Learning non-classical piano

TC3 · 2024-07-04T01:05:45+00:00

Over years of lurking at various discussion forums, I've seen many variations of the following exchange: Q: "I want to learn piano, but not classical piano....

SouthPark

Let me think about creep ... and phantom ... and later ... I'll show my 'interpretation' (or one interp) of both ... combined. My way. And I'm going to leave out fast finger exercises.

PianoMonk

thepianoplayer416 My point, exactly.

ranjit

I agree with the Creep and Phantom of the Opera examples. The former distorts the melody too much and is too cheery. I love Leiki Ueda in the latter.

I will say, to me the latter guy clearly has more formal classical training based on how he moves. I would be very surprised on the other hand if the former could play classical well. So I disagree with your characterization.

This is what I think of when I think high level classical player arranging popular songs. This is a recent van Cliburn winner, with his own transcription of a Radiohead piece:

ranjit

SouthPark Make sure to listen with good headphones. It is the kind of thing which you can only hear if the balance is correct.

PianoMonk

HeartKeys I don't care for Lang Lang. But as a performer he is also "in the business". So, maybe his agent worked the Disney deal, because it will make money, and Lang sat down and played. Show business is funny stuff on the surface, and even funnier, or weird, bizarre even, behind the scenes.

ranjit

Just came across this cover which I thought was excellent:

ShiroKuro

Wow, that Francesco Parrino is really frustrating. I'm pretty sure I've heard other covers by him that I liked (can't remember what at the moment though). There's something really wrong with how he decided to do the LH part for Creep. There are aspects of the RH part that could work, but not in the context of how he's crafted the whole thing, and that awful LH thing. Ugh...

ranjit

ShiroKuro Wow, that Francesco Parrino is really frustrating. I'm pretty sure I've heard other covers by him that I liked (can't remember what at the moment though). There's something really wrong with how he decided to do the LH part for Creep.

I remember liking this one (Billie Jean):

SouthPark

Back again ... just heard hedwig's theme with the orchestra. No problem with the orchestra ... the strings do their excellent job.

We know about the parallels with star wars main theme, which is fair enough. Ideas can certainly blend and be related.

ShiroKuro

ranjit btw I finally had a chance to listen to Parrino's Billie Jean. I think it's awesome! I'm pretty sure I have heard this before, but yeah, really well done and captures the feel, imo.

This is a bit of thread drift, but I always feel like a solo piano cover of a pop song with lyrics should meet two criteria: 1) it "clicks" for someone who knows the original, and 2) it is compelling for someone who doesn't know the original. Not everyone will agree with these of course.

But the Billie Jean cover meets these criteria, IMO. Also, Peter Bence's covers of Despacito and Attention both meet them as well. I actually heard Bence's piano versions before I heard the originals, and I fell in love with both pieces. Only later, when I heard the original of Despacito did I go and find the original Attention. And hearing the originals really underscored how good his cover versions were.
Bence's arrangements are brilliant IMO.

SouthPark

Maybe francesco was doing something like a sped up moonlight sonata vibe version etc. For creep that is. The nice thing is he gets in there to have a crack ... to see what happens.

Pallas

I've got two comments about the Creep cover, but I want to make sure I make it clear that this is my individual perspective, and I would never say my perspective is "correct." It's not an argument against someone else's perspective. I live in a beautiful world of "and" not a world of "only."

First, I love Parrino's Creep. He's not my favorite Radiohead arranger, but although I don't know why he made the choices he did with Creep, my own first assumption is that his choices were intentional. I like to believe that he knows how the song is usually interpreted, and he has chosen to subvert expectations on purpose. Maybe not, but maybe so. Unless I hear him say, I don't know.

But I love it, in the way that I love surprises. I love sharp left turns. I love being blown back and challenged. I also acknowledge that maybe he just doesn't get it, and he swung and missed. But where someone else says "a swing and a miss," is the obvious "truth," I'm super happy to imagine whatever I want, like he did this on purpose, and he's got some reason why. As an illustration of what I mean by enjoying the snot out of the idea that it's intentional subversion, I offer the following, and I hope you'll humor me.

I love the show Westworld. It's wicked playful and beyond subversive into perverse. It's my jam. The composer plays with pop music a lot. There's an arrangement of one particular piece that I fell in love with. I thought it was the most romantic and wonderful piece I'd ever heard. I went to YouTube and found this performance of it, and read all the comments, noticing how often people were saying they plan to walk down the aisle to this piece of music. Full on romantic rapture.

The pianist did not win a Cliburn. She's just some chick like me who digs piano. The performance isn't perfect, but I keep it on my reference list for when I can finally learn the piece from the sheets, which I have in my dragon hoard. This person did not even learn it from music. She learned it from a waterfall video, and I also didn't give a crap about that. The piece still moves me.

Then I went to find the original Kanye West video so I could understand what the heck was even happening. Kanye West wrote this song that's giving "wedding bells" to so many people in the comments of this other person's romantic blur video? What's going on?

Then I heard the lyrics sung by Kanye, and I won't paste them here because they're filthy, and I'm a work-safe weirdo, so here's the clean chorus that says runaway from me, baby. In the video, there are gorgeous ballerinas. There is a dinner party full of gorgeously dressed people. And Kanye is taking a large, stinky, steaming, deliberate dump on the whole thing, singing a diss in the loveliest, most romantically beautiful way possible.

Here's what I can paste. The curious can search the rest of the lyrics to roll around in dirty diamonds if they want.

People who have never seen the video want to walk down the aisle the the chorus:

Run away from me, baby
Run away
Run away from me, baby
Run away
When it starts to get crazy, then run away
Babe, I got a plan, run away as fast as you can
Run away from me, baby
Run away
Run away from me, baby
Run away
When it starts to get crazy
Why can't she just run away?
Baby, I got a plan
Run away as fast as you can

So this surprise didn't disappoint me, make me cranky, or tell me that Ramin Djawadi doesn't get it. It tells me that he's feisty, tricky, and freaking delightful, and there's a reason I have scoured the entire internet for every pianist arrangement of every Westworld Djawadi arrangement, because I'm the target audience. I dig a happy hardcore funeral march.

I don't expect anyone else here to be the target audience for the stuff I like. I'm ok if it's just me. I'm ok if it's just me who listens to Parrino and thinks "perky goth luvs this whacked version of Creep, and I'm going to spraycast it to my fellow perkygoths, because we're the target audience." By sharing my opinion, I'm not saying everyone is wrong. I just want to also hang out and share my jam and have fun.

I'll make a different post with my actual favorite Radiohead arrangers, and look forward to hearing opinions, but my favorite ones will have an "and" sensibility, rather than "only, and anyone who disagrees is stoopit." 🤣

I'm weird, admittedly. And sometimes stupid, too. But you know, it's more fun to let me be the one to own my idiocy when I'm being one, and I think this particular thing is, like with most things, about taste (however bad), not IQ. 🤣

I'm it. I'll be the one with bad taste. Fine, fine. 😝

TC3

Pallas I might have mentioned this before, but I LOVE the Westworld version of Soundgarden's "Black Hole Sun."

SouthPark

Excellent post Pallas. That's one of the nice things with music and piano ..... after some amount of time, everyone can have a crack if they want, or if they need to. Even as exercise or the love of it. In the forums ... eg. PW ... there was always the pattern of a select few commenting/critiquing works or performances, which is probably fair enough, but were generally arm-chairing. And then when we ask them to give their take on how they should do it - as in just go ahead and do it (the PW ones), it then results in some lawyer defence thing ... such as "we're highly experienced in the area and we know boats" etc. As in ... they're saying they can dish out without anyone dish out on their own works etc. Eg. culinary/food critiques that eat only ... and don't cook as such. Or novel readers that don't write. Or film/tv reviewers. I guess if it's ok for them to critique, then it's still ok for some to still say ... then go ahead ... they (as in those folks) do it ... to show something for a change.

Pallas

TC3 I might have mentioned this before, but I LOVE the Westworld version of Soundgarden's "Black Hole Sun."

I think I have at least two arrangements of that piece. I love these things such an unreasonable amount I have considered buying a saloon piano for the music room. To sit with the digital, and the YUS5 upright. I came super close to bringing home an unreasonably priced Steinway upright that had a very promising slightly janky tone. But I already have two pianos and this madness needs brakes.

Pallas

This is a forum, not a blog, but I made a long post, so if you're upset about long posts, skip this one!

Ok, and here's 1 of 2 of my favorite Radiohead pianist / arrangers (the other is at the end). I have Josh Cohen's Radiohead playbook in my dream horde, and he makes up 1/3 my personal trinity of "non-classical" reasons why I want to learn how to read sheet music and have the skills necessary to play "xyz-mumble-level" music, whatever the heck that even is. I started with film soundtracks like The Man From Snowy River, which, if I work hard I might be able to play next year, then I followed the bouncing ball into kerblam OH NO. Cue video.

Me, kerblammed: "Looks like my dreambook is much more difficult than I expected, so I guess I'm gonna need more skills. Let's see, what kind of skills?" So off I go to research My Dude Josh, and I find this description of his work. I imagine it might look like B.S. It does not look B.S.ssy to me. It looks like starlight.

"Josh Cohen (b. 1984 Auckland, New Zealand) is an Australian composer, pianist and ambient artist based in Berlin known for a unique style that merges jazz and modern classical music, as well as spirited live performances inspired by electronic music sets."

"Cohen’s innovative and improvisational approach to playing conjures all the dynamism of iconic electronic music producers merging it with the rich atmospheres of Impressionist pianists. A unique synthesis of classical and jazz training underscores his sound but it is the sense of space, simplicity and intensity of emotion that have driven over 20 million YouTube views and granted Radiohead’s approval for songbooks featuring Cohen's idiosyncratic arrangements to be released by their publisher Faber Music."

"Okie dokie, little bean, little egg, little bug. So skills, skills, what skills am I gonna need? - It looks like all of them?"

And let me be clear. Do I think I'll ever be able to play Josh Cohen's stuff? You know what, I don't know. Very probably not! But the question is: do I care about attainment, or am I living a dream just having a piano? (It's the 2nd one.) I will strive as hard as I can toward a dream on one hand, while also showing up every day to obsess over my itty bitty kinda dumb sounding arrangement of the Entertainer, on the other. Will this silly piece get me from here to there? Well. I need to practice making slightly bigger jumps in the left hand, so. That's probably one of the 99,999,999 skills one needs to play this arrangement of Paranoid Android. Will playing this piece get me further away? No. It will get me at least one measure closer. Let's play!

Does any of this bother me? No. I get perfect sleep at night playing Alfred 1 badly, with Josh Cohen's playbook sitting in my dragon stash with a little sparkle. It's next to Joe Hisaishi, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Philip Glass, Vince Guaraldi (Charlie Brown Christmas), and Debussy, and various lunatic Beethoven sonatas I will never have the skill to play. There's more chance of life on Mars. More than one person in my orbit has implied or outright said I'm crazy, I'll burn out, I'm arrogant, I'm dumb, I'm delusional. Fine. Cool. But what I'm absolutely not is afraid to fail, afraid to work, afraid to fall short, afraid of embarrassment, afraid of judgement, afraid of crying. I AM afraid of self-sabotage and perfectionism. I'm afraid of bowing my head to the story that I am less than, and that Beautiful Dream is the destroyer. Shoot low to reduce the chance of failing is not my jam. Lemme tell ya, I have already failed stupendously at twelve different big dreams, and I'm still alive and kicking, and now I have a G-d PIANO, and my retirement, for all you can eat practice, as long as I don't injure myself.

I'm not sharing to be special, to boast, blah blah blah. I'm sharing to be one voice in the wilderness to some kid Googling into the night, so they can find one person on the piano boards who is "pro wild and crazy dreams." Because life is complicated, and dreams are not arrogant, they can be a life-affirming, a rational reach toward beauty in an often hard, disappointing daily reality. I touch my piano like it's a lifeboat, but also like a toy, because it is. It can be both.

Everything I just said goes a million times for Christopher O'Riley, even though the chance I will ever play his pieces is even more ludicrous. Will that stop me from wanting, wishing, and striving to at least play around Level 5? No. No, it will not stop me. He will inspire me every day. The dream of playing alt/rock "songs" in his crazy style gives me rainbows of vicarious joy. There is nothing anyone can say that'll convince me dreaming of this music coming from my piano is any more self-destructive than my habit of taking tens of 1000s of photos a year in the hope that one will maybe turn out kinda ok enough to frame. I have the hard drive space, so why the heck not.

Here's Christopher, playing Radiohead. My God.

If you made it to the end of my TEDTalk, thanks! 🤣

TC3

Pallas Well said, Pallas. I feel the same way. I'm not ever going to play at a pro level, but I think I'll be able to make some nice sounds come out of my piano once in a while, and it gives he something to fill my existence that feels worthwhile and satisfying, no matter what level I attain along the way.

ranjit

Pallas So skills, skills, what skills am I gonna need? - It looks like all of them?"

Not quite. Have you tried learning the piece? It does not look too technically complicated (I say that not to discourage you.) I would try to work on the specific challenges in the piece. The syncopated rhythm sounds rather difficult, so practicing that in isolation might get you a long way.

It reminds me of the Fantaisie Impromptu. I spent a month purely working on 4:3 rhythms in a dozen different ways until it clicked. Once it did, much of the rest of the piece fell into place.

Pallas

TC3 Care to give us a peek into your dream book? ❤️ I always want to know what lights people's jets.

TC3

Pallas Well, I don't necessarily aspire to super flashy and fast technique to achieve my playing goals, which makes them reasonably attainable. I'm in love with blues and boogie piano, and spend most of my time working on that. My heroes are Leroy Carr (first and foremost), Charlie Spand, Big Maceo Merriweather, Jimmy Yancey, and many others. I'd like to get to a point where I have enough of their songs in my repertoire that I could play gigs of two or three sets. My biggest concern is that I don't play as consistently and confidently as I'd like, but I know that will come with experience.

Of course, this also means I need to work on my singing. Outside of the purely instrumental boogie tunes. blues is first and foremost a vocal art form, with the instruments there to accompany and/or imitate the voice (for piano, primarily the former; other instruments such as guitar are better for the latter). To that end, I'm working on my singing, and hoping someday not to sound quite so dull ...

Thanks for asking!

Pallas

TC3 Well, that sounds like terrific fun to me. Thank you for name dropping, because I do love to go YouTube prospecting with a new list. I had never heard of the various subdivisions of jazz and blues until I got to the blues section in my Alfred book and started clicking around. Then I realized that yes, I had heard these styles all my life but never knew the words "boogie-woogie" in blues, or "stride" in ragtime. The veil of ignorance lifts slowly. Thank you for sharing. ❤️

TC3

Pallas Believe me, is all such a rabbit hole. I read about blues and related music all the time, and I'm always learning something new!

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