#6 - Playing The Piano With Both Hands

FOR PARENTS OF BEGINNERS

So far, your child has learned how to read the Treble Clef on its own, as well as read a song that has notes written in both the Treble and Bass clefs, though one note at a time. The next step is to introduce them to playing both hands at the same time!

You will notice that most students will still use one finger to play at each hand – that is OK! The current goal is to have them comfortably identify the notes and get familiarized with the feeling of using both hands together. We will cover fingering shortly!

I describe the idea of playing multiple notes in one of two ways: 

1) I tell the student: “you and I are sitting here together. The fact that you are here doesn’t mean that I cannot be here, and the fact that I am here doesn’t mean that you cannot be here. This is the same with notes, they can both occupy the space together at the same time”.

2) I remind the student that “in an orchestra, you can have hundreds of players! And the page can be very long with many notes written one on top of another. On cue, everyone plays at the same time, they don’t have to wait for one person to stop playing for the other one to start”.

Once this general idea is clear, we move on to our exercise! The song chosen for this purpose is “Yankee Doodle”.

LESSON 1

1) Have the “Points of Reference” sheet and “Yankee Doodle” side by side so that your child could find the notes comfortably.

2) Ask your child, “why do you think these two notes are written one on top of another?”. Most children will intuitively answer that it is because they are being played at the same time. If they don’t answer this right away, use the examples provided above to explain further.

3) Now, ask your child to play the Treble Clef on its own a few times; then, ask them to play the Bass Clef on its own a few times. This breaks down the material into more manageable portions that are more easily digestible.

4) After they feel comfortable with each hand on its own, ask them to only play the first measure with both hands a few times – it is as if they are dipping their toes into the water with this new experience and need to see how it feels before being able to play larger segments.

5) Show them that only the notes that are written one on top of another are to be played together, all other notes are to be played by themselves.

6) Once you get a sense that they are feeling more comfortable with it, ask them to play that measure three times in a row in order to build up confidence. 

LESSON 2

1) After they were able to play it successfully three times in a row, do the same for the next measure on its own. 

2) When they feel confident with the second measure, ask them to play both measures back-to-back. This will give them further confidence in playing larger sections.

3) Move on to another two measures. Once they feel comfortable with these two measures, ask them to play all four measures back-to-back.

4) Continue until they played the whole song.

ADVANCED PRACTICE

Once your child feels confident with this song, choose another three to five songs from below to practice with them and further cement their confidence in using this new knowledge.

Little Hans | Auld Lang Syne | For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow | Danny Boy | Take Me Out to the Ballgame

Some of these songs, (for example, “Take Me Out to the Ballgame”) will have multiple notes written in either the right or the left hand. Many students do not make the connection right away to this concept of playing the notes together, so ask them once more: “why do you think those notes are written one on top of another?”, and wait for them to realize that this is exactly the same as what they have been doing previously. 

A FINAL THOUGHT

It is time to take a breather and let the vast amount of knowledge that your child has just learned to settle before moving on. Since your child is now making sense of all of this new information and organizing it in a way that makes sense to them, it is only natural for them to mix up parts of it a bit. In the next blog post, I discuss some of these common confusions, and how to address them.