by Brittni Johnson

Created on: November 12, 2009

There could be any reason to want to learn to play a musical instrument. But to learn it well you have to have a passion for the music that has been created on it as well as the kind of music you want to create yourself. The piano is so different from other instruments. It has a beauty and captures the quality of passion. I personally love playing the piano, but have never had any professional training. What inspired me to learn to play the piano, was a song that I heard. I absolutely loved the song, and decided that I wanted to be able to create music like that. The song was "A River Flows in You" by Yiruma. It is a very beautifully written song, and very hard to learn. But I was determined to learn the song, because I knew that if I could push myself to learn a hard song first, than the passion I was feeling had to be real.

When I was growing up, my life was filled with music. My parents both loved to play different instruments, so therefore I wanted to learn as well. I learned to play the violin, the guitar, the mandolin, and the alto saxophone. My father was dead set on teaching me Amazing Grace, before he taught me anything else. But as any other child, my attention span for the instrument was fleeting. I would learn Amazing Grace, like my father asked, and then give up on it. That is why I made sure to learn a difficult song with the piano, so I could know that it wouldn't be a repeat of my childhood instrument experiences.

The best way to learn how to play piano is to learn the chords, then learn how to develop a melody within the chords. It may seem intimidating at first, but can be accomplished. I watched a how to video on youtube, and learned to play all the basic chords in one single night. I was so ecstatic, that I went straight from that to learning more songs. You don't have to know chords, or even the notes to play the piano, but it can be very helpful. Find your passion with piano, and if you want to keep it simple, simply find how to videos and learn the songs of your dream. Anything is possible, but you have to believe in yourself to reach your goals.

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