Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum Alfred's Basic and ALL in One Adult Piano Course Book #1

Sight reading is difficult for just a beginner. I'm almost done with book 1 and I don't seem to be able to just look at a piece and play it. However, it does get better as you move along in the book. Mid way through the book, reading the bass was difficult. I couldn't just look at the note and know what key it was. However, that has gotten a lot better now. The latter pieces in the book really involve the bass a lot. Just keep practicing and you'll see it improve.

Got those blues frustrates me, due to the chord progressions is somewhat out of my understanding. The I is simple enough, that's been played for such a long time, the IV is however one I cannot figure out. The root is still the same, so I assume it is C..then G? and B? That is the one that puzzles me the most. V7 I'm assuming is D-G-A, since root is pushed down, and the right being where the V7 chord is would be F and D, but together they make a rather horrible so again I'm in doubt though it might sound better once all is up to speed. I've tried watching the videos to confirm whatever is the correct but I can't see it a 100%, and while trying to play them they sound a bit "goofy" together.

Since its not such a fast tempo its not that hard, but when I play the chords it makes me wonder if I'm doing it right. (Start my LH on C and G, RH on E and C if that matters, incase I'm actually dumb enough to play it in the wrong position in the first place.)

Tried googling for an answer, but no solution. Sorry for pestering you all with questions due to my lack of knowledge and understanding :S

Quagles
The fingering of this one gets a bit tricky. Left hand plays 4 measures of the C cord CEG. Then,2 measures of the F cord in the inversion of CFA (normal root positon for F cord would be FAC). Back to 2 measures of the C cord (CEG)and then 1 measure of the G7cord. This inversion of the G7 is being played BFG.
So to break the left hand down:
C cord is C/E/G fingers 5/3/1
F cord is C/F/A fingers 5/2/1- Finger 5 stays on C. Fingers 2 & 1 shift to the right to play F & A.
G7 Cord is B/F/G fingers 5/2/1 This cord is played from the C cord position, so finger 5 moves to the left from C to play B- fingers 2& 1 play F&G.

Don't lose sight of the fact that the I, IV, V7 cords of C major are still just C, F, G7 cords and can be played in any of their inversion format. Inversions are first and foremost used to make changing cords easier and also to improve the voicing of a cord to better fit the melody of the right hand.

Thanks Barbva
Congrats to "Good People" I like that one as well.

Thanks Romolo and Quagles. I'm really serious about learning piano and as an adult it seems hard to find other adults who have started and who you can bounce ideas off. It's great to have a forum to discuss this stuff. I find that once the notes go above or below the staves (?) I have trouble figuring out what the note is so I got a piece of manuscript paper and wrote the notes down for reference. Both bass and treble.

Hello all, I hope everyone had a nice weekend.

Little Brown Jug is coming along nicely, and Chipanecas also. I accidentally had skipped over Good People, so I'm still working on that one as well. Soon it's off to CA for vacation, but my mom has a piano so I should be able to keep up the progress.

I'm still on Jingle Bells

Having lots of fun with my new toy.

Thanks for that Carl That was what I thought at first but I didn't think the IV note could be like that seeing how it was drawn, maybe I've done silly errors earlier in the book when I think about it. The "V7" note is the that is usually is C-F-A. except that the root is one point higher is what I always thought. Such as in joy to to the world there's notes that is exactly the same as the V7, which is played C-F-A, unless I've gone somewhere wrong there.

Well anyways, makes more sense now still bit of a hard song, having to reach for flats and changing chords pretty often. But coming along now at least.

I'm officially on O Sole Mio right now. It's still in pieces, I'm afraid, but I hope it'll be presentable to my teacher by Thursday.

I had to look after someone in the hospital the past couple of weeks so I missed playing piano the entire time! There was a nice Yamaha grand piano in the hospital lobby but I was too shy to try and play it (I wouldn't want patients to suffer through my renditions of the method book pieces ). My 2-week hiatus, surprisingly, didn't seem to deteriorate my piano 'touch,' but to my horror, it did deteriorate my note-reading skills! I was a bit lost looking at the sheet music during today's lessons

Carl Mc : Nice rendition of The Entertainer! I quite like it better with the faster tempo

In every video I have seen of Got Those Blues on 2nd line, the second and 3rd measures on the line. Where you push the a flat E and C together at the same time, I see everyone is pushing the flat E all three times. But as I understand from the notes you only do it once then a regular C and E, as the flat is only before the first? So is every video I've watched just mistakes from others or can someone explain to my the E should be flat all three times when its only in front of the first note?

As it is now I'm playing it flat E-C, then twice E-C.

Quagles,

The videos you see of them hitting the E flat all 3 times are right. When a sharp or flat sign appears before a note, that note is always sharp and flat for the rest of the measure, unless its canceled by a neutral sign. Go on page 96 in your all in one book if you have that one where it teaches you the flat sign...the song is Rock it away and it tells you there. It also explains it on page 54 when it teaches you about the Sharp sign...the song is Money cant buy everything.

So basically, when a sharp/flat sign appears before a note, that note is sharp/flat for the whole measure.

Quagles

Once a note is indicated to be flat or sharp by the b or # sign, that note is to be played flat or sharp for the remainder of the measure. Unless, it is canceled by the little square sign (which I can't type).

Hi Romolo!

Thanks marimorimo!
I bet those patients would have been happy to hear you play.

Hi Carl Mc
I beat you by 10 seconds :P

Thanks both, I see it now and somehow missed that on both occasions which is a bit stupid of me, think I better repeat Rock it Away once more. But I think there's only once or twice where it would apply anyways, so its not like I have to relearn it. The blues should be even easier now, because the problem initially was pretty much getting fast enough up from normal to flat on the next measure.

The worst part is that I had read about the natural sign yesterday as well, and didn't even put 1+1 together from that :p

No more than half an hour ago, my brand new polished ebony
Yamaha T118 arrived.

I have been working on Entertainer using my beat up keyboard while I was between my old Lester that I sold prematurely and my new Yamaha. I sat down at the Yamaha and immediately felt better about the piece. amazing. I'm no better at playing it, but I feel better. Even the mistakes sound better.

But now I can't even practice until at least Saturday since we are having a party tomorrow that we have to prepare for. So tomorrow I entertain, then on saturday I play Entertain. or try to.

Congratulations Duke on your new piano hope you'll get a lot of enjoyment out of it.

Moved to a new place on thursday, so haven't really had any chance to practice in the last days, and still on got those blues, but I think I'm ready to move on tommorow since it pretty much sat before moving. Though vacation ends on tuesday, so I hope it won't effect my improvements too much.

grr...The Entertainer is hard lol
I'm pretty much got it, just need it to flow.
I'm working on Amazing Grace as well and that's coming along well so I'm almost down.:)

Congrats Romolo, you're almost done. I had a hard time finding our thread, it had dropped all the way to page 4, I'm guessing we've all been too busy trying to finish up this first book that we haven't had time to post.

Lessons finally got back on schedule last night, I've only had one lesson in each of June and July due to mine and my teacher's summer schedules. I'm officially up to O Sole Mio (sp). With a first run through, I'm not much caring for that song. I haven't decided yet if its difficult or jut different, need to spend some time with it.

I'm hoping to get through Jericho and The Stranger as well before my next lesson. Right now that feels like a challenge to me, but sometimes once I get started I realize a piece or pieces aren't as difficult as they looked in the beginning. And I have to say PianoNewbAlex's You tube videos have been a life saver. There are many times I would have just looked at a song and given up if I didn't have them to refer to. Does anyone know if he is a member here? I'd love to thank him personally for all of his work and effort posting the videos for everyone's use and reference.

In the Greatest Hits, I'm working on Beauty and the Beast, not too hard, infact it seems more simplified than It's a Small World and Tomorrow that I just finished. I'll probably have that one nailed in a day or so, not sure what is next in the GH book after that, haven't looked that far recently.

My plan is still to be done with Book 1 by October and spend the remainder of the year working on a Christmas repertoire before moving on to Book 2 at the first of the year. I think I'm still on track to make my plan.

Well, keep up the good work all!