience, but you do not have experience in the simultaneous reading and playing from two individual clefs, with independent musical material in each. There, you are a beginner, and I remind you to be patient with yourself.
Best regards.
I need help with my AMEB grade 8 piano exam??!! Please answer! :)?
Q. OKAY, so as you all know, my soon-to-approach and dreaded grade 8 piano exam (practical AMEB) is giving me strife. My pieces are only a matter or practice, as with the scales. BUT, I cannot seem to overcome the horrid aural tests, memory and yes, my sight-reading is also a bit dodgy, these components make up more than like 50% of the exam itself and I just cant seem to do it!
Here is the syllabus thing, checkout the requirements for grade eight:-
http://www.ameb.edu.au/site/index.cfm?display=121539
My piano teacher is really stressing me out, she says that if I just blank in the memory section (which I always do, I cant help it! At home when i practice, it is fine but at lessons I go blank) Then the examiner will fail me immediately. I cannot afford to fail this exam. So pleaseee,, how do I learn to distinguish the different harmonies etc. How do I memorise the memory section? Any tip would be appreciated. :D
Thankyou, and please give me some tips, God knows I need them!! xox
A. Do not worry so much! You can do a lot of things by yourself by practicing online. There are many very good interactive websites that can help you with interval, chords, cadences recognition, etc. These websites are free. Unfortunately through "Answers" I can only give you ten links, but there are more for you to choose from.
Go to my website http://piano-lessons-toronto.com/level-4-and-up/ where you will find a lot of links.
For sight reading, you have to practice very consistently and effectively. No way around!
You can do it! Trust in yourself. My students are doing miracles just before exams. I don't know how much time you have, just start doing online exercises now.
Good luck!
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