4 Steps to Learning How to Play Any Song on the Piano

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1. Determining the melody - Melodies are the actual tune to a song, some song are melodious and tend to be a bit flat but it sound good because it is sitting on a nice set of running chord. For beginner I would recommend starting with song that are melodious and get the tune of it, Play it on the piano in single tune, it means without the chords and bass lines. Melodies determine what chords will be played. If you can use your ear to figure out what notes are being played in the melody, you are 1/4 on your way to learning a song!

2.Harmonizing the melody - This part of it, is that you must have some understand of chords and how chords are form. In music and music theory a chord is three or more different notes that sound simultaneously. Once you have figured out the melody, it is time to harmonize it. This is simply choosing various chords to accompany the melody. There are several techniques and tricks to doing this. An example of a chord formation is always use the 1, 3 and 5 note of a scale for a major chord, example C chord is make up of C, E and G and a G chord is G, B and D.

3. Altering Chords - This is the best part! Now that you have strategically figured out the melody to a song and have harmonized it, altering your chords to produce certain sounds is the next step. If you were playing gospel music, you would alter your chords differently than if you were playing classical or country music.

4. Listening - After you have determined the melody, harmonized the melody, and altered some of your chords, there are various techniques you can use to make sure that your song sounds right. Personally I listen to the bass line and whether is from the bass guitar or from the piano this can help you more, the bass line does help you to determine the timing of the song too.

I personally learn all these theory from "The Secrets to Playing Piano By Ear" 300-pg Course by Jermaine Giggs and would strongly recommend this if you want to learn to play piano by ear. He has taught literally thousands of musicians how to play the piano by ear. This is very different from learning to read music score as what the classical pianist are trained.

Ideas To Help With Percussion In The Beginner Band

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The beginner band is a big challenge, you have an entire band of students who are just starting to learn their instruments, and you are trying to both educate and inspire them to play.

Getting the percussion section to work effectively can be one of the biggest challenges, particularly if you don't know a lot about percussion.

Don't let them be "drummers" only - be "percussionists" instead

This is the most important thing to realize - that band students are often attracted to percussion so that they can play the drum set. The drum set (or drum kit) is often used in the school band, and often is very important, so students feel that if they are not playing it they have to sit there and wait.

The band director has to find a way around this situation - if you only have one drummer, then great! They can play the drum kit and away you go.

The issue can happen when you have multiple drummers in the band, sometimes two, four, eight or ten! One way that works very effectively and has been used for many years is to have one player playing snare drum, one playing bass drum, and one cymbal player, even if you have a "drum kit" part written out. If you have this type of band I recommend having this setup at all times, and making the students stand up to play the snare drum. You then have the cymbals and concert bass drum, and its designed to be played by three players all the time.

Have an Auxilliary Percussion Table - and make them stand up to play at all times

There is nothing worse than vaguely hearing a shaker or tambourine in a school band, and struggling to see the person sitting on a chair behind the drummer!

When playing tambourine, triangle or shaker - these instruments are often more critical to the sound of the band than the snare drum or drum set, so therefore they must be taken really seriously.. by the band director as well as by the players.

So always have a "traps" table with everything in easy reach. Its not too expensive to make one or buy one of the available professional ones.

The players must always stand up to play, and have their music stand set up so that they can look immediately over it at the band conductor.

Warming up - please don't ignore us!

I've been a percussionist in a school band... there is nothing more frustrating that spending your time sitting in the school band room while you wait for the wind players to tune up and warm up. Often the band director will spend up to half an hour warming the players up - and expect the percussionists to remain quiet during that time.

How to deal with it?

- If you're going to warm up for half an hour.... Tell the percussion section to arrive later than the rest! - it makes no difference to you and its better than them being a distraction!

- Why not send them into a different room for their own section rehearsal during this time? Get a specialist teacher or assistant to work with them on their parts

- Use predefined warm-up routines that go along with what you are doing with the wind players. (doesn't always work, but can do depending on the materials you have)

Be prepared to supplement the band book

When I helped out with beginner bands I found it necessary to supplement the band books that the students were using with additional materials - often the materials are not interesting or they don't have enough variety to keep the students engaged in the materials.

They'll need lots of work on basic rudiments and rolls - often the band books don't address those things early enough. So therefore you may be able to supplement it with other material which is available online and in books.

Everyone playing mallets?

I'm going to leave this up to you - it depends on the different personalities in each of the bands you have. One popular series of band books the "standard of excellence" has snare drum/bass drum on the left hand pages of the book, and mallet percussion on the right. Another type the "essential elements" has one snare drum and one mallet percussion book.

I think that percussionists should rotate and do as much as possible, and if that means that they each need two books, whereas every other member of the band needs only one.. then that's the way it should be!

There are no quick fixes to make percussion better in the beginner band, but hopefully this article can give you one or two ideas that will help!

Cole Porter's Song "Night and Day"

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"Night and Day" was written by Cole Porter for the 1932 Broadway musical, "The Gay Divorce," starring Fred Astaire. It was the last Broadway show for Astaire and the last show that he performed with his sister, Adele.

In 1934 Hollywood produced a film version of the Broadway musical, retitled, "The Gay Divorcee." The Hays Office, Hollywood's self-censorship body, determined that the original title was too controversial. The film starred Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers in their first leading roles together.

"Night and Day" was the only Cole Porter musical number used from the Broadway production. As a footnote, one of the film's big production numbers, "The Continental," by Conrad and Magidson, won the Academy Award for Best Song that year.

In 1946 a film was made about Cole Porter's life, called "Night and Day." The biography, starring Cary Grant as a heroic and heterosexual Cole Porter, was not accurate in detail or character, but Porter did not object.

Cole Porter was born in Indiana in 1891 to parents who were wealthy. He received an extensive musical education, learning the piano and the violin by age six. His favorite of the two was the piano which he practiced two hours daily. By age ten he was writing words and music to original songs, and by age seventeen he published his first song.

Porter also received an impressive academic education which carried him through Yale and into Harvard Law School and the Harvard School of Music. While at Yale, Porter became the president of the Glee Club and a cheer leader, and, among the 300 songs he wrote while at Yale, he wrote two football fight songs that are still played today. Despite being the roommate of Dean Acheson, the future Secretary of State under President Truman, Porter dropped out of Harvard Law School to continue with his music education.

After World War I, Porter moved to Europe where he met and married Linda Lee Thomas, a beautiful and rich divorcee and a descendant of the Lees of Virginia. Their relationship was a loving, supportive, lifelong partnership. Cole Porter was gay and had numerous male interests which Linda had agreed to allow. However, the marriage was at times unstable when Porter's gay interests threatened the couple's carefully maintained social appearances.

Following their marriage in 1919 in Paris, the Porters lived an extravagant lifestyle in Europe through the 1920's. Their palatial home in Paris had floor to ceiling mirrors and zebra skin upholstery. Later, they moved into a famous palace in Venice where their lush parties included fifty gondoliers, circus acrobats, and a ballet company. They also built a night club outside their palace which accommodated 100 guests.

Back in New York, Porter's first few contributions to Broadway musicals were poorly received. However, by the end of the 1920's Porter gained recognition, and through the 1930's and 1940's he was one of the brightest stars on Broadway. He worked excessively and tirelessly on his musical productions and spent time in both New York and Hollywood.

In 1937 a terrible horse riding accident crushed both of Porter's legs. As the story goes, while waiting for hours for help to arrive he composed the lyrics to a verse of his song, "At Long Last Love." The accident left him crippled and in pain for the rest of his life. He underwent more than 30 leg operations until his right leg was finally amputated in 1958. Following his leg amputation, Cole Porter dropped out of music production until his death in 1964.

Porter said that the stimulus for the ballad, "Night and Day," was his memory of hearing distant tom toms while cruising down the Nile River in Egypt.

"Night and Day" was sung by Fred Astaire to Ginger Rogers in the film, "The Gay Divorcee." The romantic lyrics of Cole Porter and the lovely dance of Astaire and Rogers combine to create one of Hollywood's most memorable moments.

Here are the Cole Porter lyrics to "Night and Day."

Like the beat beat beat of the tom-tom

When the jungle shadows fall

Like the tick tick tock of the stately clock

As it stands against the wall

Like the drip drip drip of the raindrops

When the summer shower is through

So a voice within me keeps repeating you, you, you

Night and day, you are the one

Only you beneath the moon or under the sun

Whether near to me, or far

It's no matter darling where you are

I think of you day and night

Night and day, why is it so

That this longing for you follows wherever I go

In the roaring traffic's boom

In the silence of my lonely room

I think of you day and night

Night and day,under the hide of me

There's an oh such a hungry yearning burning inside of me

And this torment won't be through

Until you let me spend my life making love to you

Day and night, night and day