Piano mistakes when you are the sole musician who is playing for a congregation seem to be a bit more noticeable (to me) than at any other time.  At any other time you really can just flub your way around it but when you are playing for a congregation who is singing along to your playing and then you a) get lost and don’t remember for several moments where you are within in the music b)forget what the song sounds like entirely c)give an intro with the wrong tempo.   Then you know because of piano mistakes…

It’s one of the reasons you practice.

One of the reasons you may want to learn about chord patterns or progressions in music, which ones are most likely and which ones are in the songs you are playing.

It’s one of the reasons you may want to learn to play by ear.

It’s one of the reasons that even though you play fabulously by ear, just as the musicians I’ve spotted on the numerous Gaither tapes I own you may want to have a lead sheet available in case you flub up.

It’s the reason it’s a good idea to make notations on your lead sheets…in red.

Flub ups are likely. It’s how you come out of them that matters.

More tips to avoid mistakes:

• Practice. This of course you already know.
• Practice and pay particular attention to the sections where you seem to have a bit of difficulty. When you have mastered them then play through the whole song again.
• Practice the song with hands apart.
• Use a metronome and practice the song at tempo.
• Practice again

Not just your knowledge of chords, how to form them, and sheets music, but also how fast your fingers are on the piano how well the music is coming forth from your own hands and so forth.

Yes there is. You can exercise your fingers.

Not a new idea in the world of piano playing exercises for your fingers dates well back into the 1800’s when classical composers such as Hanon and Czerny put together several series of exercises designed to improve the strength, movement, agility of each of the individual fingers and as groupings also.

In addition to having hand posture and correct fingering developing your finger’s agility and strength and flexibility can have a dramatic impression on your piano playing.

As the owner of small woman’s hands I often stared in envy at the octave and above reach of male pianists. I really felt I could never do that and if so it would not be comfortable.

Many years later, and having spent some focused time on strengthening my fingers reaching an octave is no longer a problem. And it happened very quickly.

To start receiving the benefits of regular finger strength exercises add a few minutes of this to your piano practice each day. You can find finger exercises for the pianist’s hands in the resources below.

Hanon: The Virtuoso Pianist, Complete Edition By Charles-Louis Hanon. Edited by Robert Heath. For Piano. FJH Classic Editions. Traditional Studies. Book. Published by The FJH Music Company Inc. (H1006) See more info…

Practical Finger Exercises, Op. 802 (Complete) Piano Technique. By Carl Czerny. For piano solo. This edition: LB192. Piano Method. 68 pages. Published by G. Schirmer, Inc. (50253360) See more info…

But unlike me Greg Howlett has the skills and education to provide church pianists with a piano improvisational product designed to give you those tools you need to upgrade your Sunday morning performance on all songs not just one.

As a very talented church pianist himself (listen to some of the audios and view the clip at greghowlett.com) Greg understands the needs of church pianists.

Enter Inspirational Improvisation: A Nine Step Approach to Becoming a Versatile Church Pianist. A piano lesson program Greg has designed specifically for church pianists to not just to show you how great one hymn is when improvised upon but to teach you the concepts of improvisation to apply to any hymn or song you wish.

Inspirational Improvisation is designed to be used as if you were taking a piano class. Nine lessons equal nine months of getting your hands, and ears familiar with the concepts needed to improvise at the piano the songs and hymns you play each Sunday from your hymnal or songbook.

This piano DVD program is ideal for intermediate to advanced piano players who may have the basic concepts of piano playing down but want to improve their sound and know how improvise songs. You will learn music theory and how to apply it. In other words Theory and Application.

What you get

• 5 DVDs with a total of  six hours of piano improvisational lessons.
• An accompanying booklet outlining the concepts in each lesson to reinforce what you are hearing.  And your homework assignment for each concept.

With many of my learn to play piano courses while I may have learned to play the particular song the pianist performed I was rarely if ever given the concepts behind what was being played. And if I was it was only in relation to that one song so unless I knew my theory backwards and forwards it was difficult to translate to the songs I really wanted to improvise on. This was extremely frustrating.

That is what differentiates Inspirational Improvisation. Greg has taken the steps to show the why and the how of improvisational concepts so I can apply it to any song I want to improvise.

Starting with lesson one Greg Howlett’s lesson approach is to familiarize you with several of the most common complex chords used in Praise and Worship music. These are the chords that add feeling and depth to songs of praise and in order to apply them when you want and to whatever song you want you need to become familiar with them.

In lesson two you begin to learn how to apply improvising techniques to songs of your own choosing.  You learn how to transform those tired old triad (3) note chords you’ve been leaning on too long into fuller richer variations of 7th chords.

Then the fun begins. Thank you Greg you have created a program that is badly needed!  Greg begins to show you how and where you might change out some of the regular chords in the song of your choice. How and where! Where in (insert hymn name here ) can I change the chord to give a richer deeper sound? You will start to learn the rules and ideas behind how songs are improvised on.

After each lesson you are presented with a homework assignment to be worked on each night. While you may only need to view the lesson once it would make sense to watch it several times during the month of the lesson you are in.

It is recommended to stay on a lesson for a full month. It is this amount of time that allows you to not just learn but become very familiar with the concept you are learning and therefore be able to use it at any time.

These improvisational techniques and sounds will work well on older hymns and contemporary Praise and Worship songs mostly. While some pianists may look for styles such as Black Gospel and Southern Gospel Inspirational Improvisation is not designed to teach you a certain style but instead how to develop your own.

This isn’t an overnight piano improvisation program. I doubt anyone can teach you to play with feeling and understanding in 24 hours. As a church pianist if you can devote 30 minutes of your day to bettering your piano playing and you know you want to change the sound of that old hymn(insert name here) then this program is for you.

This is not a program for beginning pianists. You already should be familiar with basic music theory, all 12 keys of the Circle of Fifths and be able to play out of a hymnal.

I’ve been working with Inspirational Improvisation for a few weeks now and I really like and appreciate the way this program is laid out.

Each night after dinner is my “piano school” time. If I need to refresh I watch the part of the DVD I need to review before moving to the piano. I spend about 15 minutes going over the homework before moving on to other items in my practice time.

Greg goes over each concept in detail. The lessons are effective and I’m already getting some extra comments in church even though I’ve been disciplined and keeping myself with lesson one until a month passes. Meaning I’m only on lesson one and it’s having an impact.

I highly recommend this piano course. I used to look for piano workshops covering just these topics. If you are still a struggling church pianist and you would like to improve your piano performance each Sunday this Piano Course is for you.

You can purchase it directly from Greg’s website here.

When accompanying the congregation on piano during worship it is important to use the piano as a guide and a support.

Many times a pianist can play so loud and hard during the full song that the congregation is drowned out and it becomes more of a one act show.

In order to avoid this take time to play during the spaces and pauses in a chorus or hymn.

Some examples are to play a strong introduction to the song so the singers know when to come in and then taper back a bit not necessarily playing each note of the melody.

And also to play a fill in during parts where the singers take a breathe such as between lines of a verse (whenever you see a comma) that is a good spot where you can add a bit more to your piano playing to encourage and uplift the singers.

A very good way to practice this technique is to sing along when you are practicing alone. Practice with easy songs and note when you are taking breathes and some of the things you can do on the piano to fill those empty spaces.

Good fills for spaces are chord progressions to move to the next chord in song.  A run of some simple notes in the right hand or the left. More dramatic songs can even have a set of bass notes in an octave to emphasize the dramatic nature of the song.

The possibilities are endless but try not to over do it. You want to embellish not take over.

If you have trouble coming up with your own fills pick up a book such as Complete Improvisation, Fills & Chord Progressions Book

I purchased Roger’s video after stumbling upon it on the internet. I had seen it mentioned a few places but it was always in VHS format and a little hard to obtain. Eventually I started seeing more copies for sale but by that time I was purchasing more DVDs as they were easier to lug to the piano than the vcr and tv.

You can buy the DVD set from the Roger Bennett Direct online store and from
Christianbook.com
.
The two VHS videos lesson set has been reworked and both Volume 1 and 2 are available as a set.
Although the full title for the course is Roger Bennett’s Southern Gospel Piano Course I think that church pianists from all styles that play with chords can benefit. Roger uses this course to teach you how to back up and support a singing group of one or many.
These videos are listed for intermediate to advanced piano players.
Volume 1 or DVD 1 lists titles Chords, Rhythm, Left Hand Technique, Fill-Ins and Intro.
If you’re wondering how much you should know before using these videos I’ll give you my viewpoint.
You should have a firm grasp on playing simple hymns or simply sheet music that uses both clefs. You should know your most basic chords and how to create them so you can create them in all keys. I’m talking about he I, IV, V, and V7 or the 1,4, 5, and V7 chords. It is helpful to have a firm grasp on playing beginning intermediate sheet music and know more chords and a few extended chords such as the 9ths, 11ths, sus, augmented and such.
Yes you can rewind and go over and over but what he is showing you are some of special touches he uses in performances to give songs a fuller, unique, special sound. He is showing you how to add life to gospel songs and that means going beyond the basics.
It has been said, and rightly so, you should have a firm foundation in the basics of playing piano before attempting to master a style of piano playing. The style you will want to learn will be composed of the different ways of putting chords, notes, intervals, and rhythms together.
In Volume 2 Roger is showing you how he plays the songs he plays for the Cathedrals. I like Volume 2 because it’s showing you the stuff you can do that’s not on paper that makes songs sound special, different or what have you.
You get to hear and see how Roger plays 4 songs just as he plays them on stage and he shows you his fills and extra stuff. It’s so nice because you can see what he does when people are singing. When they’re not. How he introduces songs. And then you go off and are inspired to start flourishing up your own songs.
It’s like you’re sitting down with a seasoned pianist showing you all they’re stuff and they expect that you are able to follow along so if you turn this on and feel overwhelmed because he’s showing you just as he plays, fast and all, just enjoy the playing and then break each song down little by little, watching, absorbing, trying, etc.
I’m enjoying this set and yes I did go and purchase the Nashville Numbers VHS (also available in the store) that Roger also made but I haven’t had time to go over that yet so I will review that when I have time.
If you love the old Southern Gospel style and are looking for a how to for piano then this is a good buy. It is very reasonably priced with no gimmicks or what have you.

Southern Gospel Piano Course, volumes 1 & 2 DVD By Roger Bennett / Midnight Meditations House Join legendary pianist Roger Bennett for this how-to instructional book and DVD for intermediate to advanced players. Volume 1 focuses on chords, rhythm, left hand techinque, fill-ins, and intros while Volume 2 covers how to accompany a group or soloist, how to play licks and fill-ins, solo techniques, and much more.

Gospel Keys 202

Then you might think that you can’t afford a piano and have no place to put one even if you could.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

You can learn to play the piano at any age.

If you are thinking about learning to play the piano and know next to nothing about music start with thinking about how you want to learn to play. For example many adults learn well visually by watching someone else in a studio or on a video, but that is not true for everyone.

For those that need visual instruction videos such as…

• Ethel Caffie Austin and the Learn to Play Gospel Piano DVDs or videos will show you how to take a basic gospel song and embellish it to have more of the sounds found in black gospel music
  




• Any of the Gospel Keys series put out by Hear and Play will teach you about playing by ear depending on what level you are at. The Gospel Keys 101 starts with the basics of which basic chords to use to accompany the melody Gospel Keys 202 goes on to work specifically with worship and the chord progressions most commonly played. Gospel Keys 300 breaks down the basics of faster praise and the progressions found in different ones while Gospel Keys 500 touches on that most difficult of styles, shouting music.

• The Piano For Life, Video Set or Piano for Life–3 DVDs by Mark Almond work will teaching you about chords and harmony. By the end of the 3 videos you can be playing all the the major, minor, diminished, augmented and even extended chords such as 9ths and 11ths. I found Mark’s approach to be very refreshing and different. This will also give you more of a foundation in playing by ear.

For those that reading for their musical lessons

• Hear and Play’s course the 300 page book will teach you all about chords, how to form them and using them in progressions. The very first chapter of the book is a primer on sight reading. It’s a good buy and comes with free software for quizzing yourself and hearing the chord progressions.

• The Alfred piano series is also a good buy. The adult series will take you through learning to play the piano by the chords but also teach you the basics of music theory and reading sheet music.

• Both of these series include interactive CDroms to give you some ear training studies and test your knowledge of what you’ve learned.

And yet another option is lessons from a real live piano teacher. Look specifically for one that teaches adults. Call you local music store or check the yellow pages.

Things you should be covering as you learn to play the piano.

• music theory
• reading sheet music
• rhythm
• chords and chord progressions
• technique

As you learn to play the piano you might get frustrated. You would like to be at a certain point and you’re just not there yet. Scales and music theory are no fun. And you think you sound bad. Don’t give up. Please don’t give up. Just keep practicing. Really focus on getting through. If you practice faithfully you will surprise yourself. One day you will have that breakthrough moment and it will motivate you to keep going. Then you will have another breakthrough and on an on.

For example just as the I or 1st note of the C scale isC and the I or the1st note of the G scale is G there are 1 chords and 2chords, 3chords and each relates to it’s corresponding scale note.

Since C is our favorite and easiest scale to talk about I will explain what I mean using the keyof C.

The Primary chords of each key are the

• 1 chord or I
• 4 chord or IV
• 5 chord or V
• 57chord or V7

These chords are the Major Chords with in a scale. The other chords associated within the major scale are minor chords and diminished chords.

When you play the piano or guitar most of the timethe chords you will be playing will be one of those associated with the key your song is in unless of course you are doing fancy stuff to get a different sound. To create different styles of music chords are often altered or different ones are introduced into a song in chord progressions but as you play and become more aware of what chords you are playing you willbe able to see that and do much of it yoursel.

Moving on:

In the following diagram are the chords found along the scale of the key of C. As you move along the scale each note is numbered. The Scale Position, Roman Numeral, and Type of Chord translate to all ofyour scales.

Moving on:

In the following diagram are the chords found along the scale of the key of C. As you move along the scale each note is numbered. The Scale Position, Roman Numeral, and Type of Chord translate to all ofyour scales.

Note Scale Position Roman # Type ofChord Chordnotes

Remember in the beginning I said “if you know your chords and how to form them”. So if this is a step you are unfamiliar with thentake a step back and take a quick primer on chords. There are several books available or print off this basic primary chord chart I put together for the piano and get to know the way the chords are formed.

Then don’t try and figure out all of the chords at once. Just make it a goal that you want to accomplish and as you move along in your studies make it a point to learn the chords of the keys you are playing in.

Asyou practice your scales also practice the chords. The idea behind the numbers for the chords is that if you know your scales you can playin any key just using the numbers.

Another thing to help your understanding of chords and how they are placed in songs is to play some of your songs with just the chords. Don’t worry about the melody of the song just play through the chords and sing the melody.

This means you will need to play chords in both hands if you are playing the piano. The guitar will be easier, you’re just chording.

What the numbering of the chords will do for you is allow you to transpose into other keys much easier.

There you have it. Now have at it and get busy learning to play piano or guitar using just numbers.

These days you can find the Wedding March in chord version, Canon in D in the key of C and more. This is not a time to stress over playing the right note it’s a time to enjoy the Wedding Ceremony and not everyone is a classical pianist.

If you have been approached or have fears of being approached to play at your best friend’s, our cousin Jean’s wedding get yourself in gear and get organized.

Will you be playing by yourself or are you working with another instrumentalist or soloist? Make sure you have plenty of time to practice, together, and come prepared. You can work out your songlists and which arrangements by email and/or telephone. Get your part of the music together and practice it and make notes all over your music. When you get together with your accompanist make a point to note all the rough parts and work over them on your own too.

Maybe you don’t want to accompany a soloist. Tell the couple if you are unprepared to do this. Maybe the soloist can use some nice taped music.

Are you playing the whole ceremony? Get your songlist together and make sure it’s there on the program.

What songs has the couple requested? Can you play them well? Be honest with them. In fact give the couple a private concert of your playing skills so they know what they’re getting into.

Have you worked out your honorarium? Surf the internet to get an idea of what some musicians charge to play a wedding. At this point I make it a gift because I only play for friends and family.

I lucked out at my wedding. She could play classically AND by ear. I just gave her my list and trusted in the Lord it would work out all right and it did.

Still looking for some wedding sheet music?

Then try one of the following…

Wedding Music Made Easy Easy Piano.I have this book and used it for my first wedding. An easier version of the Bridal Chorus can’t be found. Not every song includes chords only the Bridal Chorus, Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring, Ode to Joy, Trumpet Tune, Trumpet Voluntary, and the Wedding March do. By Various Composers. Easy Piano Songbook (Easy arrangements for piano and voice). Size 9×12 inches. 72 pages. Published by Hal Leonard. (310492)

Classical Music For A Classic Wedding – Easy PianoI also have this collection. A few more songs than Wedding Music Made Easy but the ones that are the same are arranged the same since it’s also published by Hal Leonard so I guess it just matters which one holds the song you need. Collection (simplified piano arrangements) for easy solo piano and easy solo voice. 88 pages. Published by Hal Leonard. (HL.310716) See more info…

Wedding Music – Instrumental Keyboard SoloFor the more seasoned pianist and edited by my favorite Carol Turnquist this collection has some beautifully arranged wedding classics for those not into improvising on chords. My favorite is Sweet, Sweet Spirit which includes an optional C instrument part in case a flute wants to accompany you. This nice collection also has two versions of some traditional wedding songs, a topical index, 6 songs with optional C instruments, and processional ideas. By Various Composers. Sacred Folio. Size 9.5×12 inches. 184 pages. Published by Word Music. (309729) See more info…

So don’t sweat if you have a wedding to play for. Get some easy arrangements, or if you are (or think you are) wonderfully accomplished pick up some lovely tasteful arrangements and help make this a day to remember for some lovely couple.

God Bless!