The Piano and its Trinities

The piano isn't in the string instrument family as so many incorrectly assume. It's an instrument of percussion in the same family as the drum.

Some of the biggest failings of the piano's 3 Classic Methods of instruction, which have been in existence for generations, is their reliance on string-instrument-based teaching methods. Chord Methods, Learn-by-Ear Methods and Sheet Music Methods all suffer from this same malady. The major contributing factor in the high failure rates of all Classic Piano Methods.

The sad fact is the largest group of 'graduates' of any Classic Method is the failure group. With each classification of piano method gaining its limited success by restricting the overall abilities of their student success stories.

The gist of it all being that Chord Method folks teach their students to NOT play Classical music or to NOT play precise arrangements. Learn-by-Ear Methods teach their students to NOT play anything too complex. With the worst of the worst being the Sheet Music Method folks who teach the overwhelming majority of their incoming students to not play anything at all, and take up Golf or Guitar instead.

The most common statement made by former students from the Sheet Music fleet is, "I've had years of piano lessons and I can't play a thing."

Been there, done that.

The piano is a simple point and click percussion instrument dominated by trinities. An Acoustic Piano has 3 foot pedals. Inside the wooden box of a grand, baby grand or upright the rule of thumb is that a felted hammer whacks a 'choir' of 3 strings. And for acoustics, digital pianos and electronic keyboards there are 3 types of piano keys that repeat across the keyboard in a 12-key pattern.

That 12-key repeating pattern consisting of 2 black keys grouped in a duo, 3 black keys grouped in a trio nestled among 7 white keys.

That duo, trio, duo, trio pattern of the black keys works as the piano's GPS system. Allowing the player to navigate across the keyboard by sight, or by touch. Since the black keys rise like hills above a flat, white plain.

Note how the black duos in the diagram are highlighted by a little white square and how that makes those duos easy to spot from the trios. That's a simple way to increase a student's playing accuracy. Since the most common playing error is striking a black duo key instead of the proper black trio key or vice versa.

Actually marking your black duo keys with a little square of white, self-stick address label or tape as shown in the diagram greatly increases your playing accuracy. Your fingers rarely touch the keys that far into the keyboard so that error-reducing white square can last for years.

Been there, done that as well. Consider that black duo key marking system your keyboard tip of the week.

As for the piano trinities the oddest trinity of all is the one I've only recently discovered, hidden  within the mathematics. That discovery coming only weeks before this year's September 7th Michael J. Drinkwater Tournament held at the New England Country Club.

It turns out that Golf, Mini-golf and playing piano are all games involving instruments of percussion. Where the piano is in the role of micro-golf with its set of 88 little clubs that we call hammers.

So until next time stay tuned...

A Grand Piano Does Not Bend

One of the great piano myths promoted by both ‘experts’ and novices is that the flats or sharps are the black keys and less often... a white key.

Truth be told the evolutionary design of the piano’s construction and its tuning eliminated the dreaded flatting and sharping of the stringed instruments. Simply put... by design, a Grand Piano has absolutely NO flats and NO sharps. It cannot produce the sound of flatting or sharping any given tone. A skilled player FAKES playing flats and sharps ‘cuz they ain’t there in the piano.

The Piano isn’t even in the stringed instrument family... it’s a percussion instrument in the musical family of drums and xylophones. It does have strings but the strings get whacked by little hammers to set the strings vibrating, thus producing the sounds. Once a key’s hammer whacks its set of strings there is nothing a player can do with the keys to change the pitch produced by those strings. Holding down the key while wiggling your finger or wrist back and forth doesn’t produce a violin-like vibrato.

Technically speaking, flat and sharp are VERBS that have erroneously been used as incorrect nouns with the piano. And the Math and Science team hasn’t dealt with the problem yet.

Using modern music terms more precisely, to ‘flat’ a tone is to produce a downward ‘bend’ in pitch. ‘Sharp’ is an upward bend in pitch. A violin vibrato is a rapid up and down bend in pitch. Plucking a string on a violin, cello or fretless guitar and sliding your finger holding the string way up or down the neck of the instrument produces a more extensive ‘bend’ of pitch.

The massive cast iron frame in a Grand Piano or other acoustic piano is specifically designed to STOP any bending of pitch in its tracks. You can’t ‘bend’ an acoustic piano, no flat or sharp is allowed for in the design or the standard tuning.

Now all that matters because you’re wasting valuable time and effort learning with any piano method or music notation that includes the playing of flats and sharps on an instrument that has none at all. Black Keys Matter because a Grand Piano cannot ‘bend’ any pitch.

Giving the black keys their own names frees the player from the classical music ideas that have nothing to do with the playing the piano.