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    Pianist's Handbook: A Guide to Playing the Piano and Music Theory
    Pianist's Handbook: A Guide to Playing the Piano and Music Theory
    Pianist's Handbook: A Guide to Playing the Piano and Music Theory
    Ebook238 pages1 hour

    Pianist's Handbook: A Guide to Playing the Piano and Music Theory

    By Matti Carter

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    About this ebook

    Pianist's Handbook is Matti Carter's guide for pianists and musicians about piano playing and music theory. Here is what you will receive:

    - 10 chapters on the basics of piano playing and music theory
    - 60 music theory and piano playing exercises consisting of 20 easy, 20 intermediate and 20 challenging exercises
    - 45 playable piano pieces divided into 15 easy, 15 intermediate and 15 challenging pieces
    - Notation examples and images
    - A list of different types of chords and their position on the keyboard
    - A list of intervals
    - 40 examples of typical accompaniment patterns
    - All the different major and minor scales, triad arpeggios and cadences for piano
    - An appendix listing common musical notation and vocabulary
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBooks on Demand
    Release dateJan 3, 2019
    ISBN9789528054917
    Pianist's Handbook: A Guide to Playing the Piano and Music Theory
    Author

    Matti Carter

    Matti Carter is a professional composer, pianist and author of music related online guidance and instructional materials.

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      Book preview

      Pianist's Handbook - Matti Carter

      TABLE OF CONTENTS

      FOREWORD

      WORKING INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE USER OF THIS BOOK

      THEORY

      1.1 POSTURE

      EXERCISES

      1.2 PIANO KEYS

      1.2.1 KEY RATES

      1.2.2 OCTAVES

      1.2.3 STEPS

      1.2.4 EXERCISES

      1.3 CLEFS

      EXERCISES

      1.4 NOTES AND TIME VALUES

      1.4.1 BASIC NOTE VALUES

      1.4.2 DOTTED NOTES

      1.4.3 RESTS

      1.4.4 TUPLETS

      1.4.5 TIME SIGNATURES

      1.4.6 EXERCISES

      1.5 FINGERING

      EXERCISES

      1.6 INTERVALS

      EXERCISES

      1.7 SCALES

      1.7.1 THE MAJOR SCALE

      1.7.2 THE MINOR SCALES

      1.7.3 BLUES AND PENTATONIC SCALES

      1.7.4 WHOLE AND HALF TONE SCALES

      1.7.5 MAJOR KEY MODES

      1.7.6 EXERCISES

      1.8 KEYS

      1.8.1 KEY SIGNATURE

      1.8.2 THE CIRCLE OF FIFTHS

      1.8.3 MODULATION

      1.8.5 EXERCISES

      1.9 CHORDS

      1.9.1 MAJOR AND MINOR TRIADS

      1.9.2 OTHER TRIADS

      1.9.3 FOUR-NOTE CHORDS

      1.9.4 EXTENDED CHORDS

      1.9.5 CHORD INVERSIONS

      1.9.6 SCALE DEGREES

      1.9.7 EXERCISES

      1.10 ACCOMPANIMENT

      1.10.1 ACCOMPANYING FROM CHORD SYMBOLS

      1.10.2 IMPROVISATION

      1.10.3 CHORD PROGRESSIONS

      1.10.6 EXERCISES

      PIECES

      2.1 EASY

      2.2 INTERMEDIATE

      2.3 CHALLENGING

      MATERIALS.

      3.1 CHORD BANK

      3.2 CHORDS ON THE KEYBOARD

      3.3 INTERVAL BANK

      3.4 ACCOMPANIMENT PATTERNS

      3.5 MAJOR AND MINOR SCALES

      APPENDIX 1: NOTATION AND VOCABULARY

      SLURS AND ARTICULATION

      MARKINGS

      DYNAMICS

      CHANGING DYNAMICS

      TEMPO INDICATIONS

      FIXED TEMPO

      CHANGING TEMPO

      VOCABULARY

      APPENDIX 2: ANSWERS TO THE EXERCISES

      PIANO KEYS

      CLEFS

      NOTES AND TIME VALUES

      INTERVALS

      SCALES

      KEYS

      CHORDS

      FOREWORD

      This book will provide you with some of the necessary elements for developing your skills on the piano and learning the basics of music theory. The book is targeted across a range of abilities: beginners, intermediates and advanced musicians. It is primarily designed for pianists, but also for anyone else who is generally interested in music theory.

      The main goal of the book is to develop the reader’s musical understanding, knowledge and piano playing skills. The book is designed to help the reader understand the most important areas of music theory, and teaches how to apply them in practice. If improving as a piano player is your primary goal, knowledge of music theory can help you significantly speed up your improvement as a player. This is why you should make use of the wide theory base and the vocabulary of the book, so that you can enhance your experience as you learn new pieces on the piano.

      The book is divided into three main categories: theory, pieces and materials. The theory section comprises 10 different chapters, each of which covers a specific topic. At the end of each chapter there are exercises related to the topic. The chapters contain a lot of general information, but the examples and exercises are more detailed, and completing them is important for learning and understanding the concepts, as well as developing your skills as a player.

      The exercises of the theory section are divided into three skill levels: easy, medium and challenging. About half of the exercises are music theory related, and the other half focus on piano playing skills. Most of the easy exercises can be found in the first chapters at the beginning of the book, while the harder exercises are in the later chapters.

      The book is designed to offer new concepts and challenges for all skill levels. One of the goals while creating the book was to arrange the chapters into an order that will guarantee you the fastest possible development of your piano playing skills. That is why, if you are a beginner, it is recommended to go through the book one chapter at a time, starting from the very beginning. If you are an intermediate or advanced player, you may want to skip the basic information at the beginning and jump straight to the chapters and exercises that are more challenging for you.

      After the theory section there are 45 playable pieces composed especially for this book. Just like the exercises, the pieces are divided into three different skill levels: easy, medium and challenging. The pieces are related to the previously presented music theory, and you can use the theory as a tool to help you learn by playing the pieces.

      The final section of the book Supporting materials consists of useful information, theory and examples that may come in useful for any pianist or musician in improving their art. The beginning of the section presents 40 different accompaniment modules for those who are interested in learning accompaniment by the piano. The accompaniment modules are categorised into different musical styles. This section also catalogues the most typically used chords in tonal music, all the different interval types, all the major and minor scales, explanations of common markings in music notation and the definitions of different music-related terms.

      WORKING INSTRUCTIONS

      FOR THE USER OF THIS BOOK

      For beginners:

      Read through the first chapters and examples of the book several times.

      Complete the exercises at the beginning of the book to become familiar with sight reading and other basic music theory concepts and skills.

      Focus primarily on the easy exercises and pieces.

      Learn one thing at a time, don’t rush forward too quickly.

      Play through the examples slowly and with the right technique.

      Read the parts of the book that you can understand; don’t rush into areas that are too difficult for you. Remember that learning the piano is a long term process.

      Once you have

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