Inspired

I have decided to teach myself to play the piano. I've always wanted to play. I love listening to piano music and I've always envied people who could play. I don't think it ever occurred to my parents to have me learn it.

My grandmother had a piano when I was younger, but I don't ever remember her playing it much. She offered to give it to my mom when she decided to get rid of it, but we lived out of state so there was the problem of transporting it, and then where would we put it, and would any of us ever play it, etc etc. So she sold the piano to some acquantaince of hers. The lack of access to a piano has been my most major stopping point.

At some point Meredith got a small (cheap) keyboard, which would have been good enough to learn on, but Mere and I have never been big on sharing with each other and it didn't really occur to me to teach myself at the time.

I have a few advantages going into this undertaking. I have almost abnormally long, thin fingers for a person of my size. As in, during geometry when we did a project on the proportionality of the human body, the proportions of my fingers/hands were ridiculously off, to the point that we re-measured them. Also, in sixth grade when we were all picking instruments, my band director begged me to play the bassoon because I was one of the few kids whose fingers were long enough to reach all the keys. (This did not happen because a) I hate the bassoon and b) my mom forbade me from playing any instrument larger than I was).

I also have a strong background in music. I've been playing saxophone for 8 years now (omg) and have had courses in music theory. I'm not terribly good with chords, which will be an issue, but we'll cross that bridge later. Not having to teach myself to read music is a huge advantage because it's not easy to teach music theory to yourself. If you already know what a key is, how to read notes, rhythms, and the basics, you can learn an instrument much more quickly. It's like if you speak english, and were going to learn a new language, it would be a lot easier for you to learn French than Russian because at least with French you would already know the alphabet.

There is of course the problem of me being 19. Most people start piano as kids. Most people also have a teacher and take lessons. I am teaching myself in my spare time.

But I really really really really want to play piano, so I went to the library today and checked out three beginner piano books (Modern Method for Keyboard: Volume 1, Recital Classics for Beginner Level Players, and the Hannah-Barbara Songbook). The first book is my lesson book. It's what's actually teaching me to play. I did lesson one and two today because lesson one is like "this is a whole note". There was no playing involved so I skipped it. I think I'll stay on lesson two for a few days until I can do it all without making any mistakes. The other two books are pieces that I can practice with, once I learn a little more. I think after lesson two I should be able to do the easier pieces. I'm so excited about the Hannah-Barbara book: all the best cartoon theme songs, including Flinstones, Jetsons, Scooby-Doo, and Johnny Quest. That book's significantly harder though so those may take some time.

But, wait, you say! You spent all that time saying you just never had access to a piano! Where did you get a piano? Well I have this wonderful thing called a roommate. Sam brought her keyboard from home (much better than Mere's) and we keep it beneath the futon. So I have that for everyday practice. There's also a keyboard in the common room, but I don't want to embarrass myself so I'm only going to use that as necessary. And if I feel like walking down to the music hall, there's a gazillion practice rooms in the basement.

So there you have it. I'm going to learn to play the piano.