A Teach Yourself Piano/Keyboard Guide

About the Book

Learning to play the piano should not be stressfull or boring!

There are probably many pianos and keyboards collecting dust while sitting in homes all over the world. More than likely, the owners of those instruments gave up on learning to play it because it was stressfull or lessons became boring.

This Teach Yourself Piano/Keyboard Guide was created to help make finding your way around the piano easy and exciting for beginners and 'play-by-ear' types.

However, musicians of all levels can use it to test or renew their skills.

If you are just beginning, this Guide will start you off from the most basic part of the piano, and take you to a point where you will develop enough piano skills to move on to more advanced subjects.

If you are playing-by-ear, you can greatly increase your knowledge, because you will clearly understand what you are playing, and all of the songs that you learn thereafter should become easier to learn.

The songs that you choose to learn is a personal matter, therefore, it was decided that the subjects in this Guide should be built on finding your way around the piano, instead of playing songs.

Musical staffs and piano illustrations were created showing the reader of this guide how the piano and music charts work together, which can be found on page 37, 38 and 62. This Teach Yourself Piano/Keyboard Guide also has lots of piano charts made to help you find your way around the piano!

About the Author

I spent over twenty five years as a singer and backup vocalist in a four-part front line vocal group. Although fun and exciting, it took up much of our lives trying to keep the show fresh, exciting and lively, which also is one of the main reasons I kept saying "one day I want to learn the piano".

However, in all of those years, the most I learned about the piano was what I picked up from some great musicians, such as singer/songwriter by the name of John Whithead (we called him toodles) who wrote tons of hits, such as "Ain't No Stoppin Us Now", "Back Stabbers", and many more.

He took us into the studio to go over some songs, and while standing there watching him play the piano it really got my attention! But, I still never got the chance to learn until the group broke up and we went our own ways. I guess I just loved being on stage more than learning to play the piano at the time.

Due to the fact that my years in the music business had already exposed me to many songs, and how they were structured, things like melody, form and especially harmony, I became more interested in the force behind all of those beautiful songs.

I attended a music school called Granoff's in Philadelphia where I grew up, which was very short lived, due to the fact that I am a very anxious person, and I found that lessons were coming very slowly for the money and time. So I started teaching myself with the help of some great books, and what I picked up on the road from friends.

I recorded a lot of what I learned and put it into the computer as I moved along, and one day my co-author Judy Braithwaite, who was my student at the time was looking over my notes, and she said to me "Wow! You've got a book here!"

I replied to her "Yes, I am organizing those notes for my daughter in case she ever wants to learn", And Judy said "Yes, but others can learn from this as well. And that is how the Teach Yourself Piano Guide was born.