Hearing questions

[[vogue]angel]

Well, it's been sometime since i last started a thread. I'm back. I have a question to enquire from the sifus here.

My church is lacking of pianist to serve in the music ministry. So my music leader decided to ask me to train some of our members to play piano for the church.( there are classically train, 1 of them is a diploma)

They are really technical and have superb sight-reading. I on the other hand have "improving sight-reading" ( getting better after practising) . Here's the question, i notice they don't really have the hearing ( they have trouble playing by ear and following the beat of the crowd)

And they need notes to play, some songs we sing need to be transpose higher or lower, they are having trouble with transposing alsolar.

I'm kinda scared of teaching them as I'm not sure how can I teach them.

 

[yoruka19]

Playing by ear is all about the feel~~take away their score n ask them to play not read lol,no lar juz jking..maybe u can intro some song they might like n ask them to play by feel step by step the thing is they must like the song lar, but the thing about them not able to do transposing sounded weird,since they are classically train it should'nt be a problem for them~~@@ n yea ask them to play along with a metronome without score dat is, metronome can be found in some guitar tuner hehe.

 

[pf]

Aiyahh...you missed the church keyboardist training session conducted by Cheez a while ago. But never fear, he is still here. LOL

And don't worry abt teaching them. They are more scared than you.

Since you're now playing in church, I suppose you would at some point in time started to learn how to do that. So, you can teach them.

Just post any specific questions you have. Its been sometime since we have any fun in discussion here.

 

[[vogue]angel]

brother, i wish i could have attendedlar. But i'm the your northern neighbourlar. how to attend?

 

[pf]

Orrrhhh....now still can ask.

 

[noinimod]

[vogue]angel

Hmm since you alr play the keys for your church, you should roughly know what needs to be done what, no? I don't think that hearing aspect you described is that critical when playing in church, especially the beat of the crowd man. Most important is heart attitude, towards God and towards the band members and whether the person can flow with the band. Dude, the worship ministry is first and foremost a service to God, not to entertain people man.

Your playing by ear is what? That term is tossed around so much until the meaning is lost already. Do you mean using common chord progressions to put together a song or literally playing by ear w/o any knowledge of what note/chord a person is playing? Cos i don't know many people who can REALLY do the latter despite boasting of being able to 'play by ear'.

Since they won't be doing much solo-ing since they just making the transition, most important is probably combin. Teach some LH and RH rhythms. They should alr know what the chords are and how to construct triads. Also teach them the add9, sus4, dominant7, maj 7th, pentatonic scale, should be more than enough to start. Circle of fifths also.
To be brutally honest, keyboard players in church setting don't usually do much in technical wizardry, it's all quite basic stuff. Of course this is a player thing rather than the music 'prohibiting' more advanced playing but in many many christian songs, the keys can play the background role and still sound more than enough.

 

[pf]

Yes. Comping is a must for keyboardists in church. Our role is to faciliate worship. Cannot be 'talkative' all the time.

I think what is meant by the 'beat of the crowd' is playing in line in terms of rhythmn with the band. Am I right? If thats they case, they need to practice more with the band. At home, they can practice with CDs or the drum machine in their keyboards (if they have one). If they can't blend with the band, a distraction is created. That doesn't facilitate worship.

 

[Cheez]

I would tap on their strength. If they are all classically trained and even one diploma player, you have to be very careful not to put down people who play by reading scores. Start by recognising that there are many Ch keyboardists who may be able to play by ear but not read scores. So being able to read scores is a good place to start - easier for them to learn playing by ear and improvisation than for those who learn playing by ear and start learning to play scores.

Then start with theory. This is how their previous training works. Tap on their learning processes they are used to. Start with a basic understanding of chords using roman numerals. Then slowly go into techniques - of left hand, or right hand etc.

Remember they already have techniques. Tap on that.

 

[pf]

Yeah...I think there's a need to start on comfortable ground. Need to give very concete examples, eg:
1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &
C--C---C-xxxx

First to 3rd beat play the chord and fill in from the "& 4 &" with the scale notes.

Please don't tell them to "go with the flow", "go by feel", "just let go and play with your heart to the Lord"...but play what? These words totally put me off. It still does sometimes.

 

[Cheez]

One thing that's very unfortunate (and very human, even in church), is that classically trained tends to "look down" on those not classically trained, and vice versa. People who "play by ear" always criticise the classically trained as rigid, and those classically trained always complain those who don't learn the standard methods to lack techniques. To bridge the gap, it's best to have a person who is trained in both areas to teach.

And be very humble...

 

[[vogue]angel]

actually, i started this thread is also to help improve myself also. Coz sometimes i dunno wat m i playing also. ( i have this very crazy thing in me that tells me I must know what m I playing or I will go nuts)

noinimod, I agree on that they don't have to be technical. But they themselves are technical. 1 of them can play La Campanella by listz.( a song which is hard to play). The things is, I'm sure they know tons of theory, but do they know how to apply it.

Thanks Cheez for the advice. I'm posting this is to actually offer some advice to them on how to apply the knowledge they learn. We learn alot of theory, but putting it into practice, that's the hard 1.

Pf, that's what i was trying to say. The whole band rhythmn will go out. but normally, our drummers will go out coz they just like to whack for the sake of whacking The pianist in my church have to lead and set the rhythmn, or else, hairwire n sounds distorted. No synergy..........

 

[soft]

[vogue]angel

Maybe you can video yourself playing the song and then transcribe it. I am sure with these 2 in hand, it would be easier for everyone to learn the song.

 

[noinimod]

=[vogue]angel

i don't think so. The main bits of theory required used pop piano is vastly different from that in classical music.. maybe i did learn this while i still took ABRSM, but forgot, cos i surely don't remember my teacher teaching me add9s and maj 7ths and how they're used in chord progressions. The stuff i listed above is more than enough to get any beginner going man
about your drummer prob, bo pian what. have to make sure everyone knows what their role is and does accordingly. It's not right to have someone lead, at least not in the sense of keeping time. That's the basic expectation of ANY musician

 

[pf]

Coz sometimes i dunno wat m i playing also. ( i have this very crazy thing in me that tells me I must know what m I playing or I will go nuts)

What do you mean by that? Do you mean you must plan your playing? E.g: what note to use to fill and where to fill, etc?

[vogue]angel, everybody applies what they have learnt differently. How about getting everybody to start learning together? Listening to CDs together, make observations, research for tips online, watch youtube etc. Things are perhaps not as terribly difficult as you thought.

 

[pianomankris]

Cheez is spot on

Since they can read, i'd say get them to read the melody, and play the chords underneath, without actually reading the underlying harmonies.

this is akin to a jazzer reading a lead line and comping the rest of the song




in order to do this you will need to teach them all of the major/minor chords.

the best way to do this is to learn them all as R and 5 in LH, and R 3 5 in RH.

i'll group them for you in order to make them easy to learn:

C, F, G major - all natural

D, A, E major - # in the middle

Db, Eb, Ab major - natural in the middle, the other two are b

then the other three have to be learnt with their own rule:

F# -all #

Bb - R is b, other two are natural

B - R is natural, other two are #





Then teach them that to play 'minor', just flatten the middle note in the RH.

the benefit of doing just R and 5 in the LH (apart from a more complex musical reason) is that the LH is the same for both major and minor. As such, they have less to learn.



That would be my first lesson with them - learning all the major and minor chords.

Also - write out a I IV V progression in ever key as major and minor, and get them to practise it/learn it for the following lesson. They will need a system in order to practise their new chords.



PS this can be done by all technical levels, since no chord mentioned above is harder than the next - they are only tricky theoretically, if tricky at all.

 

[pf]

pianomankris, I like your tips on how to remember chords and scales (in one of your other posts). Thanks for sharing!

 

[pianomankris]

no problem pf

it seems to work, as I have a few 7 year olds who can play tunes such as 'unchained melody' purely by learning this way

i've tried both approaches e.g. reading, and the jazz way of learning.

I now begin kids on the jazz way (but teach them how to read rhythm, of course), then after about a year or two, depending on age, when they have a repertoire of about 50 full pop songs, I teach them how to read properly (but also still teach them songs the jazz way).



Reading music is a fight against two things- reading pitch, and reading rhythm.

If the player can read rhythm fluently before they begin to read pitch, it makes the battle 50% easier.

Plus, both the student and the parent's encouragement is increased when they hear that they are playing 'actual music'. Therefore the kids practise more.

The trouble with the classical approach is that the student is learning to read as well as learning to play. The reading part can put a lot of people off, and can actually put them off music for good, which is not the desired result of learning an instrument.



I have 10-year old kids who can play a I IV V in every key, both major and minor, yet still get adults coming to me who can play Rachmaninoff, but can't even play a basic chord progression.

I remember once when I was at music school (the Royal Academy here in the UK), me and a friend were mucking around on a piano. I said to him 'let's have a jam over a I IV V', and he just looked at me as if I was speaking in Swahili!

He is now a concert pianist, and just finished giving a recital where he played Scriabin's 7th Sonata, among other nightmarish pieces.



Learning the chords does help, as when looking at a score, you can just 'see' the chord as, for example, a Dm 2nd inversion etc etc

Learning the theory makes the reading far easier.


It then becomes possible to, for example, sight-read the complete Schubert sonatas in one evening, since when one sees a chord on the page, one knows what it actually is at the piano, and how to finger it etc etc

 

[joashchee]

I'm not sure if I'll be able to help in any way, but I do conduct a free 1 hour session for people who would like to try learning the art of accompaniment that's specially crafted for church worship. If you'd like to find out more, do check out my website at scorelessmusic.com.