Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum Rythmic problems!

Just thought I'd have a go at a Diana Ross Remix I like, to find I'm having great problems keeping rythym with my left hand. As soon as I attempt to play with my right hand, the rythym just goes completely. Here's what I'm trying to do.

This is the rythym with the left.


This is what I want to play, (I've had to record the bass seperately to demonstrate)


Any explanations to why this happens?
Any tips?
Or is it a case of just keep trying?

Cheers Guys & Gals

Have you tried synching on the first note in a bar? I don't know the piece but maybe use the LH as the timing and synch the RH as appropriate.

I'm finding this hard to explain, but as soon as I start to play the melody with my right hand, my left automatically starts playing

1 2 3 4, 1 2 3 4, 1 2 3 4, 1 2 3 4

instead of

1(for 2beats) 2 (for 2beats), 1 2 3 4, 1(for 2beats) 2(for 2beats), 1 2 3 4

I hope that makes sense

Figure out how to correctly count it out loud, then play the first phrase or first few measures, while counting out loud, at about 20% of the tempo in the video. If doing this HT proves too much, then do it HS first. Only start to speed it up once you can do it slowly without error 5 times HT. Walk before you run.

sorry for my ignorance, but what do the HT and HS abbreviations stand for?

Hands together and Hands separately.

Ok, maybe I have got the rythym wrong, and maybe it's 123, 123, 123, 123.

I haven't got a score for this as it's by ear!

lol, thnx

Wayne, you might also try this twist on Hands Separately. It sometimes works for me. Try tapping out the left hand rhythm instead of playing. Use the wood on the piano or your lap--wood is better. Then try tapping and singing the melody. Finally, try tapping while playing the melody. Then play hands together.

pmsl, I'm even finding that difficult, but great idea, thnx

wayne32yrs, I think you mentioned sometime you had the Piano for all package, but correct me if I'm wrong. The reason I ask is that Robin says there are some rhytmic patterns common to most pop/rock music, and that you have to learn those rhytms long before you learn all the fancy right hand licks. You have to be able to play them in your sleep, as he puts it.

Just my two cents, as you call it. But tell me, what song is this, because I'm quite familiar with the nostalgic disco tunes of that great woman singer, Diana Ross? Would like to learn at least some of them in the future.

Errr no, I haven't got piano for all!

The song is a remix version of "love hangover", I was using this remix as an inspiration for a piano solo.

Here's the remix.......

Would you be able to write out the separate parts for yourself as a normal combined 2 stave piano part? If you can do this and carefully line up the beats between the two parts I think seeing the spatial connection between the two parts could be a useful guide. You'd know then where the LH and RH coincide and where certain notes come 'in between' others.

You'd have to play it slowly to begin with..

- just a thought..

I think I could manage that, will give it a go, thank you

I'm planning on playing it in D minor, chords Dm, Gm, Bb/C then transitioning to Dm, (C#,E,G) (I don't know this chord lol, is it c# diminished)(this is the bit I'm stuggling with the rythym) Hope I'm making sense

- yes that's c#dim.

Hope to see the final vid when you've mastered it!

Cheers, if I do lol

Just opened the video of the remix, and got this related video up. Can't resist this soulful song, everytime it gets me, that golden oldie.

Julie London - Cry Me A River

Does anybody know of a good soul disc with this song, and maybe others like it, Everytime You Say Goodbye with Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong and such artists?

PS Hope this is not considered a thread hijacking!

Wayne, the rhythm you're playing with your left hand is, in your language, 1 (for 2 beats), 2 (for 1 beat), 3 (for 2 beats), 4, 5, 6.

It is syncopated. Counted in a more standard way, it is 1-2, 3, 4-5, 6, 7, 8. That's if you hear the fast notes as a beat, where the hyphenated numbers mean one longer note. I hear the fast notes as eighth notes, so would count this as a single 4/4 measure: ONE and TWO AND three AND FOUR AND. The all-cap words are where you are playing; the lower case words are where you are holding.

If you're writing the music out, it's quarter, eighth, quarter, eighth, eighth, eighth. Or half, quarter, half, quarter, quarter, quarter, but writing it with the shorter note values makes more sense to me given the feel of the music.