While the fresh start that a New Year offers may have inspired your family and friends to pledge all manner of the more typical resolutions – such as to lose weight or find a new job – there can surely be few resolutions more inspiring than learning to play the piano.
Learning to play any musical instrument opens up a whole new world of expression and creativity, even it never graduates beyond a hobby. However, the piano, in particular, is a beautiful and sophisticated instrument that especially rewards dedicated and persistent practice.
However, if you do wish to learn to play the piano, it helps to have the right resources to hand. Here are some of those that we reckon you will find most indispensable.
First of all... what piano should you choose?
Of course, you won’t be able to learn to play the piano if you don’t have one in the first place. As one of the UK’s principal piano suppliers here at Coach House Pianos, we can provide you with tailored guidance on the right piano for you, before supplying the piano that best meets your preference.
With all of the world’s finest piano brands represented in one location, we help you to make a judgement without being influenced by what may be the very different acoustics of different rooms.
Visit our main showroom in Swansea by appointment, take a 360-degree virtual tour online or answer our useful questionnaire, which will help you to determine the right piano for you.
What about the world of video tutorials?
The wonders of the Internet and video-sharing sites are such that the teaching of how to play the piano has become truly democratised in recent years.
Visit YouTube and peruse the channels of such users as the Slovakian Peter PlutaX and Kyle Landry, where many fine Synthesias can be found, including the likes of the Skyrim main theme, “Once Upon a December” from Anastasia and even a Pirates of the Caribbean medley.
For those who are unaware, Synthesia is a Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X video game and piano keyboard trainer that enables users to play a MIDI keyboard or use a computer keyboard in time to a MIDI file by following on-screen directions – think Guitar Hero for the piano...
A selection of the best piano-playing apps
You can even practise your piano-playing technique on your smartphone or tablet, thanks to such apps as Piano Free, which gives you access to a full 88-key piano keyboard, and OnlinePianist, which gets into the Guitar Hero spirit by enabling you to play popular piano songs by your favourite artists.
If you want to get truly realistic with your virtual piano playing, however – you are, after all, wishing to learn to play a real piano – you can’t do better than the Piano 3D app. It combines an awesomely three-dimensional recreation of the instrument with a realistic piano sound and user-generated library of more than 750 songs.
Swot up with these highly rated books
If all of the above sounds a bit too high-tech, and even if you just want to complement your virtual piano-playing with a bit of good old-fashioned book learning, one of Amazon’s best-selling books for those wishing to learn the piano – It’s Never Too Late to Play Piano – may be of interest.
Author Pam Wedgewood takes you through the steps of learning the piano in her own friendly style, and the reviews are certainly resoundingly positive. However, there are many other appealing tomes out there depending on your preferences and needs, including James Rhodes’ How to Play the Piano and Ben Parker’s How to Play Piano: A Complete Guide for Absolute Beginners.
There are also many good websites to browse
An obvious choice of website to consult for piano-playing guidance is PianoLessons.com. This site offers easy-to-understand tutorials encompassing beginner, intermediate and advanced categories, covering such basic aspects as proper hand posture and how to read sheet music, as well as rather more specialised matters like dotted notation and chord inversions.
This site is free to use, but so is Zebra Keys, which provides more than 50 lessons concerning how to play the piano and the associated music theory. Finally, we also like the somewhat primitive-looking – but still undoubtedly insightful – Learn Piano by Chords.
Alternatively, just hire a great teacher
It is often said that you can learn something most effectively when you do it rather than merely watch or read about it, so if you really do wish to ensure you fulfil this particular New Year resolution, you can’t beat hiring your own private piano teacher.
A good place to look for the best teachers is First Tutors, through which you can find many of the best private piano tutors from across the UK.
Why should you accept anything less than the finest tools and resources when you are trying to learn such a challenging, but also unquestionably rewarding musical instrument as the piano? Certainly, here at Coach House Pianos, we wish you only the most enjoyable piano playing. Good luck!
