Piano Pieces

Piano Pieces for Weddings

Piano-Pieces — Sun, 29 Jul 2012 20:09:20 +0000

The following are some great videos which feature some top music to play on the piano at weddings. The key is to choose repertoire which is both appropriate for the celebration whilst being appealing to a wide ranging audience. The first piece here is the perfect choice for any ceremony and the playlist below features around 20 great songs to choose from. Don’t forget to leave a comment and a rating or like one of the videos.

Debussy – Claire De Lune

A great wedding prelude music playlist:

Recommended:

Hire a Pianist - Book a piano player to play at your wedding ceremony or reception.
Wedding Pianists – Various pianists for hire at all sorts of events including weddings, corporate events and functions.
Wedding Music Samples – The place to find suggestions and examples of wedding songs.

Martin Bartlett – Sonata in F Sharp Major, Scarlatti

Piano-Pieces — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 12:29:30 +0000

We stumbled across this wonderful video earlier of 16 year old pianist Martin Bartlett. He is playing Sonata in F Major by the Italian composer, Scarlatti. We were struck by his lyrical, mature playing and were totally shocked to read that he is only 16 years old. This sort of composition is really difficult to play well without be obviously challenging. It is much more difficult to bring your own personality in this sort of work so when one does achieve it, the result is something beautiful. This piece is well known to many pianists but not that recognised in the wider classical music world and to hear a nice rendition of it is lovely. We really hope that you enjoy watching this budding pianist perform as much as we did.

More:

On the Sunny Side of the Street

Piano-Pieces — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 10:30:36 +0000

We are heading back to the jazz standards this week at Piano Pieces. On the Sunny Side of the Street just happens to be one of our favourite songs over here and so the chance to showcase it could not be missed. Composed by Jimmy McHugh in 1930 the tune has been played and recorded but pretty much every notable jazz musician that we can think of. The reason for this, we suspect, is that the chords for this song are so much fun to solo over. Of course, it’s a great melody and a wonderful song to sing but the world of jazz has embraced this song as much for it’s harmony as with the tune itself. Our favourite recordings include those produced by Frank Sinatra, Nat King Cole, Miles Davis and John Coltrane.

The sheet music and chords below for On the Sunny Side 0f the street have been transposed so should be playable by pianists of all standards. The harmony still works really well in this key and now we actually prefer this version to the original, and no, not just because it is easier to play! We really hope that you enjoy playing this song and remember that you can comment and rate it below and also check back regularly for new pieces for the piano.

Rhythm Exercises for Pianists

Piano-Pieces — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 11:36:13 +0000

Understanding rhythm is as important as knowing scales, harmony and everything else associated with becoming a competent musician. Rhythm is often overlooked for students of classical music and it is not uncommon to hear music college students clapping along to a metronome to improve an obvious weakness in their playing. There is a simple reason that drummers and percussionists have a better grasp of rhythm and timing than most other instrumentalists, they study it and practise it properly. It is all about sub-diving the beats into manageable chunks.

The rhythm exercise written out below is an example of what we are talking about. In this score we are practising our quaver (eight note) rhythms and syncopation. As this is a rhythm exercise, the notes that you play are up to you. Perhaps pick a particular scale or mode that you are comfortable with or just improvise until you find some nice sounding harmonies. The point here is that the bottom line is always playing the whole set of eighths (or quavers) so you will clearly hear any messy notes. We hope that you find this exercise useful and it helps you to improve your rhythmic playing on the piano.

Ain’t No Sunshine

Piano-Pieces — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 18:35:48 +0000

Bill Withers wrote some of the best-loved songs of the past fifty years. He was a prolific writer who featured the piano a lot in his works. Some of his most famous songs include Lean on Me, Just the Two of Us, Lovely Day and the song that we are talking about today, Ain’t No Sunshine. Below you will find both the Sheet Music for piano and a Chords chart so everyone should be pretty much covered. However, before we get in to actually playing this song on the piano, lets look a bit more closely at the music itself.

Wither was born in 1938 and started making his first recording in the early 1970s. He signed with Columbia Records in 1975 and released an album per year with them for three years. Funnily enough, only Lean on Me out of all of the great songs the Bill wrote actually achieved number 1 status in both the US and UK. I was really surprised to read that fact as I automatically expected every one of his tunes to have been worldwide best sellers.

Ain’t No Sunshine was released in 1971 and reached number 6 in the Billboard Charts. The songs has since been used in many movies including the worldwide hit, Notting Hill. It is a fairly straight forward piece to play on the piano. It centres around the chords Am and Em so as long as you know those chords then you should be OK. We really hope that you enjoy playing this song as much as we do.

Piano Sheet Music:

Chords:

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Lady Bird

Piano-Pieces — Mon, 12 Mar 2012 21:16:30 +0000

The song Lady Bird by Tadd Dameron was made a cornerstone piece of the bebop movement. It was made famous by the great Charlie Parker and was said to feature in most of his sets at the height of this period. Bebop was a genre of great technical virtuosity and imaginative soloing within the confines of a fairly rigid set of rules. Lady Bird was actually a 1940′s composition and as with so many songs of the era, was originally quite a sweet and slow song. This obviously changed with the like of Mr Parker got hold of it, various accounts place the maximum live performance tempo of the piece to be around the 300bpm mark. That is such a ridiculous speed and shows the dexterity that these players achieved after a few years of laying the foundations for a new genre and establishing show ground rules.

Whilst we would never suggest trying to play this at such fast speeds on the piano or any instrument for that matter, a nice starting tempo would be around the 190 beat per minute mark. At the end of the day, this sort of composition needs to be played quickly in order to fully use the stylistic idiosyncrasies that occur in this genre. As a general rule, everything that lands on an off beat should be given a little accent. Also, the quarter note triplet patterns should be played with a slight crescendo rising to land on the first beat of the following bar each time. Otherwise you should pretty much just read through this and keep increasing the tempo every time, as with most piano pieces of this era…

Anyway, here is the sheet music / chords / lead sheet for Lady Bird, we sincerely hope that you enjoy playing it as much as we do. A great recording of this piece is on the album Bird’s Eyes by Charlie Parker which features the great Buster Williams on piano. Other notable recordings of this song have been made by Miles Davis, Tadd Dameron (the composer), Count Basie and numerous other luminaries of the jazz world. Obviously, when dealing with bebop heads like this one, when soloing really try to stick to the changes as more modern, dissonant scales really don’t fit the style in a traditional sense. However, if you are attempting to create your own sound or take on this genre then do whatever you think sound nice!

Useful Links:
Learn more about the bebop movement from Wikipedia: Bebop.
View some more Jazz Piano Pieces.

Minuet in F Major, J.S. Bach

Piano-Pieces — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 10:33:17 +0000

A great pianist and friend of ours commented recently that if you don’t understand Bach then you don’t understand music. I actually found this comment to be a bit incorrect, I’m not sure whether John Lennon understood the intricacies of Bach but he was still an amazingly talented musician who wrote some of the world’s best loved songs. However, it is most certainly true that Bach cemented the foundations of modern harmony and almost invented a whole set of rules which were diligently followed for a very long period of time. For anyone who is interested in classical music and has never played any Bach, shame on you!

The following Minuet is in F Major and comes from a series of compositions from late on in Bach’s career. There is no tempo marking on this sheet music but we have heard two wonderful recordings which sit at around 80 beats per minutes. We have also heard the likes of Lang Lang absolutely roast this piece at speeds of up to 180 beats per minute. It’s up to you which end of the spectrum you go for but somewhere in the middle is probably about right. The melody does becomes a bit rushed of the tempo is too high so bare that in mind.

This piece, as with a lot of Baroque music, is all about the left hand. Bach wrote wonderful bass parts and this is shown beautifully in this work. Be sure to set a steady rhythm and always focus on the bottom part. The melody can really float over the top but the left hand must stay fairly rigid and mark out the time and feel of the song. Anyway, we hope that you enjoy playing this Minuet in F Major by J.S. Bach as much as we do.

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Theory: Circle of Fifths

Piano-Pieces — Sun, 04 Mar 2012 18:37:23 +0000

The circle of fifths is one of the most fundamental musical rules or ideas that one should understand when studying music. It’s just one of those universal almost-unbreakable idiosyncrasies of music, almost all of the compositions of the past 500 years have been based around the harmonic ideas laid out in the circle. The point here is not so much to learn about the circle, it’s more about how to use it as a practise tool for the piano. However, if you have never seen it before, the basic point is to take a starting note (like C) and go up five steps (in this example you would arrive at G), then continue this until you return to your starting note.

As a first idea, to work on improvisational skills, you could go round the circle with one chord every four bars and then improvise a melody over the top. Obviously, this can be done with any starting key so the number of possible patterns is quite high. This sort of practise routine can ensure that you do not avoid the chords or keys that you dislike or play at the weakest level. It’s all about creating a systematic routine that makes sense and sounds fairly nice (unlike the chromatic alternatives). Try to choose a style for your improvisation first, for example jazz, baroque, waltz etc.

Below is a diagram showing the cycle in he key of C. If you are not good at transposing at sight then it could be a good exercise to write this diagram out in all keys. A good starting tempo for this practise routine would be around 90 beats per minute increasing gradually over time to whatever tempo you require. Remember, when improvising it is also a good ideas to try different time signatures, it’s no good to be able to play in every key but only in common time. Good luck working your round around the merry-go-round that is the circle of fifths.

More sheet music for Piano Method?

Blue Monk

Piano-Pieces — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 18:39:45 +0000

Blue Monk by the great jazz piano player Thelonius Monk is one of the most popular tunes in the whole jazz music repertoire. Written on a standard blues sequence (pretty much) the melody is about as simple a blues melody as you could imagine. It’s all about the way it’s played with this one. Have a listen to a few monk records and watch a few video clips of the great man playing. Notice his splayed fingers and erratic style of piano playing. It really is all about the rhythm with Monk, it’s definitely all about the space between the notes and some would argue that his strange dances whilst playing the piano were developed to give him some breathing space during solos.

This song works great with a jazz trio or as a solo tune. There are some great audio files out there somewhere with a bass player and a drummer playing blues sequences in different keys and at different tempos. We are trying to find them at the moment so watch this space for more information. Alternatively, try a walking bass line in your left hand with the melody and then a solo around the chords a few times. This is such a great to tune for a horn as well so consider inviting a trumpet or sax player along for a jam. Anyway, below are the chords for Blue Monk which we hope you will enjoy playing as much as we do.

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Improvisation: Chopin Waltz

Piano-Pieces — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 10:07:47 +0000

Improvising is something with classical musicians often shy away from and leave solely to the “jazzers”. I find this strange as all of the great composers were also great improvisers, that’s how they came up with all those great musical ideas. Bach was a great improviser on the harpsichord as was the pianist that we will be talking about here, Chopin. The Waltz is something which Chopin loved to improvise and play around with. It has a rigid form and structure which gives you a basis or vehicle for the improvisation. Have a look at the piano score below, you will see that the left hand is already written out for you. Feel free to change this but it’s a pretty left hand pattern to get you started.

The right hand has a few example parts written in. The first two bars and the beginning/ending of the Coda section are also written in. These right hand parts are very much a guide and starting point so that you have a good launching point. Try to listen to some waltzes before playing this, try not to copy melodies that you have heard but listen to the overall “language” that the composers are using. For example, a blues scale might not work that well and would be described as being from a different language of music. Anyway, we hope that you enjoy playing around with this on the piano as much as we have! Want more piano pieces?