Piano Blog, Play Piano Techniques, Piano Tips

Have you ever wanted to accompany yourself or others while singing? The desire to do so is one of the key motivations for a surprising number of piano students. Yet so many students feel intimidated by this idea. Some days, it seems hard enough to play the piano piece by itself. How will you ever learn to sing at the same time – and carry a tune?

Don’t give up! The ability to accompany yourself on the piano while singing is a skill like any other. And like any skill, it can be taught. (Didn’t I say the same thing about improvisation not too long ago?)

If you already have a good grounding in piano basics, such as knowing the notes, knowing your scales, reading music – great! You have a very firm foundation for learning how to accompany yourself. Now you can learn to read a “lead sheet,” which is a kind of musical shorthand. (Don’t worry, if you’ve already learned to read traditional music, you’ll find this a piece of cake.)

A lot of pop, rock, country, and other contemporary music is noted down in this non-classical format. These lead sheets are collected in books called “fake books.” In its simplest form, the lead sheet consists of a single line of notes that pick out the melody, accompanied by chord notations above.

In accompanying yourself or others using a lead sheet approach, the vocalist takes the melody, and the accompanist plays the chords. Pretty simple, really.

But wait, you say, don’t you have to pick out the melody with the right hand, while singing it too? Actually – and this is the big secret of accompanying yourself – you don’t. In fact, it sounds better if you don’t.

Remember, the goal of an accompanist – even when accompanying himself – should be to get out of the way of the vocalist. The singer has the melody, the voice has the spotlight. If the piano is plunking out the melody underneath, it pulls attention away from the voice.

If you want to sound great when you’re accompanying yourself, you’ll need to try something called “chord piano.” This is, as the name implies, a style of playing in which the piano plays primarily chords, and leaves the melody to the vocalists, or perhaps another instrument.

Here’s what you need to do to accompany yourself and sound great doing it:

• Learn to sing the melody (if you can’t do this, what’s the point?)
• Play the chords, as noted in the lead sheet, with your right hand
• With your left hand, play the roots – your left hand takes on the role of the string bass in a jazz trio

Not only will your music sound better this way, but it’s easier too! All you have to do is look ahead on the lead sheet to the next chord that’s coming up, and pick out a bass line with your left hand.

With a bit of practice and some guidance from your teacher, you too can learn to accompany yourself on the piano.

In 1924, pianist and composer George Gershwin produced what has proven to be one of the most enduringly popular works of the piano repertoire: The Rhapsody in Blue.

It is somehow fitting that Gershwin, this child of immigrants, rising from humble beginnings, should have written what he himself described as a “musical kaleidoscope of America.”

The work is boisterous, exuberant – it defies classification. Is it jazz? Is it classical? It’s a concerto, it’s a melting pot mishmash of folk tunes and jazz elements – and it’s absolutely brilliant. What could exemplify the best of America better than this composer, and this work?

Later critics, including no less a luminary than Leonard Bernstein, would criticize Rhapsody in Blue for what they saw as the chunkiness and clunkiness of the work. “It has no overarching theme,” they said; “It’s just a slapdash collection of various individual themes jostling up against one another.”

But that was Gershwin’s whole point. That’s what this nation of immigrants is like. In the space of five minutes in a large city, you could bump up against Jewish culture, Chinese culture, Irish culture, African-American culture – and somehow it all worked together to create a harmonious, even beautiful whole. The same is true today. Even those who don’t live in a big city bump into all those pieces of the whole in movies, radio, TV, and the internet.

As I mentioned in my previous post, Gershwin wrote this amazing piece in only 5 weeks, at the request of his friend, the band leader Paul Whiteman. Whiteman was organizing a concert of jazz and jazz-influenced music which he intended to call An Experiment in Modern Music. He asked Gershwin to compose a concerto-like jazz piano work for the event.

At first, Gershwin thought that he couldn’t produce such a major work in the short amount of time left before the concert. But then, in a newspaper article about the upcoming concert of “experimental” music, Whiteman was quoted as saying, “George Gershwin is at work on a jazz concerto.” Seeing this, Gershwin felt he had to deliver.

Fortunately, during a train journey to Boston, Gershwin found inspiration in the rhythmic sounds of the train. By the time he arrived in Boston, Gershwin had most of the piece composed in his head. Working feverishly, he managed to finish it in time.

The concert was held on February 12, 1924. Rhapsody in Blue was second-to-last on the lengthy program, and the audience was quite restless by then. But Gershwin’s work held them spellbound.

Much else that was premiered that day has long since been forgotten. But generations of pianists – and concertgoers – have enjoyed the Rhapsody in Blue right up to the present day.

From the opening glissando of the clarinet to the glorious finale, the piece contains 5 distinct themes and a sixth “tag.” All of the themes are written in some form of the “blues scale,” with its lowered sevenths and prevalent use of thirds, both major and minor. Each theme is presented in various styles and with the frequent use of rubato, and is handled by both the solo piano and the orchestra at different times.

Gershwin’s respect for jazz and other popular music of his day is evident from his use of “blue notes,” his use of syncopation, and the inclusion of “vernacular” instruments such as banjo and saxophone. He also presented various popular piano styles of the day, including stride piano, novelty piano, and comic or vaudeville piano, as well as the style of the song-plugger, which is where he got his professional start.

Any pianist who can perform the Rhapsody in Blue demonstrates mastery of the instrument, in both classical and jazz styles.

Composer George Gershwin is among the best-known composers. His style was uniquely American: Big, boisterous, and an energetic fusion of old and new. He typified the “melting pot” that was the America of his day.

Born Jacob Gershovitz in 1898 to Russian Jewish immigrant parents, the boy who later became George Gershwin was no Mozart-like child prodigy. He was inspired to begin music lessons after attending the violin recital of a young friend of his – at the ripe old age of 10.

So much for the idea that you can’t amount to much, musically, unless you start piano before your feet can reach the pedals.

George’s parents had bought a piano for his older brother Ira, and at his request, allowed the younger boy to begin lessons. Five years later, George Gershwin was ready to quit school and begin playing piano professionally.

Command performances for the royalty of Europe? Um, no. Again, in contrast to Mozart, Gershwin began his professional career as a lowly “song plugger” – a pianist hired by a music company to demonstrate the latest songs available on sheet music. In this way, perhaps, he developed an ear for popular music that would serve him well later.

In 1916, when he was just 17 years old, Gershwin published his first song for the princely fee of $5. Also in 1916, Gershwin began work for the Aeolian Company and Standard Music Rolls in New York City, making recordings, arranging, and composing under his own and assumed names.

By 1920, Gershwin had begun to see commercial success for his compositions. In 1924, he collaborated with older brother Ira on a musical called Lady Be Good, the first of many productive collaborations between the two brothers. George handled the musical composition, while Ira wrote the dialogue and lyrics (the “book”).

Also in 1924, George Gershwin wrote what is perhaps his most famous major piano work, the Rhapsody in Blue. It is an American composition: A 15-minute concerto for piano and full orchestra – containing clear elements of jazz, popular, and folk music woven into the very fabric of the piece. Gershwin himself thought of it as “a kaleidoscope of America.”

Gershwin wrote this amazing piece in only 5 weeks, and only reluctantly at that. His friend, band leader Paul Whiteman, had requested a concerto-like jazz piano piece for a concert he wanted to put on called An Experiment in Modern Music. The concert was held on February 12, 1924.

Initially Gershwin refused, thinking that he couldn’t produce such a major work in the short amount of time allotted. But after seeing a report in the newspaper that quoted Whiteman as saying, “George Gershwin is at work on a jazz concerto,” he felt he had to deliver. And deliver he did.

1924 was a busy year for young George. This was also the year in which he traveled to Paris, seeking to study under master composers of the day. Maurice Ravel, an admirer, famously refused to take him on as a student, fearing it would ruin the jazz influence that made Gershwin so unique. While in Paris, Gershwin wrote another piece that has proved enduringly popular, the symphonic work An American In Paris.

In 1935, Gershwin produced his most ambitious work, which he called a “folk opera,” Porgy and Bess. This was based on the novel Porgy, by DuBose Heyward. Heyward, with his wife, had previously adapted the novel to play form, and collaborated with Ira Gershwin to adapt the play to the operatic form.

In 1937, Gershwin, then only 38 years old, began to experience blinding headaches. Later in the year, he was diagnosed as having brain cancer, although the diagnosis of the exact kind of cancer since been questioned. Following surgery for his tumor, George Gershwin died on July 11, 1937.

Here Gershwin finally comes to resemble Mozart. Not a child prodigy, not a performer for royalty. Yet still a prolific composer of wildly popular music — and Gershwin, like Mozart, died too young.