Mikes Music Room – Music Articles

Many piano students want to learn how to play piano by ear. Some are hesitant to learn because they fear it will be too difficult. While it can be hard at first, the more you practice, the easier it becomes. This article will show you how you can learn how to play piano by ear easily.

Melody

The first thing you need to work on to play piano by ear is the melody. Find a song you like that has a simple melody, then sit down at the piano and try to pick it out. This will be easier if you work on recognizing intervals. An interval is simply the distance between two notes. If you can recognize intervals easily, you will be able to pick out a melody much faster.

Chords

After picking out the melody, the next step to play piano by ear is to harmonize the melody with chords. If you’re a beginner, you will be happy to know that you only need to know three chords in order to harmonize any melody. These three chords are based on the first, fourth, and fifth notes of the scale in whatever key you’re playing in. In the key of C, the three chords would be C, F, and G chords. These three chords include every note in the key of C.

Chord Voicing

The last thing you need to know to play piano by ear is chord voicing. Chord voicing is when you play a chord in any position other than root position. Let’s take a C chord for example. In root position, you will play a C, E, and G in that order. To voice the chord differently, you could play the E on the bottom, followed by a G and C. You could also play the G on the bottom, with the C and E played above it. When you play piano by ear, you could play all chords in root position, but you could vary your sound by using different chord voicing.

Learning how to play piano by ear is not that difficult. Once you have the melody figured out, all you have to do is harmonize it with chords. After that, you could experiment with different chord voicing to vary the sound. After practicing for a while, you will know how to play piano by ear with ease.

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Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=D_Swain

Tags: c chord, intervals, piano students, play piano, root position, simple melody, three chords

Musicians often disagree about where phrases start and finish. This is because there is often more than one possible INTERPRETATION. When you play music, try to hear which notes belong together. Phrases may be the same length, or start on the same beat of a measure. Songs may have a phrase for each line of the words.

• IDENTIFYING PHRASES: Musicians often disagree about where phrases start and finish. This is because there is often more than one possible INTERPRETATION. When you play music, try to hear which notes belong together. Phrases may be the same length, or start on the same beat of a measure. Songs may have a phrase for each line of words.
• ANSWERING PHRASES: In some music, pairs of phrases of the same length sometimes seem to match each other. The first phrase seems to ask a question, and the second phrase to answer it. (Does this sound like a pattern for the Blues?) For example, the second phrase may seem to answer the first by ending on the tonic when the first phrase did not.
• RHYTHM PATTERNS: Phrases often have a strong rhythm structure. A pattern may be repeated or varied within a phrase, between phrases, or even throughout a whole piece.
• MELODIC PATTERNS: Phrases often contain patterns of notes that are repeated exactly, or changed by transposing them to a different pitch or varying the intervals.
• SHOWING PHRASES: Composers usually do not show phrases in their music. Instead, they show how to play notes within phrases, using signs such as SLURS and STACCATOS. It is up to each player to decide how to phrase the music. Signs such as BREATH MARKS or BOWING can help do this.
• PHRASES THAT MODULATE: Sometimes a phrase may end in a different key from the one it began in, such as the relative minor or major key. This is called MODULATION. For a tune to modulate clearly, it has to use a note that is in the scale of the new key but not in the scale of the original key. The end result is very professional!
• Each artist has the unique gift of using dynamics in the song they are performing. What an incredible gift we have to color in the lines, to add our interpretation of musical phrases and give our audience a music idea to listen to. (Phrases that are smooth as glass or as crunchy as peanut brittle!)

For more information on music phrases and music resources that can benefit your playing, please visit my website.

I love the piano and I hope this information will help you to play the piano well with more feeling with expression!

Diana Rogers

http://ladydpiano.com/Music.html

http://ladydblog.com/

http://www.freewebs.com/ladydpiano/

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Tags: breath marks, composers, intervals, melodic patterns, modulation, music signs, musicians, phrases, pitch, play music, rhythm patterns, strong rhythm, tonic