Non-Classical Players Unite!

HeartKeys I’m one of those people who excel in one area (playing by ear most songs except Classical pieces) and deficient in some playing fundamentals. Basically I can walk up to a public place and instantly play songs they’re familiar with, on all 12 keys. It seems cool and folks ask me why I don’t play professionally. My answer is because my talent is more a niche and purely entertaining but I am NOT a conventional pianist.

And I can’t, and don’t have interest in, reading music. It’s more fun for me to play them by ear. Call me strange

In the Pop, rock, folk, jazz, blues, country genres, we would call you [Wait for it!!] ... a musician. I've never seen a gigging musician in these genres play from sheet music. You're expected to play from memory. No one will hire you if you don't know the standards from memory. Far from being niche player, I'd say you embody the norm for musicians.

Sophia I'm still at "Mary Had a Little Lamb" level. Ok, just beyond, but close

I'm assuming you refer to the Stevie Ray Vaughan version of Mary Had a Little Lamb. Pretty advanced stuff! Good on ya!!!

Quitter Haha I realize that wasn't the best example... considering what @rogerch did with it

Quitter I've never seen a gigging musician in these genres play from sheet music. You're expected to play from memory. No one will hire you if you don't know the standards from memory.

I've occasionally had a lead sheet in front of me "just in case", especially doing 3 or 4 hour gigs where there are no repeats and we're doing a number we've not done in public before. Something to jog my memory of how a B section starts off, something like that. But typically, I have a set list with song titles, a key, a tempo, typical play time, and sometimes a few words to help me remember something such as "two tags on the end" or some such. For the most part, I'd be fine with someone just calling out the songs. But there might be a handful that I might mess something up pretty easily, like playing it in G instead of F (I did that once, no one knew except the bass player. LOL! I started it in the wrong key, but hey, it wasn't that hard of a song, so I just kept on going. Didn't figure there was any need to shut it down just for that, and I didn't. )

I think I have maybe 70 or 80 songs in my head, most are in the Real Books so I've got some more learnin' n memorizin' to do. Probably pick up a dozen or so new ones a year without even trying. And sometimes the guys on YouTube who do tutorials have some good tunes they go through that I didn't know. I've got "Bernie's Tune" in my head right now and that came from a tutorial, I'd never heard it before. Snappy little tune.

I've been focusing on Jazz for the past year. I love Classical but I've always been frustrated that I never learned to improvise. I play a fair amount of Pop as well (60's-90's) with a small group I'm part of, but most of that is similar to Classical in that you're really trying to play it as close as possible to the original version.

Sophia Quitter Haha I realize that wasn't the best example... considering what @rogerch did with it

Since you are learning the blues form, the SRV version of Mary Had a Little Lamb is a blues/rock song. You might find it out on YouTube. When I'm learning a song, or playing an exercise, I always enjoy changing it up. Key, time signature, rhythm, genre, harmony, tempo, it's all fair game. Keeps me from getting so bored with what I'm learning, and helps make it my own.

I can't speak for others but one of my best friends for trying out different improv, different music styles, etc, is boredom. When I've played a song so many times I can play it in my sleep, know all of the chord progressions without even thinking, know the melody inside and out, I get bored. And when I get bored, stuff happens. I try out new things. Sometimes alternate melodies, sometimes new chord progressions, sometimes new rhythms (sometimes multiple rhythms in the same song), sometimes pairing songs that wouldn't normally be paired, sometimes speeding up or slowing down, sometimes changing keys. It may even get kinda silly at times, that's OK. Play with it. Let your imagination romp a little. It's amazing what kinda shows up outta nowhere sometimes.

Quitter I listened to it. It's a very catchy version! I'm not much into rock music and I had never heard of him, but I really enjoyed what he did there. Thanks for the recommendation

Sign me up. I'm overwhelmingly interested in blues piano (my heroes include Leroy Carr, Charlie Spand, Big Maceo Merriweather, etc.). Secondarily I do some rock/pop stuff, often singing while playing. After that, I dabble in this and that, maybe a little jazz (at a very low level) sometimes, or just trying to pick up tricks from this and that miscellaneous genre (e.g., country, new age).

Some of you may have seen me post videos over at PW, sometimes solo and sometimes with my wife, the household drummer. Recently I started teaching a friend to play guitar and we have a bit of a trio going where I switch off between bass (when we're playing rock) and keys (when it's mostly blues).

For the record, I do like classical music, and I worked through the RCM syllabus up into a bit of level 5, but I don't really have any goals to perform classical, so I've left that aside for the time being.

Hello everyone, my first post in PT. I’ve been playing much less lately due to creeping arthritis in my wrists but I expect to pop in from time to time. Pleased to see the numbers are growing!

Welcome, @diretonic , sorry to hear about your arthritis. If it's any consolation, proper technique does not require much range of motion in the hands and even the wrists.

ShiroKuro -thanks for your kind thoughts.

Rubens I’m sure you’re right but in my dotage, motivation is in short supply so will likely end up just playing more chordy, less notey. I appreciate your thoughts though.

rsl12 Thanks, back at'cha. Yes, my other username was unique but a bit of a mouthful.

rsl12 Even on PW the non-classical forum is tiny!

I don't think the non-classical forum on PW is "tiny"because of a lack of interest in popular, jazz, film music, etc among piano players. Without any data to back it up, I think they likely make up the majority of players. My take, the reason for being 'tiny' has more to do with some of the people who frequent that forum.

I only ever posted something to it once, and promised myself "never again".

Another (mostly) non-classical player here. When I play by myself I play pop from Hal Leonard real books (or from musescore) or pieces from movies/musicals. When I play with a couple of friends in a band/practice group, then we play classic rock (I actually play bass guitar there, my wife plays keys in this group). I don't mind classical pieces, it just so happened that I started out about 13 years ago with non-classical when my kids started learning piano. My teacher at that time (pre-covid) introduced me to Alfred's series books together with supplemental books from Alfred's (Greatest Hits I-III).

@JohnCW I'm sorry to hear about your bad experience at PW's non-classical forum. Hopefully that won't be repeated here!

@MandM Welcome!!