Learn to Play Piano

Some Background and Familiarization of the Piano

A pianoforte, or piano, was first invented in the early 1700's as a sort of innovation to the harpsichord. The difference between a piano and a harpsichord is that the piano has the ability to be played with varying degrees of loudness or softness; thus the name pianoforte (piano translates to soft, and forte translates to loud).

A piano has 88 keys, 52 white ones, and 36 black ones. The white keys are called "natural" keys, and the black keys are called, "sharps" or "flats."

Most piano's have three pedals: the damper, the soft, and the sotenuto.

The damper pedal is the one on the right. This pedal is pressed to allow the the notes to vibrate. When pressed, it makes the notes last longer. It is used when the piano piece calls for notes to be played legato, or smoothly and "tied together." Pressing the pedal sort of blends the notes that are played consecutively.

The soft pedal is the one on the left. When pressing this pedal, the little hammers inside the piano that srike the strings that make the sound, do so in a way that makes the note much softer. This mechanism is done differently by different pianos. In early pianos, each note had two strings that the hammers struck to make a sound, but when the "soft pedal" was pressed, the hammer only struck one of them, so the sound was more quiet.

The sostenuto pedal, if your piano has one, is used in conjunction with a damper pedal. It keeps those dampers raised (meaning the piano strings that were already used can keep on vibrating in legato), while other notes can be played staccato (staccato means abrupt or short; you don't want staccato notes to vibrate or tie into other notes).

**Many upright pianos have a "practice pedal" instead of a sostenuto pedal. The practice pedal just makes the notes very quiet, so that you can practice your piano without waking up the neighborhood or driving your roomates insane.

Down To Business: The Music Theory you Need to Know to Begin Playing

There are two aspects of the piano that you should learn before beginning your first lesson:

1.The idea of a scale

2. How to read music notes

Scales