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I have only followed you for a little while. So far I find I get allot of bang for the buck. Fun is the whole point for me. I find you keep it fun which means whatever I learn is pure gravy. At my advanced age I love any gravy I can get.
Thanks Nate. As some others have said, your Breakthrough course definitely helps with this. The challenge for me is singing and counting at the same time, especially when the eight notes and sixteenth notes are in the mix !
Totally. The key is always to get the piano part deep in your muscle memory before you add in the singing. Starting by humming the melody instead of singing the words as a transitional step can help too
Counting is key. I couldn’t agree more. I’ve never been patient enough to use a metronome. I do know it would help. When I try to learn a new song by you I do count, but as I learn the song I find that I do it more by feel and by ear. As a beginner, I still haven’t found the coordination to use the foot pedal yet or octaves still elude me. I usually just use one octave. A lower bass note with my left hand. I think I suffer from what many beginners struggle with, I wanted to play songs quickly, so I bypassed scales, music theory, and other Lessons that are helpful. I just learned chords and ran with it.
Hey John! Good to hear from you. I know you have made amazing progress and learned a ton of songs...I really do think you're doing yourself a big disservice by avoiding the pedal. Once you get the hang of it, all of your playing will sound so much more pro. But I suggest following the approach that I lay out in the later part of this video...if you suddenly start trying to force yourself to use the pedal on all these songs you enjoy playing, you're going to get frustrated and stop trying. Dedicate a small portion of your practice, just a few minute, to working on pedal timing with something very simple. Then forget about it. Keep doing that over th coming days and weeks, at some point incorporating it with more songs but just the very easiest ones. At some point it really will click and you'll be able to add it to everything without getting tripped up
Great class Nate and concur as someone who is working through Piano Chord Breakthrough, it does help with the topic of timing. I actually go back and rework some of the sections periodically. My challenge is when it comes to say live music where multiple instruments and vocals are present. I play in a garageband and periodically someone will show up and say "lets do this Gin Blossoms song." It's one thing to work on something with timing at a slow 70 BPM with just a single instrument - the challenge for me is a full band cranking along at say 120 BPM. I struggle with sifting through the "noise" and finding the beat. Is it the bass guitar or the drums which a crashing on snares, bass drums cymbals. I would love a class where we took say 4 songs easy to hard and dysected them drilling down to the essences of the beat. The rhythm section is the heart of a band or song and wish I would have had more exposure to understanding its role when I first was getting into playing and instrument.
Great to hear from you, Craig! This could indeed be a really good topic for a video. In a band context its often best to keep it simple and accentuate but not add to that "noise"...when in doubt play on beat 1 and then just a few other spots...either just on the quarter note pulse of pick a snare drum or bass hit to lock in with.
You can try it and see how it goes. For some people, doing it out loud keeps them focused, and doing it in their head too soon allows them to forget about it/ignore it
Piano Chord Breakthroughs is simply the title of my course..."Breakthrough" does not have a specific musical meaning. It is meant to communicate the goal of the course, which is to give people "breakthrough" moments where they are suddenly able to play chord-based piano music with more confidence and creativity. "A-ha" moments, if you will
Once you are really feeling the pulse, it is much easier to add in subdivisions. For example, if you're tapping your foot steadily, you simply put 1/8th notes on the "ands" when your foot goes UP
