Mokless Girgis Fan Blog

Mokless Girgis articles, information and tips about music

Blog For Free!

Archives
Home
2008 April

tBlog
My Profile
Send tMail
My tFriends
My Images


Sponsored
Blog
Piano Lesson, Compose And Become A Better Pianist
04.15.08 (2:08 am)   [edit]
Author: Peter Edvinsson

Everyone can compose sheet music! You have to start where you are and anyone can do that. You can create your own compositions for piano! Let's see why you should!

Where can you start?

Maybe you find it difficult to notate sheet music. Well, you don't have to notate your music. You can record the things you do with a digital recording equipment, maybe your computer or a tape recorder.

But if you want to use sheet music? What can you do?

Let me suggest that you start by writing for piano beginners. Sheet music for piano beginners have to be very simple. Few notes and very easy rhythms. This is the place where you fit in!

If you start to write piano sheet music for beginners in progressive order you will also learn to write sheet music in progressive order. Smart idea, isn't it!

But..., what benefits are there in writing and composing piano sheet music for your own piano playing?

Here are some of my own thoughts:

1. You own endeavors to create piano compositions will make you more aware of other composers music. Questions will arise in your mind on how to notate the things in your mind and how to arrange and so on. These questions will be in your mind and make you more aware of how other composers have written and notated their music.

You will probably look at other composers musical notation with fresh eyes trying to learn how professional composers write.

2. As you compose you will become more and more sensitive to intrinsic musical subtleties in your own music as well as in other composers music.

3. Gradually you will start to think and feel more like a composer. This will help you become a better performer as well. You will respect other composers music more, trying to convey their hearts intent to your public.

4. As you train your creative muscles by composing they will also help you as you perform piano music. Both performing and composing are creative processes requiring your heart.

5. You will become a better sight reader by composing piano sheet music. Many years ago I had an assignment to write sheet music to a musical. I encountered not a few notational problems. Problems I had not as yet solved for myself.

Afterwards I started to play piano sheet music again. To my astonishment I realized I had developed as a sight reader.

My own conclusion was that my concentrated efforts to notate my piano compositions also was a course in sight reading.

I realized I had experienced a reversed sight reading exercise by composing music with my fingers on the piano keyboard and then trying to notate the music on manuscript paper.

Do you have to buy manuscript paper?

Well, no! To notate sheet music does not need to be expensive. You can use an ordinary pencil and ordinary white paper. Sometimes I use this equipment when I have nothing else at hand. I write five lines, one bar at a time, as I compose. It works!
 
Tuning Your Guitar The Right Way
04.15.08 (2:00 am)   [edit]
Author: MIKE SELVON

Proper maintenance is important to any technical piece of equipment, all the way from vehicles down to instruments that you play. The guitar is no exception. One of the things that you must do on a regular basis is to tune the strings on your guitar.

Without doing this, they can stretch and the sound will be distorted. Tuning your guitar every so often will help prevent you from looking like an idiot in front of your friends whenever you are trying to impress them with your musical skills.

There is a standard, as there always seems to be, involved in guitar tuning and it is conveniently labeled the standard guitar tuning method. The standard involves tuning the strings from the thickest to the thinnest. The order should be E, A, D, G, B, E.

This method is the easiest methods because it is the easiest for tuning the most amounts of scales and chords. The way to start this method is with the E string. The E string is the thickest, and the least likely to fall short of tuning.

The A string is the next string that you should tune. The way to adjust the A string is to place your finger on the fret, pick the fifth and sixth strings while adjusting the fifth string tuning peg until the two notes sound the same. The D string comes next in line.

The way to find the proper D string note is to find the A string that is located just behind the fifth fret. You then turn the fourth string to that note. Tune your G string to the note that rings when you put the first finger on your left hand just behind the fifth fret.

The B string should sound like when your first finger of your left hand is placed behind the forth fret. You should recognize that the tuning of the B string is the only one in the method that uses the fourth fret and not the fifth. Last is the E string which is where you place the first finger of, you guessed it, your left hand behind the fifth fret on the B string.

There are other ways to tune your guitar, but they can get more complicated. You can use an online guitar tuner. You can customize these tuners or you can use the standard method in order to hear how the note is supposed to sound. There are many sites that you can visit in order to find an online tuner, but when you find a site that you like, you should bookmark it in your favorites so that you can easily find it the next time.

If you don't have a keen ear attuned to different pitches, you might want to invest in an electric tuner. With this device you can look at a tuning monitor to see how off-tune each string on your guitar is. Then, by following the needle on the display, you can tune each string on your guitar according to the reading given on the electric tuner.

Even if you do have a trained ear, electric tuners can come in handy if you're trying to tune your equipment just before a gig. Noises and other distractions can keep your ear from creating just the right sound on your guitar strings.

If you're experienced enough, you can tune your guitar by using piano notes. This is quite difficult to do though, especially if you're not trained in tuning your guitar with this method. Experts and musicians who have been performing for years can also tune their instruments though harmonies and octaves, but this might only confuse the beginning guitar player.
 

Links