Covarr! I gots me a keyboard! Help me and meh wife learn!

[jeffdamann]

Hey man me and the wife got an M-Audio Keyrig 49.

Do you Have any suggestions to start us of down the wonderful road of pianism?

[Covarr]

Since you didn't really specify what kind of suggestions you're looking for, I've tried to be as broad-reaching as possible.

• Learn chords as early as possible, maybe even before you're reading sheet music. This may seem counterintuitive at first, but it'll make everything a lot easier down the line, especially if you have any intention of improvising. Practice finger exercises in all twelve Major keys.
  
  
• You want books? I cannot highly enough recommend Robert Pace. Don't be fooled by the childish artwork on the cover, these really are among the best. His books are well laid out, and perfectly paced so that it's never too hard or too easy, and does a better job preparing you for higher levels than almost any other piano curriculum. There are a number of websites selling this set (including his own), and it can be found in many bookstores and music stores as well.
  
  
• DO NOT FEAR THE BLACK KEYS. Some people, some teachers, and some books (not these books) give the impression that black keys are more difficult to play or learn, and recommend starting off in C-Major with only white keys and moving onto the black keys later. Unfortunately, this method will bite you in the ass once you're ready to move on. Treat them all like equals, and a few months from now you'll be glad you did.
  
  
• You are going to regret purchasing a 49-key unit. I wish I could say otherwise, but you will. You probably don't need a full-sized keyboard right now, but so much of what you will eventually want to play requires AT LEAST a 61-key device, and occasionally even a full sized keyboard with 88 keys.
  
  
• Practice, practice, practice. Especially when you're starting, you need to spend at least a few hours a week on this. Read and play as much sheet music as you can, even basic stuff, to make sure your eyes and fingers are trained to play what you see. At first, your sightreading WILL be slow. Ideally, you will be able to take in notes with your eyes and play them with your fingers in realtime, without needing to mentally process them in-between. The only way to achieve this is through time investment.
  
  
• Looking for a good piano VSTi to use with this thing? My personal favorites are Alicia's Keys ($119 USD) and New York Concert Grand ($79 USD), both by Native Instruments. If you're strapped for HDD space, you can also use Pianoteq (starting at 99€) which is synthesized rather than sampled, and consequently only takes up 25MB as opposed to the enormous multiple gigabytes of others. It also has a free trial, which isn't too terribly restricted (must restart every 20 minutes, can't use higher and lower notes which your keyboard doesn't support anyway).

Did I miss anything? I'd be glad to answer any other questions you might have. Otherwise, best of luck!

[jeffdamann]

You really laid it out for me, Im most likely going to get Roberts book, and will learn all the common chords before I move on to playing anything.

Hate to try and learn sheet music, but this isnt guitar, it must be done lol.

Yeah hopefully me and her both can get our sightreading better. When I learned sheet music with my guitar I could easily read it and tell you what the notes were, but my brain took like 5 secs to proccess each individual note and I sort of dropped it, wish I didnt.

Ill sell this crap when we get a little better(I didnt know this keyboard was so bad until we opened it, plays great, functions great, but is very limited.)I bought it for my wife for a surprise and when it got here I was apologizing lol, I felt that bad about it.

Thanks again for your well rounded reply, Ill let ya know if I ever need any guidance.

[Timu Sumisu]

from 13 years as a classical pianist, i`ll say - along with chords - LOTS OF SCALES. also... if you want to be good... lay yer time into it. srsly, minimum an hour a day if you want to scale up yer skill.