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Welcome Coatimundi,
We look forward to having you. We are in fact beginners but there are some highly experienced players lurking around also. You’ll find everyone nice and willing to help you along. Without the people on this site I’m sure I would have dropped out a year ago.
I too played in band years ago. Ok, decades. I hadn’t read a note since 1983 until last year and was surprised that I could remember stuff.
Keep us posted and don’t get frustrated. Have fun.

Okay, so got about an hour of work yesterday and another one today with All In One; it felt really comftable to be sitting again at the keyboard. I find it funny that after all these years, my fingers still remember how to play a little. I worked on Ode to Joy (page13) for the right hand and Aura Lee (page17) for the left hand. I'm trying to focus on achieving an even sound and fluid phrases (while working with a slow metronome).

Also looked around for some medium-term "goal" to play for the future, and settled on Bach's Prelude in C major. When I tackled Bach on bass I had so much fun, that I'm actually excited for giving it a shot in another instrument.

Tonight’s practice was perfectly horrible. Nothing went right.

You know, I've found that this just happens. The last lesson I had before I left for vacation (3 weeks ago!) was one of my worst. Nothing I did seemed to work. I even thought about emailing my teacher later to apologize.

I'm currently slogging through The Can-Can. I've noticed that I'm going much slower than before. I presume it's because the book is increasing in complexity...and I am trying to follow the music even though I still tend to be memorizing these pieces. I do seem to be making some progress with a couple of the songs I'm working on (The Forrest Gump Feather Theme, I'll Know, and Christmas Time Is Here), but sometimes I feel like instead of moving ahead, I'm stumbling backwards.

Look at it this way: you can only go up from here!!

I think you'll have days like that.



Especially with the shorter pieces early on, I think you tend to play them so much that you can't help but memorize them. It just happens. But I've found that the memories don't last. I can't now go back to earlier pieces and play them through the first time. Now that the pieces are getting longer for me I find that I do still memorize parts and the music ends up being more of a guide or a map through the piece with some of the parts not really memorized ...at least not yet.

As for me, I feel like I've finally got a reasonable grasp on Raisins and Almonds. I still don't like He's Got the Whole World in his Hands but I can tell I'm improving. Y'all weren't kidding when you said Amazing Grace is challenging. It might take a little more time, but I'll get there. I can't help but think that maybe I haven't mastered the theory well enough and that it should come easier.

It was time spent on piano so not a total loss. Today will be better. I guess I’m pushing too much since it’s the last songs in the book. GidgetKeys and pathguy are correct, we have days like that. (I hope you enjoyed “Raisins”, I did get thru it last night ok)

pathguy, she is also correct about memorizing. It just sticks with you after a bit. I have to memorize due to vision. You will be pleasantly surprised because sometimes that feeling of stumbling backwards will turn into a breakthrough.

One last note on the bad practice trip is that I think I handled it better than times like that before and kept it from completely going off track. I didn’t blow my stack, curse, or throw anything but rather switched things up, took a breather, and so on. All are methods I’ve gotten most from folks here. In that sense I guess I got more from it than I thought.

A bit off-topic, but today I bought a Yamaha NUX1 AvantGrand hybrid piano! I needed a replacement for my Roland FP30 which will join me in my work apartment an hour from my home. It’s probably a bit too advanced for me, but I played it and honestly just fell in love! More than I planned on spending, but thanks to financing, it’s quite doable, and I don’t see the need to upgrade for a long time. It comes on Thursday! ❤️

Oops: NU1X that is ☺️

Congrats, pathguy! You'll enjoy it I started with a YDP-181 and then moved to the N2. I could never go back to the YDP now. It feels all wrong.

Progress this past week was going slowly, but fairly well for me I think. I’ve managed to figure out coordination for playing both hands together (on Jingle Bells, at least), and now Jingle Bells is quite easy, and I’ve inadvertently memorized it, just from practicing it so much. I’ve gotten a bit further now into Alfred’s and also Fundamental Keys.

I had some trouble initially with playing multiple keys on the same hand, particularly my left hand, and especially where I need to play something like just fingers 5 and 3, for example. I’ve read through “What Every Pianist Needs to Know About the Body” over the past week, however, and feel like that has helped tremendously with both this problem, and my form in general. I’m just starting out, so I chose to read through that book and try to put it into practice, in order to establish good movement patterns in my playing from the outset. For playing multiple keys, I realized that I had been trying to isolate the movement to my fingers too much — e.g. actually lift finger 4 while pressing down with 5 and 3. I’ve found that if instead I allow my hand to drop (using fluid movement of my whole arm), and resist the keys under 5 and 3, pushing them down, while not resisting with 4 (essentially letting that key push my finger up), the motion is much easier.

Thanks for the welcome, monkeeys.

Pathguy, congratulations on the new piano. I probably got a piano that is too advanced for me (it almost has to be, by definition, as I’m a total beginner), but I hope to grow into it over time.

Coatimundi I, too have difficulties when having to play certain fingers together with my left hand: especially 3 and 5. The sense of my own progress seems to have slowed a bit, but I think it's because the lessons in the book are getting more challenging, which is a good thing. I do notice that when I feel I've progressed, it does feel like more of an accomplishment (if that makes any sense). I guess it feels like I have to work more for it.

Can't wait for the piano to arrive on Thursday! I told my teacher about it, and he is very happy I bought it. He thinks I will progress even faster, and said it definitely is not overkill.

Play on!

I’m still finishing these last pieces as well as just reviewing the book and going back thru lessons. I’ve looked ahead at the first lessons in both Alfred’s and Faber level 2 books and those are reviews too so that’s what this weeks plans will be.

It looks like everyone is doing well. Have a great week.

You're doing well, monkeeys.

I'm seeing progress on Amazing Grace finally (it's a good thing too, I was beginning to get frustrated at my perceived lack of progress), and still smoothing out the Entertainer and He's Got the Whole World.

I have the Alfred's book 2 for when I'm ready. What do you think of the Faber series? Is it worth buying and working from both?

Pathguy, congrats on the new piano. I'm sure you're counting the days.

GidgetKeys, I’m honestly not sure and was thinking the same about doing lessons from both. I do like the Faber book. Both start with reviews of level 1 so I figured I would think about it as I do those.

GidgetKeys and monkeeys you both are progressing so well!! My vacation and boards really slowed me down (I didn't get quite as far as I was planning), but I can at least get through Can-Can without messing up too much. We'll see how tonight's lesson goes!

I hope the lesson was well pathguy. You’ll shake the vacation off and be back In the groove in no time.

Haha: thank you! One of the great things about my teacher is since he only teaches adults, he realizes sometimes we just can't get to the piano as much as we'd like. The lesson went pretty well in spite of my lack of moving too far in the book: My three songs ("I'll Know", "Christmas Time is Here", and The Feather Theme from Forrest Gump) are starting to sound somewhat coherent; although the memorization bug is showing it's head again. The Feather Theme I had essentially memorized awhile a go (just was having difficulty playing open 10th chords in the left hand), but the other two I'm trying hard to follow along with the music. Got a new song last night to work on ("Sunny"), and the new piano arrives today, so I hope to be playing much more very soon.

Feeling good about my progress on Amazing Grace. It's smoothing out and I've shaved 30 seconds off the recorded practice version time so I can tell it's getting better. Still one measure tripping me up in The Entertainer so I need to work on that. I keep getting pulled away to play drums with my husband (he's learning a new song).

Monkeeys, I know you are in the Carolinas somewhere. Be safe next week. Looks like Florence is coming for a visit.

Thank you GidgetKeys, Im in the upstate of SC and keeping a close watch on the weather. Im admittedly afraid of storms since a rough time about 10 yrs back. I’m just hoping this thing stays offshore as I’m sure all of our east coast members are.

So cool: I am a recovering drummer, myself!