How I did it: I've toyed with the idea of learning to play piano several time in my life, not really digging too deep, and not really getting anywhere. About 8 months ago i bought a decent cheap keyboard, and started actually getting serious about it. I cant really say that I have 'learned to play piano', all i can really say is that I have progressed significantly in the last 8 months, and can now play some piano, and have composed some piano music.

How? It seems unapproachable to many people. You simply have to get over this, and start teaching your self little by little each day.

Lessons & tips:

• Set weekly goals. eg: "I want to learn how to play Billy Joels 'Piano Man'"

• Play a little bit every day

• Focus on building a set of songs you can play in-time, on key, and well. When you learn by playing, you do not nessesarily have to focus on music theory and structure. Your brain will start picking up on patterns and you will come to a deeper understanding of the relationships between different pieces, the relationship between the sound and the act of playing, and general musical structure and composition like chords, scales, harmony, what sounds good with what, where you can improvise, etc.

• Things like youtube are great for getting started. Once you build up your confidence by learning a few pieces, then you can start worrying about sheet music and music theory

• Have fun. If you find yourself more frustrated with your current project than enjoying it... call it a day, and come back to it later. You learn much more quickly if you do not strain to the point of discomfort and frustration, you cant force music. It also give your brain time to let what you did learn in your session sink in, and you will have a more natural understanding of it the next day when you come back to it.

Resources: Youtube.com

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Oct 20, 2008, 06:29AM PDT | 0 comments | 2 cheers