Author: maryisobel Page 2 of 3

I have to say overall I am quite happy with my musicianship growth assignment this far. Taking some time amongst all my academic subjects and focusing on playing the piano  has been a nice relief. Although I am still using my brain and it is a learning experience I find it a much more relaxing assignment and I thoroughly enjoy spending time doing it. Some weeks I have found it tricky to fit into my workload, but I usually manage to find at least 10 minutes on those busier days. I have appreciated that I am able to adjust the volume levels on my keyboard, that way I can always find time at night after everyone has gone to bed and my brain is fried of academic work to unwind with some music. With that said, I recently visited a friend whose home had a lovely piano and it became very obvious to me how much nicer it was to play than a keyboard. The quality of sound is the major difference, I feel that playing on a grand piano is a much more authentic and uplifting experience and I am disappointed we got rid of the one my home had. I had proposed in my template that I would be recording videos weekly of each song I chose to play. Although I have not followed through on that, I did post an initial video, then the one attached to this post and I will post the last one for my final assessment. I found a lot of the songs I was learning to be very repetitive and I moved through them quite quickly. Therefore the song I am sharing today is actually what I planned to perform as my final piece.  I have caught on to reading music and finger placement faster than I anticipated and the pieces I am finding the most difficult are the ones that have both hands playing simultaneously.

Sheet Music for “African Celebration”

For many units in my piano book the songs focused mostly on the treble clef, which honestly was very helpful for me just starting out again. My criteria is still as I proposed it, the only modification being a different song for my evaluations. I am changing my final piece to “All of Me” by John Legend and I hope to sing along with it! I am so thrilled that I could use this assignment to learn piano again, I could not be happier about where I stand in my development this far.

Photo by Marius Masalar

Over the last two weeks of working through my growth plan I have noticed that I am easily able to play a lot of these pieces, but I am penciling in some letters to remember the different notes. I am still struggling with properly playing the right amount of beats without playing some too fast or too slow. I have looked for apps that can act as a metronome and then I discovered if I google it there is one available to me there. I just recently found this and have incorporated it in to my playing and it has been very helping with keeping me on beat. I think I am doing quite well in regards to my growth plan and I am moving ahead much faster than I thought. The song for my midterm evaluation may be altered just because I want to have more of a challenge going forward. I have also been browsing around online for some more popular songs that I may end up switching to for my final evaluation. Ideally I would really love to sing and play along to a song for my final recording because when I initially thought about which instrument I wanted to play I chose piano knowing it’s a beautiful instrument to sing along with

Photo by Rachel Loughman

I have had a few moments of frustration with mixing up the notes, especially in the base clef. I was certain it was the right note and it did not make sense to me on why it wasn’t sounding right, but then I remember that FACE and EGBDF only applies to the treble clef so that cleared up a lot of my confusion! Again I am finding the music literacy sheets to be extremely helpful with teaching me the language of music. I am thrilled to be playing an instrument again and really enjoy the release of pressure I feel when I get to sit down at the keyboard and play.

This is the adult learners book I am using.

A few weeks back I began to rekindle my piano playing abilities and purchased myself a keyboard. I use to play when I was younger, almost 15 years ago and I am finally getting myself back into it. At first I thought I would be able to use a lot of my old sheet music but it was very child orientated, which meant extremely beginner based. When I did piano, theory was a big component that I would have to complete before going back to my next lesson. At the time it was something I never wanted to do, looking back now I am grateful because it has made reading music not as frustrating this time around. I have also found the different music lectures and worksheets to be helpful with reminding me of all the different components to look out for when reading sheet music. After the first week I found myself sticking to my growth plan quite well, although the first two units which I planned to do over a two week period were completed within the first week since they were very basic. A lot of the different songs I am playing are definitely beginner level and they are truly helping me concentrate on the fundamentals of playing piano again.  Occasionally I have been attempting to play along to more popular songs and easy piano tutorials from videos that I find online.  I struggle most with playing both hands at the same time unless the note movements are the same, but in more intricate songs that is not the case.  It is definitely a work in progress as I am trying to retrain my fingers positioning and movement.

Ode to Joy, the song I learned to play at the end of week one. See video below!