Rock & Roll 101

May 14th, 2024

Caiden didn't come tonight.

May 7th, 2024

We worked on the first line again for the whole lesson. Caiden is having a bit of a brain-block with it, so just taking her time to really get it.

April 30th, 2024

We continued working on You're On Your Own Kid, focusing mostly on the Bminor to A/C# part.

April 23rd, 2024

Caiden played through Red today, at 90% speed, and did very well!

She decided to add a new song, and chose "You're On Your Own, Kid - Piano Version"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JL4aZh7JKSY

April 16th, 2024

We continued working through Red, and got it up to full speed! Caiden is doing very well on this. There are a few places where she regularly falls behind, and I tried to help her work on those spots especially.

April 9th, 2024

Caiden has a family commitment today and cannot attend.

April 2nd, 2024

We continued with Red, and worked through the bridge section as well. This week we played along at .75 speed with the song, and I tried to focus on staying in the right spot and not speeding up too fast in the song.

March 26th, 2024

Caiden wasn't certain of that new part again, so she videoed it with her phone, and then we spent the lesson learning it with both hands.

This way if she has trouble again, at least she can watch the video to be reminded.

She's doing very well.

March 19th, 2024

Caiden is sick today.

March 12th, 2024

We continued with the next part of the song, which had already been written out but not learned yet.

March 5th, 2024

Caiden won't be coming tonight.

February 27th, 2024

Caiden had been having some trouble with last week's lesson, so I walked her through it again, and helped her with how to practise the transitions between chords to get faster at them.

February 20th, 2024

We went over the different section (after the main verse parts) again today. I rewrote the chords for the B and Bsus parts for her, and we practised playing it to help her have a good foundation for working on it at home this week.

February 13th, 2024

Caiden is doing well on Red. We added more sections, which involved a major 7 chord, and some nice voicing for those chords.

February 6th, 2024

We continued working on Red, the piano version. We added a bit more complicated arpeggio part for the second section of the song.

January 30th, 2024

We reviewed Don't Blame Me (great job!) and added a new one:

Taylor Swift, Red (piano version):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zOXvQQaXDE

January 23rd, 2024

Caiden is doing well on Don't Blame Me.

We focused most of the lesson on the hits on the and of 3 and the and of 4 at the end of each four bar phrase.

January 16th, 2024

Caiden played through Numb Little Bug for me, and we then added a new song.

This one is more repetitive, it's Taylor Swift, Don't Blame Me:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Os0mdp3pX7U

We worked through the first bit together, working specially on going from the D minor to C where she was having some trouble with the inversions.

January 9th, 2024

January 2nd, 2024

Caiden cannot make it tonight.

December 19th, 2023

Caiden played through how far she's come so far - I corrected her on a couple of places (don't speed through sections but let them have a full four beat counts), and then we added the next part and went over it a few times.

Good job! Merry Christmas!

December 12th, 2023

Great job today! We worked through the chorus especially, trying to get comfortable with both hands.

December 5th, 2023

Caiden forgot her book at her dad's this week, so didn't practise much. We picked up where we left off, reviewing the numbered chords and playing through the verse from last week. We then added the chorus before running out of time.

See you next week!

November 28th, 2023

We added the first verse to the song, which involved me teaching Caiden what numbered chords are such as add9, 2, 6, major 7, etc.

See you next week!

November 21st, 2023

Caiden played through Kings and Queens for me, and then we added Em Beihold, Numb Little Bug
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flV7ZcRIoq0

We just worked on the intro for now, and we'll add more next week.

November 14th, 2023

Caiden made it to second round of try-outs and won't be coming today.

November 7th, 2023

Caiden has hockey try-outs today, and won't be at lessons.

October 24th, 2023

Caiden is doing very well with this song! We tried playing the third section with the recording, and she said it's hard to know where the chords change, so we spent some time really trying to work it out again. The chords change evenly, just like the rest of the song, so if she can work on that, maybe chords alone with the recording first, then add melody when she's got that down, it might help.

October 10th, 2023

Caiden struggled a bit with this new section of the song, so we spent the whole lesson just working through the timing, and when to change the chords for the parts of the melody. I think she felt much better by the end of the lesson, and should be able to play it without problem by next lesson.

October 3rd, 2023

Caiden came in by herself tonight. We went over the Kings and Queens song, and we added a new section.

September 19th, 2023

Caiden went through the Kings and Queens song with me on drums, and really nailed it! We added the first part of the verse after that- pretty complex, but I think she'll be able to do it!
She's got a lot of potential!

September 12th, 2023

Caiden came with grandma Joanne today.

Caiden is so close on Kings and Queens! The first line right hand is perfect or very nearly so. The second line she often makes little mistakes especially on the two higher b notes. I recommended she just do that line over and over again until she's got it memorized.

She should do the same thing with the left hand chords, playing them without looking at her hands, and when both hands can be played independently, then putting them together.

September 5th, 2023

Great job on working through the Kings and Queens song!

The next things to work on:
1. Inversions for this song
2. Both hands together
3. Watch where the melody is a bit different between the two lines
4. Watch the second last chord that's a G# major, not a G# minor.

August 29th, 2023

Caiden played through The Bones for me at 100% speed! Very good, only a little bit of an issue in the second verse or playing too fast.

We then added Kings and Queens by Ava Max:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6LhCim5y_Y

This is a stretch in difficulty, but if she works through the chords and forces herself to learn the new stuff, it will hugely help her in the future.

August 22nd, 2023

Caiden is unable to make it today.

August 15th, 2023

Caiden was able to play along with the recording at up to 95% the regular speed! I suggested she shoot for 100 percent this week.

Headphones while playing with the recording might help in not falling behind.

Great job! Get ready for a new song to learn!

August 8th, 2023

We went through The Bones together - Caiden has worked on it some, but there are parts of it that are disjointed, so we decided to work on joining up all the parts so it's a unified song.

August 1st, 2023

July 25th, 2023

Caiden is at camp on the 25th of July.

July 18th, 2023

I didn't see Caiden tonight.

July 11th, 2023

Caiden isn't feeling well today and isn't coming in.

July 4th, 2023

We spent a big part of the lesson working on counting the "pushes," which is a quick way to say the dotted quarter note followed by an eighth note, which is tied to a half note.
If she counts ONE AND TWO AND THREE AND FOUR AND, then the chords change on ONE, and then on the AND after TWO.

The last chord in the chorus is an A chord, and we glossed over that she wasn't playing that quite correctly, so she can try to find the right inversion for that on her own. A chords have an A, a C sharp, and an E in them.

June 27th, 2023

Caiden wrapped up Good life today, and we added a new one by Maren Morris, called the Bones:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WT18Uh0rWU

It's got a neat intro / verse section which sounds beautiful but is quite easy to play. We went through that and the chorus, and left the bridge until next time.

Good job!

June 20th, 2023

We worked more Good Life, talking about timing over the intro and the verse (counting 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and) to know when to change the chords.

We then added the next part of the song, which has some syncopation. This makes it even more critical to know where the "ands" are for playing the off beats.

June 13th, 2023

Caiden is doing really well. We finished up last week's song and added a new one, OneRepublic: Good Life
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Bo4oWK22bk

May 30th, 2023

Caiden is doing very well on Giants. We focused the lesson on trying to smooth things up by memorizing and by using inversions.

I'll be gone next week, so she has two weeks to work it out and commit it to memory.

May 23rd, 2023

Caiden is doing really well on Giants. Today we worked out a bit of timing, on when to play the chords in the left hand. Then we added another section to the song -- fleshing out the chorus.

May 16th, 2023

Caiden can't make it because of a play at her school.

May 9th, 2023

Caiden could play the hands separately, but hadn't been able to put them together this week in practise. We spent the lesson working through the first two lines, bit by bit, helping her coordinate the hands together.

She's coming along! She said she thinks she can take it from there to the end now, on her own.

May 2nd, 2023

Caiden did well on A Thousand Years, and she decided to learn another song. We added Lights, Giants:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Odrge7XZqNM

We only got the first part of the song written out, and not the chorus, so she can work on putting that together this week, and we'll add more next week.

April 25th, 2023

Today we talked about 4/4 , 2/4, 3/4, and 6/8 timing.

She played her songs for me. Keep working on them.

I wrote out a simple Old Mac Donald Line to demonstrate note reading, and showed her a video to try to get through. See if you can get to level 4:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qp4flocUmxM

April 18th, 2023

Caiden did a great job on Titanium... there are a few small issues where she stops timing to find the next chord, but I think working on it at home should help more with that.

We added a new song today: Christina Perri, A Thousand Years:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZGHXy1IAHM

It's a pretty one!

April 11th, 2023

We talked about fingering positions for Titanium, to help her not slow down or pause in the song. I gave her some strategies for how to practice that.

We also learned how to do the full scale all the way up the piano, by tucking her thumb under her ring finger at the top.

April 4th, 2023

Good job Caiden. We added the next part of Titanium, and I showed her how to use Looper.tube.

Here's a link:
https://www.looper.tube/?v=KxnpFKZowcs&s=0&e=268&spd=0.65

Paste the URL to YouTube in that box and set your speed.

March 28th, 2023

Caiden is doing really well! She played through the first part of Titanium without issue, really, except for missing a C minor chord the first time. We corrected that, and she was able to do it properly.

I then wrote out the next section of the song for her, and we worked through that a few times.

We also reviewed the D scale. She's able to do it with both hands independently, and with them together going the same direction. She should also work on them going the opposite direction from each other.

I added the E flat scale for her to practise as well.

Great job!

March 21st, 2023

Caiden did quite a good job on Oh Canada - it wasn't perfect, but it was much better than last week. I thought it might be more motivating for her to learn a song she loves, so we added Titanium by David Guetta:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KxnpFKZowcs

I only wrote out the beginning part for her in order to make the most of time.

I also wrote out the D scale for her to work on.

March 7th, 2023

Caiden played through O Canada for me. It was a little bit unpractised compared to what I was hoping, compared to previous weeks.

We talked through some things:
1. fingering, so you're not using the pinkie and over as a note gets higher
2. I showed her inversions, how to turn chords over but moving notes around
3. How to play low chords so they're less muddy by removing the notes that are close together.

We then went over the first line a number of times, to help her play the chords more smoothly.

There are no lessons next week over March break, because I'm away. She has two weeks to practise! :)

February 28th, 2023

Caiden came in with her dad today, (Chris), and her grandma came in at the end.

We went over the song from last week, and she's doing very well with it.

We added O Canada to our song list, and I introduced Caiden to the G Scale.

February 21st, 2023

This week we added Down By the Bay. This time we used chords. Great job being so enthusiastic, Caiden, and I'm glad you're practising so much!

I wrote this in the key of G, to help introduce other keys besides C and F. The chords are as follows:

G: g b d
D: d f# a
C: c e g

Play them with the left hand using pinkie, middle finger, and thumb.

Keep working on the other songs to make them as smooth as possible.

The same for the C scale.

February 14th, 2023

This was Caiden's first week on piano with me. She had taught herself a little bit in the past, and her mom had taught her too.

We went over the key-names together, and I showed her the animal names for the keys to help find them on her own.

I wrote out Mary Had a Little Lamb and Happy Birthday, and we went over that together before running out of time.

I introduced her to sharps and flats as well.

I asked her to try to learn the key names by quizzing herself, or maybe spelling words using the letters on the keys.

Also try to play the songs with both hands.