Piano for Beginners

Merrily, we are rolling along.  I can now play Merrily We Roll Along on the piano.  After only two lessons!  Are you as impressed with me as I am?

As I wrote before, I am following RocketPiano’s free six-lesson trial, doing the Piano for Beginners version.  I started last week and was pleased with myself for playing Mary Had A Little Lamb during the first lesson.  But now it’s even more smashing than that.  I can play two songs.

The second lesson expands on reading music.  I was introduced to dynamic marks and time signatures.  But the real focus of this lesson was on reading notes on the staffs.  The notes for the treble and bass clefs are presented.  I got exposed to notes going up the staffs, one by one, first on a line then on a space, with letters by their sides indicating which note was which.  I paid some good attention to that part of the lesson. 

I am a little bit familiar with the treble clef, but I don’t read the bass clef, so I need to learn it now from the beginning.  Learning to read music, I am reminded now, is a laborious task.  And that makes me really grateful now for Jayde Musica.  This is a computer game that aims to teach you to read music.  You can download it free with the RocketPiano program.  In Jayde Musica, notes on a staff move across the screen and you have to identify them quickly and accurately.  If you succeed, you advance to the next higher, and harder, level.  As I have worked with it the last few days, I thought it was fun.  But now I am seeing that it is a much better way to learn to read music than just memorizing the notes on a staff.  Jayde Musica is interactive.  It moves, rather than just requiring you to stare at and memorize a staff of music.  The snatches of staff come across the screen with a single note, so that you can focus on it visually, rather than being swamped by a ladder-like string of notes.  It requires you to react speedily, so you stay alert, rather than entering into a trance staring at a line of notes. 

In the last few days when I worked with Jayde Musica, I only practiced the treble clef, because although I was a little bit familiar with it, I need practice.  I will be going back now to work on the bass clef for the next few days.

The other thing that was presented in the second lesson was the “Middle C hand position.”  In it, you position both hands on the white keys, both thumbs on Middle C.  So your right hand goes up from your thumb to G, and your left hand goes down from your thumb to F.  And they give you little tunes to play with each hand to learn rhythm, reading notes and hand position.  I didn’t recognize the tunes, so they may have been written just to practice that part of the lesson.  But I like it that you practice by playing melodies, not just scales.  I played the tunes first by myself without listening to the MP3 track that demonstrates how it’s supposed to sound.  I did a pretty fair job, if I say so myself.

Well, that’s the update on my piano-learning experience.  Have I seduced you?  Do you want to play, too?  The first six lessons are free.  Just click on the grand piano in the sidebar on the right and sign up for RocketPiano!

The lessons come via a link in an email every four days.  So I’ll be spending the next few days working with Jayde Musica and playing Mary Had A Little Lamb and Merrily We Roll Along.  I’ll be back in this space with an update after I take the third lesson.  See you then!

Until then, here are some other articles for you to read:

• Buying Tips for Portable and Flexible Piano Keyboard | KEY BOARD PIANO – Portable and flexible Piano keyboard is now available in the market with wonderful features. Even the beginners can achieve a professional sound from these Piano Keyboards. Portable Keyboard is low cost equipment and can be used for …

• Free Piano Sheet Music | Piano For Beginners | Beginners Piano – The people at about.com have kindly provided us with a list of free piano sheet music which can be downloaded and printed out. The interface is a bit clumsy as.