Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum Newbie...need advice re:approach to take to reach my goal???

Hello. I've been reading on this site for about a week, and this is my first post. I have some piano knowledge including: reading music, scales and chord progressions,etc. I sing on the worship team at my church, but would also like to play with them. I've been taking private lessons for about 2 months, with prior lessons as a child, very basic. I want to know how to play by chords, play what I hear in my head, but also need to be able to play with a band who uses sheet music for guitar chords. I have composed one song, which includes right hand melody and left hand chords, but want to know how to expand and embelish it. I don't know how to make it sound like I want. I've been looking at PianoMagic.com, but not sure that's the right approach for me, since it emphasizes playing solo. Also, many of the student recordings sound very similar and it's not what I want to sound like. I don't want to have to play every song with right hand melody and left hand chords, but also want to just play accompaniment. So for playing with a worship team, and also wanting to arrange my own songs, would PianoMagic be the answer to what I'm wanting? I'd like to get away from private lessons. Thanks in advance for any advice.

As you say, if you are accompanying, you need to keep away from the melody.

Also away from the bass line, if your band has a bass player.

I would suggest playing the chords partly in your right hand,not always in root position, and with your left hand, playing what would be the 'Tenor' part, so as not to tread on the bass players lines.

You could always embellish the right hand chords with passing notes, suspended chords, descant lines, etc.

Good luck.

Okay ROB, you've confused me a little. Remember I'm a beginner, and I need more training. I understand root position, inversions, scales, and chord progressions. However, don't know what you mean playing the tenor part, suspended chords, passing notes, and descant lines??? What I want to know is what type of training should I go with other than private lessons.

There might be others who chime in here with a specific course - I remember reading here in the ABF about one that was specifically for accompaniment, but -

pianomagic is about playing by ear and understanding the structure of the music. So you don't have to play the melody in your right hand - if you can hear in your head what you want to play as part of the band then it seems to me pianomagic will help you learn to do that, too. The best suggestion I ever got, and I play in a band, was "listen, listen, listen." What pianomagic would do would be to help you understand what you are hearing and how to find, on the keyboard, what you want to sound like.

The tenor part is the range of pitches between the bass and the alto in a chorus. In a band the bass player will carry the lowest lines - runs, oom pahs, etc. What Rob is saying is that you want to find the accompaniment that doesn't clash with the other instruments, but complements them. That's a learning process by itself, for everyone in the band. The tenor part runs from around middle C to the next C below that, give or take some notes on either end.

I think of the descant as the "high harmony" - a "melody" line above the main melody that adds interest. I'm not sure that's the official definition, but that's the way it was used when I was growing up. At any rate, the piano is really good for adding bits and pieces that are single-note melody lines that complement the rest of the melody, or for adding little bits of interest when the melody line is holding a long note.

So I think pianomagic would give you the information and skills to do those things - understand the harmony, how to find on the piano the harmonies and descants you can hear in your head, etc. But, from what I understand from the folks here who are pianomagic folks, it's not different from other methods in the amount of time you put into it in order to actually play what you're learning

As I say, others will have more information about other courses.

Cathy

Cathy, thanks. I do have a good ear for picking out harmonies when singing. Can't tell you whether it's alto, tenor, bass, etc., but I can sing harmony very easily. Also, I was just listening to a worship CD, and the band was just playing chords, no melody. The vocalist was singing the melody. I would like to sing melody but not have to be bound to playing melody on the piano. I'm not opposed to playing melody, I just don't want to be bound to it. I'm sorry if I'm not making sense. It can be frustrating to know what I want but not be able to explain it. I think PianoMagic sounds great, I just want to make sure it would give me the ability to do what I want. I don't want to put out the money and then find out it's taking me in a different direction.

Sorry for confusing you, skanepa

I really should have spent more time on my reply, but thankfully, Cathy (jotur) did an excellent job, explaining, and expanding on what I was trying to say

I have no experience of Pianomagic, but many here have had great results with it.

Regards,

Rob

Need to clear something up. After reading my original post, I realized I made it sound like I ONLY want to play accompaniment. That's not the case. I want to be able to play melody but when needed or wanted, also accompaniment. I guess the main thing is I don't want to be bound by sheet music...notes on a page. Currently my teacher has me in the Alfred's Adult Book 1. She's also teaching me theory and that's what I really love. I don't really care about playing songs like the CanCan, Mexican Hand Clapping Song, etc.
And Rob, that's okay. I appreciate any feedback.

I would still suggest trying to split the chords between both hands, but adding some melody, or harmony notes to the chords in the right hand.

Try playing 5th intervals with the left hand.
When accompanying, you could leave out the left hand root, and just play the 5th, or third, as a harmony to the rest of the band. ( that is roughly the 'tenor' line I mentioned earlier)
Also, playing your left hand chords, arpeggio style, would be something to try.

Maybe take a simple song that you know well, and experiment with different styles.

Of course, if you are composing your own tunes, as you mentioned earlier, you would want to create the bass line yourself.