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This is really good teaching. Using applied psychology to overcome mental blocks instead of shouting and screaming like my old cello teacher. This will work.
Bill's understanding of how adult brains adapt and build leading to novel ways of climbing the "educational staircase" is just brilliant. Each time I re-watch an earlier video, I spot something I missed first run through.
Fantastic! ❤ i recently tried incorporating my left hand and has made practicing not as enjoyable because of my mental block. You do so well at helping overcome the psychological walls new students hit.
After seeing this video I wanted to tell about an observation I had. I am a music teacher as well. I teach brass instruments. I also conduct and compose. I had a teacher who always said, "The music happens between the notes". What he meant is that just playing the rhythm in time does not complete the process of performing music. All musicians have to go through the process of learning timing between the beats in order to truly interpret the music that is performed. That applies to any style of music. That said, the egg exercise is a brilliant way to instill that feeling of subdivision between the beat. Great stuff. Cheers.
This is very interesting and may be helpful to some people. But the probem I have as an intermediate player with more complicated pieces is the left hand usually does not correspond beat to beat with the right hand as your exercises do. The left hand is playing arpeggios or something equally challenging - and the right hand has an entirely different beat structure. The notes don't neatly line up from treble staff to bass staff. The most extreme example of this is Boogie Woogie!
They should line up but at a much higher bpm e.g. 32nds - I guess the trick is to find material to practice on with steadily increasing variance between the two parts?
I think Adrian’s point is a good one, Paul - steadily increasing the difficulty is perhaps the way around this. It’s also worth remembering that when you’re shaking the left hand rhythm you’re really only asking that hand to do something it would be doing anyway - marking out the left hand rhythm - if it were playing the actual part. Does that make sense? So I’m not saying it’s necessarily easy as such, just that it’s a way of breaking down and practising one aspect of a complex task.
This looks like an excellent idea. I know some people who are already used to browsing certain web sites with a single hand with the other one busy, maybe they have higher abilities at the piano :-)
@@BillHilton Yes it's, I just made one from old toys 🤣hand made 🤣 And I want to tell it's usefull. Love it❤ This thing made amazing hands, fingers and brain coordination. Than you👍
I have one student who is an adult beginner with percussion background. This is a great idea I will try Thursday - he always keeps a rhythm anyway with his foot might as well make it fun with this idea. I love 11:55 moment this is so great - for my beginners too - getting used to two hands - great trick Bill :)
What you're describing is bilateral stimulation! My therapist introduced me to this when dealing with more complex ideas. Bilateral stimulation activates more of your brain and, as an adult, is the best way to learn new things or process some more complex things like what I worked through in therapy, but the application works for a great many things like music!!
Absolutely spot on! It's really interesting to hear that you've used bilateral stimulation in therapy. I guess the way it engages the brain in a holistic manner works on how we learn and process across a whole bunch of activities, internal and external. Thanks for sharing that - It's a handy reminder of how interconnected our development, learning and indeed healing processes are. 🧠🎶
@@BillHilton my therapist told me that the way I write in my journal (listening to the best music while typing with both hands) is better than anything she could think up because my way is bilateral stimulation. Playing the organ is much more because not only are you using both hands, but also both feet to play. I honestly believe that the only reason I was able to process all the ick from my past and be OK with me, was my journal writing and playing the organ. I thank God every day that He gave me the gift of music.
@@BillHilton my therapist is a big proponent for EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) and told me that bilateral stimulation was a necessary part of it because it puts your mind in a state to better process traumas, learn new things, or move memories out of the limbic system (where mine were) and into long term memory so I wasn't constantly being traumatized with the ick stuck in the limbic system. But when she said that BLS allows you to learn new things....it just made sense. I've always found the organ to be easier to play and much more fun for new things and experimenting. When I asked her about it, she said that organists are some of the coolest people on earth because they learn things the fastest and play with all four limbs instead of just two.
All of this is so interesting - thanks very much indeed. To be honest, the organ boggles my little piano-playing mind: one day I will get to grips with it, but right now I'm very much still in the "I have to do WHAT with my feet!?" camp. It's certainly true that some of the finest musicians - in terms of sheer musicality and breadth of ability - that I've known have been organists. Also a strong overlap between mathematicians/scientists and organists too. Obvs you get mathmos/scientists/docs in all fields of music and they're probably over-represented among skilled amateur classical players, but I do notice a particular correlation between scientists and the organ in particular. Strange, eh?
@@BillHilton I got top marks in both math and science. My college degree is in accounting and finance with a minor in organ performance. I guess I'm an oddity, and that's alright.
Solid advice, good place to begin, but slapping your knee is shown in dozens of similar two hand exercises. Should you not also use a metronome to learn how to keep the rhythm consistent?
As novice my problem is not playing with both hands but being able to press the right keys because I can't look or focus at both hands in the same time. So one of the two hands is driving the other hand has to magically land on the right keys.. after a lot of trial and error
Yep, that's the challenge - it's the same for everyone and it remains a challenge to some extent throughout your piano playing life. The trick is to gradually nail down and perfect the skills so you can start to do some things with an increasing level of automaticity (find particular notes, for example). To some extent you just have to brute force it: steadily chip away at the problem with efficient daily practice over a period of weeks or months. Progress won't necessarily come in a linear way, either, so you might feel you're working and working and working and getting nowhere for a while, but then suddenly BOOM you'll notice a step-up in skill. Does that make sense?
yes Bill is right - and also usually we do one of two hands blind - so you find which hand you don't need to look at and look at the other. Well written pianistic songs would always have that - one of 2 hands no need to look
This is a good idea and ill give it a try. I failed trying to keep the left hand rhythm and trying to fit more notes in with right hand...the left just followed suit and sounded kak.
Is playing with 2 hands too hard? Depends on the level and the pieces you're doing. Always interesting to hear unconventional approaches to learning. In my family, a number of young people learned with a teacher but eventually quit playing not only because piano is hard, but because teachers tend to make playing music & the learning experience like exercises than having fun. In the beginning we'd all start with pieces like "Chopsticks" or "Hot Cross Bun". For many beginner getting the hand coordination is hard. If you survive the first year, beginner pieces become less challenging. Now you're playing more difficult pieces. If you survive another year, these pieces become easy.
I’m flattered at the suggestion, Daniel, and sometimes indeed I do. The downside is that it has a personality all of its own and I get inundated with fanmail/offers to write sponsor messages on it/improper suggestions from ladies of a certain age etc etc
Sorry to hear that! You might want to work on some easier skills first and then come back to this. Bear in mind it’s not supposed to be easy as such - just a little easier than playing hands together, so it’s kind of a bridge to that particular skill.
👉Improve your piano skills with my great value Piano Packs and 3 Ebook Bundle deal:
www.billspianopages.com/piano...
www.billspianopages.com/bundle
👉Join my Patreon community - we're a very friendly bunch of piano learners!
www.patreon.com/billhilton
👉My gear (in association with Sweetwater.com)
Nord Piano. Latest model is the Nord Piano 5: sweetwater.sjv.io/Gm3RNn
Rode NT-USB microphone: sweetwater.sjv.io/AWXR6a
Sony DCZV1/B digital camera: sweetwater.sjv.io/3erm1n
(Disclosure: I receive commission from Sweetwater if you click through and buy these or any other products from their website.)
This is really good teaching. Using applied psychology to overcome mental blocks instead of shouting and screaming like my old cello teacher. This will work.
Diolch, Dafydd - glad you think so!
Thank you, 68 now and just started to play , I can relate to how you teach looking forward to be playing and singing to, Thanks again.
@@dickyrorson8907 You’re welcome Dicky - let me know how you get on, and shout if you need any help!
Thanks!
Wow
Thank you very much indeed, Christoph - that's very good of you, and I really appreciate it!
How kind & generous 👏
Bill's understanding of how adult brains adapt and build leading to novel ways of climbing the "educational staircase" is just brilliant. Each time I re-watch an earlier video, I spot something I missed first run through.
Fantastic! ❤ i recently tried incorporating my left hand and has made practicing not as enjoyable because of my mental block. You do so well at helping overcome the psychological walls new students hit.
Thank you - I hope it speeds up your progress and you get back to having some fun when you practise!
golden medal for the tutorial, thank you!
Thank you very much indeed - I'm really glad you liked it!
After seeing this video I wanted to tell about an observation I had. I am a music teacher as well. I teach brass instruments. I also conduct and compose. I had a teacher who always said, "The music happens between the notes". What he meant is that just playing the rhythm in time does not complete the process of performing music. All musicians have to go through the process of learning timing between the beats in order to truly interpret the music that is performed. That applies to any style of music. That said, the egg exercise is a brilliant way to instill that feeling of subdivision between the beat. Great stuff. Cheers.
Brilliant Idea!
Thanks Jim - glad you think so!
Thanks a lot Bill !!
You're welcome, Mike - my pleasure!
This is very interesting and may be helpful to some people. But the probem I have as an intermediate player with more complicated pieces is the left hand usually does not correspond beat to beat with the right hand as your exercises do. The left hand is playing arpeggios or something equally challenging - and the right hand has an entirely different beat structure. The notes don't neatly line up from treble staff to bass staff. The most extreme example of this is Boogie Woogie!
They should line up but at a much higher bpm e.g. 32nds - I guess the trick is to find material to practice on with steadily increasing variance between the two parts?
I think Adrian’s point is a good one, Paul - steadily increasing the difficulty is perhaps the way around this. It’s also worth remembering that when you’re shaking the left hand rhythm you’re really only asking that hand to do something it would be doing anyway - marking out the left hand rhythm - if it were playing the actual part. Does that make sense? So I’m not saying it’s necessarily easy as such, just that it’s a way of breaking down and practising one aspect of a complex task.
This looks like an excellent idea. I know some people who are already used to browsing certain web sites with a single hand with the other one busy, maybe they have higher abilities at the piano :-)
Maybe we should be asking skilled boogie-woogie players what they are doing in their spare time 🧐🤣
Omg lol
TYSM😊
I agree Shaker is the new META
Interesting...adding to my daily warm up.
Thanks Mike - let me know how you get on!
@@BillHilton Very slowly so far...but it's day one. Using a pumpkin sprinkle mix spice container for a shaker.
@@mikehess4494 Good idea!
Another great tip. Thanks, Bill!
You’re welcome Donna!
Thank you, this makes sense to me. I’m going to try it, as my left hand is completely un developed.
Good to hear, Michael - let us know how you get on!
Cool , I’m going to try this.
Let me know how you get on, Donnie!
Thanks for this.
You're welcome, David!
That looks awesome👍 definitely I will try, thank you 👍
You're welcome, Grzegorz - I hope you find it useful!
@@BillHilton Yes it's, I just made one from old toys 🤣hand made 🤣
And I want to tell it's usefull. Love it❤
This thing made amazing hands, fingers and brain coordination.
Than you👍
I have one student who is an adult beginner with percussion background. This is a great idea I will try Thursday - he always keeps a rhythm anyway with his foot might as well make it fun with this idea. I love 11:55 moment this is so great - for my beginners too - getting used to two hands - great trick Bill :)
"Is Piano With 2 Hands Too Hard?" I'd say so!
Lol, keep it up Bill!
Well _I_ certainly find it too hard 🤣
What you're describing is bilateral stimulation! My therapist introduced me to this when dealing with more complex ideas.
Bilateral stimulation activates more of your brain and, as an adult, is the best way to learn new things or process some more complex things like what I worked through in therapy, but the application works for a great many things like music!!
Absolutely spot on! It's really interesting to hear that you've used bilateral stimulation in therapy. I guess the way it engages the brain in a holistic manner works on how we learn and process across a whole bunch of activities, internal and external. Thanks for sharing that - It's a handy reminder of how interconnected our development, learning and indeed healing processes are. 🧠🎶
@@BillHilton my therapist told me that the way I write in my journal (listening to the best music while typing with both hands) is better than anything she could think up because my way is bilateral stimulation.
Playing the organ is much more because not only are you using both hands, but also both feet to play. I honestly believe that the only reason I was able to process all the ick from my past and be OK with me, was my journal writing and playing the organ.
I thank God every day that He gave me the gift of music.
@@BillHilton my therapist is a big proponent for EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) and told me that bilateral stimulation was a necessary part of it because it puts your mind in a state to better process traumas, learn new things, or move memories out of the limbic system (where mine were) and into long term memory so I wasn't constantly being traumatized with the ick stuck in the limbic system.
But when she said that BLS allows you to learn new things....it just made sense.
I've always found the organ to be easier to play and much more fun for new things and experimenting. When I asked her about it, she said that organists are some of the coolest people on earth because they learn things the fastest and play with all four limbs instead of just two.
All of this is so interesting - thanks very much indeed. To be honest, the organ boggles my little piano-playing mind: one day I will get to grips with it, but right now I'm very much still in the "I have to do WHAT with my feet!?" camp. It's certainly true that some of the finest musicians - in terms of sheer musicality and breadth of ability - that I've known have been organists. Also a strong overlap between mathematicians/scientists and organists too. Obvs you get mathmos/scientists/docs in all fields of music and they're probably over-represented among skilled amateur classical players, but I do notice a particular correlation between scientists and the organ in particular. Strange, eh?
@@BillHilton I got top marks in both math and science. My college degree is in accounting and finance with a minor in organ performance. I guess I'm an oddity, and that's alright.
Just got my eggs! You are right... it's kind of like rubbing your head and patting your tummy!
Good to hear, Donna, and thanks for ordering them - let me know how you get on!
Solid advice, good place to begin, but slapping your knee is shown in dozens of similar two hand exercises. Should you not also use a metronome to learn how to keep the rhythm consistent?
As novice my problem is not playing with both hands but being able to press the right keys because I can't look or focus at both hands in the same time. So one of the two hands is driving the other hand has to magically land on the right keys.. after a lot of trial and error
Yep, that's the challenge - it's the same for everyone and it remains a challenge to some extent throughout your piano playing life. The trick is to gradually nail down and perfect the skills so you can start to do some things with an increasing level of automaticity (find particular notes, for example). To some extent you just have to brute force it: steadily chip away at the problem with efficient daily practice over a period of weeks or months. Progress won't necessarily come in a linear way, either, so you might feel you're working and working and working and getting nowhere for a while, but then suddenly BOOM you'll notice a step-up in skill. Does that make sense?
yes Bill is right - and also usually we do one of two hands blind - so you find which hand you don't need to look at and look at the other. Well written pianistic songs would always have that - one of 2 hands no need to look
This is a good idea and ill give it a try. I failed trying to keep the left hand rhythm and trying to fit more notes in with right hand...the left just followed suit and sounded kak.
Thank you - yes, give it a go, and start with the easier exercises so you can warm into it. Let me know how you get on!
I got my egg shaker at Camdon Guitars in London
Is playing with 2 hands too hard? Depends on the level and the pieces you're doing. Always interesting to hear unconventional approaches to learning. In my family, a number of young people learned with a teacher but eventually quit playing not only because piano is hard, but because teachers tend to make playing music & the learning experience like exercises than having fun.
In the beginning we'd all start with pieces like "Chopsticks" or "Hot Cross Bun". For many beginner getting the hand coordination is hard. If you survive the first year, beginner pieces become less challenging. Now you're playing more difficult pieces. If you survive another year, these pieces become easy.
"Survive" 😅👍
Marracas to this song
This is exactly what I meant to say in the tutorial. Thank you for the concise summary 🤣
Well done, Bill. If you wouldn't mind, I'd like to talk a moment about Sweetwater. Thanks.
Take off your cap and show your chrome dome in all its gloriousness!
I’m flattered at the suggestion, Daniel, and sometimes indeed I do. The downside is that it has a personality all of its own and I get inundated with fanmail/offers to write sponsor messages on it/improper suggestions from ladies of a certain age etc etc
Hi Bill, do you have a Patreon tier for children (age 10)/beginner?
To be a good pianist you have to be a good drummer first. 😅
To be a good ANYTHING you have to be a good drummer first 👍
❤😢😢😢😢is too hard for me to lean
Sorry to hear that! You might want to work on some easier skills first and then come back to this. Bear in mind it’s not supposed to be easy as such - just a little easier than playing hands together, so it’s kind of a bridge to that particular skill.