How To Teach Yourself Keyboard and Piano From Books

Do you like the idea of being a self taught keyboard or piano from only books?

Are you a motivated person, who is good at sitting down and focusing on something without the support of a teacher or fellow colleagues?

Some people are great at disciplining themselves and once they get something in their head that they want to do, then they will dedicate regular time slots to practice.

Learning from books is a very logical way to play keyboard for some people, but for others they could find learning from a book confusing and not really grasp the concept behind keyboard.

If learning by this way works for you, then take the opportunity to pursue your hobby and within a short period you will be playing classic pieces that you can showcase to all your family and friends.

It is a great way of gradually building a repertoire of your favourite songs, and learning sight-reading from when you start playing is a great skill to have and can open up endless opportunities for you.

Books that are great for beginners are: -

The Complete keyboard player by Kenneth Baker. This book is very informative and is laid out in an easy step by step format which is perfect to use when teaching yourself, and it gradually progresses through the book.
Get yourself a Scale book. The ABRSM scales arpeggios and broken chords are a good book along with Hanon virtuoso exercise book one.
Get organised and get your books to arrive the day your keyboard does, so you are all prepared!

Once you are organised with your books, set yourself a plan to learn one scale in your first lesson - C Major contrary motion scale is a good one for a beginner to keyboard, and Hanon exercise one is another.

Get yourself familiar with the repetitive note pattern on the keyboard, and challenge yourself to playing games where you need to find each individual note in a time scale - start with 20 seconds and then reduce it every night by 5 seconds.
Play the first piece of music given in your book. This will normally be a piece using just your right hand initially. Once you complete this the next song will incorporate both hands but at different times.
Practice every day for at least 20-30 minutes, break this down into shorter bursts if you need too, and try to dedicate some time everyday even if it ends up only being 5 minutes, it will be worth it!

It can take many years of practice to reach the standard to be able play your own one hour song repertoire on piano or keyboard.

Learning from books is fine but it also helps when learning piano or keyboard to see and here what you are playing so check out some
cool video lessons here: Piano & Keyboard Videos

There are also some fantastic tips, downloads and videos on this popular website which I recommend you should visit: Easy Keyboard Songs

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