Four Pianists turned Politicians

Charles Dickens played the accordion, Neil Armstrong played the Baritone Horn, Thomas Jefferson played the violin, and Basketball great Wayman Tisdale played the bass guitar. These are only a few well known people who play a musical instrument. Although these are all worthy stories, let’s focus on the piano. As you might imagine, there are a lot of people you may have heard of who have played piano. (We’ll skip people like Elton John, Billie Joel, and Little Richard for obvious reasons) Today, we’re focused on people who have made a name for themselves as a political figure.

Condoleezza Rice

Condoleezza Rice was the first African American woman as well as the second woman to serve as the United States Secretary of State. She served in this position from 2005-2009 under President George W. Bush. She now serves as a faculty member of Stanford University.

Ms. Rice is a highly accomplished piano player. When she was 15, she played with the Denver Symphony Orchestra which was an award for a piano competition she had won. Today, Ms. Rice plays a few times a month with a string quartet in Washington with a group of lawyers in her apartment. Many of her quartet members, like her, are highly trained with one being a former college cello teacher. In addition she has performed with Yo-yo Ma as well as solo performances at embassies and for Queen Elizabeth II.

Bill Clinton

Most people who remember the Bill Clinton presidential era know that his Saxophone was an integral part of who he was. He didn’t have the virtuoso ability of Condoleezza Rice but he did have a talent that allowed him to play and enjoy the saxophone and music in general. He was even presented with a custom made presidential saxophone that was later donated to a museum.

Harry Truman

As a young boy Harry Truman woke up at 5am every day and practiced piano for two hours. He once said that if he was good enough, he would have never been president but instead a professional pianist. His mother was his first teacher and later, he had teachers in his town. At age 15 he quit taking piano lessons telling his mother that he would never be good enough to play full time.

According to the Truman library, in 1945 he played piano for a group of Methodist women, winked at them and said, “When I played this, Stalin signed the Potsdam Agreement.”

Richard Nixon

President Nixon is known for bigger things than his musical talent but most people don’t know that not only was Richard Nixon a pianist but he was also a composer. In fact, a concerto that he wrote was so good that he performed it on the Jack Parr show and five years later, he became President of the United States.

Although we mention only four American political figures, the world is filled with many more. Brittish Prime ministers and Indian peace movement leaders are just a few examples of the many around the world who have made the piano their instrument of choice.

People like this are proof that music is very accommodating. You don’t have to play music full time to enjoy the benefits of playing.

As you know, there are many ways to make your piano playing fuller, including fillers, chord subs, runs, all kinds of chordal techniques, and so forth. And one of the best ways is to use passing tones. Passing tones are non-chordal tones that “pass through” from one chord note to another. Listen to this 10 minutes podcast and I think you’ll get the idea.

Enharmonic notes are simply notes that have more than one name. Just as you might be known by not only your given name, but also by your nickname, so notes can have more than one name. The same is true for enharmonic chords — they can be known by multiple names as well. For example, the Db major chord sounds exactly the same as the C# major chord, but looks different on printed music, and has two different names: C# major and Db major.

To get a really full sound in your right hand, try putting in not only the notes of the chord under the melody, but also try to incorporate a color tone of some kind, such as a 6th, 7th, major 7th, or 9th. You can overdo it, of course, but this short video demonstates how it is done.

One of the techniques you can use in your right hand to make your piano playing fuller is to add 3rds under the melody. Just make sure it is a scale note 3rd — anything else will not harmonize correctly. When 3rds don’t work at a given spot in the melody, switch to 6ths under the melody — one of those two will almost always work. For more good stuff like this, come on over to http://www.playpiano.com and sign up for our free online newsletter.

There are many ways to add excitement to your piano playing. Here are 7 ideas you can put into practice fairly quickly.

1. Change the chords slightly by adding color tones. What are color tones? Color tones are notes added to the basic chord, usually expressed as 6ths, 7ths, 9ths, etc. For example, instead of playing just a straight C chord as it is written – C, E, G – try adding a color tone to it, such as a 6th (A) or a 7th (Bb) or a major 7th (B) or a 9th (D). In fact, try adding a couple together, like a 6th and a 9th. So instead of being a plain vanilla chord made up of C, E, and G, you’ve made it a tasty variation adding A and D to the equation.
2. During the pause between phrases, add a counter melody. How? Take the given melody notes and turn them upside down or inside out, or change the rhythm slightly so the tune is still recognizable, but different.
3. Add chord substitutions. Instead of always using the chords that are written, ask yourself this question: “Into what other chord will this melody note fit?” For example, if the melody is G and the chord is C, what other chords contain the note G in them? There are several answers to that question. G is not only in the C chord, but it is also in the Em chord, the Eb major chord, the G chord, the Gm chord, etc. Try one of those alternate chords until you like the sound combination, then use it instead of the C chord. It will add an originality and freshness to your playing almost immediately.
4. Add fills and runs between phrases. How do you do that? Simply break up the chord that is in force at the moment, and run it up the keyboard as a broken chord – one note at a time. Or start at the top of the keyboard and come down. Or play with the chord a bit by playing 2 of the 3 notes instead of the entire 3 note chord.
5. Use melodic echos. After you have played the melody, echo it by playing it an octave higher, or two octaves higher, or an octave lower.
6. Use half-step slides. If the chord progression is from D7 to G7, instead of going to G7 directly, “slide into it” by playing the chord that is one-half step above – namely, Ab7, then quickly sliding off Ab7 to G7.
7. Use “blue notes.” Blue notes are created by sliding off a black key onto a white key quickly. For example, if the melody is E, slide off Eb to E quickly using the same finger.

For a complete course on 101 ways to make your piano playing more exciting, please click on How To Dress Up Naked Music.

Will learning to play the piano make you more intelligent?  Could the brain grow larger than normal by learning to play a musical instrument such as a keyboard or piano?  Questions such as these have been arising everywhere over the past few years and not only in science journals either.  The interest of the general public in these studies involving music and the development of the brain has led to the publishing of many articles, to the delight of music-lovers everywhere.  But all the information gathered, the reliable and the questionable, has left many still confused about how much importance should be put on use of musical training for brain development.

If your feeling confused about what you have learned, certain valid points considered may help clear your thinking.  It seems that the most benefit is derived from early musical training when it comes to strengthening the connectors in the brain and creating new pathways. Research demonstrates the definite influence that music training has on the long-term development of specific parts of the brain.  The research findings of Gottfried Schlaug, Herman Steinmetz and their associates were published in Discover magazine in 1994. They did a comparison of 27 classically trained right handed musicians with 27 right handed non-musicians using a technique called MRI, abbreviated for magnetic resonance images.
 
Their findings revealed that the planum temporale (the brain’s auditory processor) was larger in the left hemisphere and smaller in the right in comparison with the group of non-musicians. Musicians who started training before the age of seven had even more outstanding differences.  The differences were especially notable among musicians who started early training, specifically before the age of seven.  Shlaug claims that the study of music also promotes enlargement of the corpus callosum, a bridge of sorts between the brain’s two hemispheres. He discovered that among musicians who began their musical education before seven years of age, their corpus callosum was thicker by 10-15% compared to non-musicians.  It was suspected that a larger corpus callosum improves motor control by making a faster connection between the hemispheres of the brain.

Later research published in a 2002 issue of Science magazine showed the results of a study conducted by Dartmouth music psychologist Peter Janata which confirmed that music is one of the best stimulants for improved connectivity between the right and left hemispheres of the brain and between areas responsible for emotion and memory.  A team of scientists led by Janata reports that with musicians, they have found certain areas of the brain to be 5% larger, and specifically the auditory cortex in expert musicians, up to 15% larger than people with little or no musical background. In addition, those who started studying music early in childhood have increased development of up to 15% in the brain area called the corpus callosum, which is a four-inch bundle of nerve fibers connecting the left and right side of the brain.
 
There is growing evidence that detailed and even skilled motor functions are enhanced, besides the growing evidence from research studies that some brain region connectivity, as well as some types of reasoning functionality is improved by music training. The corpus callosum in musicians is evidently essential to the performance of such tasks as the coordination of fingers. As any muscle must grow to accommodate the tasks at hand, this portion of the brain also grows to make one more proficient at these necessary musical skills.

In a study conducted by Dr. Timo Krings and reported on in Neuroscience Letters 2000, non-musicians and pianists of the same age and gender were asked to complete a series of intricate finger movements.  In this study, pianists and non-musicians of the same age and gender were asked to perform sequences of complex finger movements.  Correct movements were noted by both groups, but less activity was seen in the brains of the pianists. The conclusion drawn by the researchers was that the pianists’ brains make skilled moves with less effort.  There are a staggering number of ways that the human brain and its development are affected thanks to the study of music.  With all this research at your fingertips, how do you decide what type of musical studies will benefit yourself or your children?

An article by N.M. Weinberger published in Musica Research Notes in 2002 made an interesting point about how the Mozart Effect , although not living up to it’s musical hype, has raised the public eye to the research being conducted in the field of music. Listening to just a few minutes of Mozart invites a whole new world of musical possibilities to the listener. The academic evidence discovered for using music study as a tool to aid brain development is compelling, even with the hype regarding the Mozart Effect.  Dr. Frank Wilson from the University of California’s School of Medicine in San Francisco says his research reveals improvement in coordination, concentration, memory, eyesight and hearing when a person engages in practicing the art of music.

According to Frank Wilson’s research, learning to play an instrument brings about these benefits: better coordination, improved concentration, memory, eyesight and hearing. According to Wilson, all other activity pales in comparison to musical training which refines the entire neurological system by improving connections and motor skills in the brain. Dr. Wilson says that he believes musical instruction is vital for total brain development.

The conclusion we draw from what we’ve learned is that studying music can be an important tool to enhance various important functions of the brain. No guarantees, of course, but if you love music, why not do what you love?  Therefore, if you are a lover of music, dust off that old piano you have always wanted to play and get started today - you have much to gain in satisfaction and pleasure. And who knows? If it increases the capability of your brain, what a bonus!

Our population is aging. People are living longer lives, and they are constantly looking for brain food to keep their mental prowess in peak condition. One of the best ways to keep those hamsters running might be sitting in the corner of your living room gathering dust. That old piano of grandma’s has more than its share of brain teasers.

If you’re looking for a perfect way to keep your mind sharp, piano playing is the solution. It exercises several different parts of the mind and body, while providing you with years of musical enjoyment. Whether you play piano currently or are thinking about starting, playing piano is great brain food.

In order to play piano, your hands must develop independent coordination. This is one of the basic ways to keep your mind sharp. Each hand must often perform entirely different movements, and the brain must tell each hand what to do. By learning separate hand coordination, you stimulate several different areas of the brain. Practice each hand separately, and then combine the movements of each hand.

Not everyone is born with perfect pitch, but many people can develop it. When you play piano, you train your ear to hear pitches and tones in relation to one another. This makes perfect pitch possible. Intervals stimulate your mind in slightly different ways. A perfect fifth will cause one reaction in your brain, while a seventh will cause an entirely separate reaction. This trains the mind to recognize pitches and intervals.

Sight reading offers the brain another workout, as the eyes must follow the music while the hands play it. The ability to sight read is similar to knowing a foreign language, yet also requires extreme hand-eye coordination. The eye muscles are also strengthened as they move up and down the staff across the page.

Analyze musical passages and learning the theory involved is another mental exercise when you play piano. It’s brain food at its finest. Chords, melodies, and changes are all rooted in complex musical theory. It pays dividends to learn and understand how music is put together.

When you play piano in the presence of others, you are participating in a valuable social exercise. History is filled with participants and spectators in the world of music. You have the ability to make others’ time more enjoyable. You also meet other musicians who can share knowledge with you, expanding your understanding of the piano.

Proper piano playing, whether done for leisure or profession, keeps the fingers nimble. It strengthens all the muscles of the hands, which helps in other lines of work. A maintenance man with strong hands is more valuable than one with weak digits.

Besides all this, piano playing is great fun. It lets you create your own tune for the day. The piano has provided society with over a hundred years of enjoyment and will do so for hundreds more. It’s not only an instrument; it’s a social communication tool and a brain exercise, as well. Play piano for your brain. It’s lot more fun than Sudoku, and it’s great at parties.

How Can I Learn To Understand Music & Piano Playing?

The graceful flourishes of a well-played piano masterpiece are sounds that many people would love to create. From trained professionals to child prodigies, a brilliantly

played piano can steal the show. But great lessons are costly and involve scheduling time away from your busy life. So how do you learn how to play the piano or deepen your

knowledge of the instrument?

Piano workbooks can provide a solid foundation in theory, an effective practice routine, and piano classics in one package. If you don’t have the time or money for lessons,

consider buying a few piano workbooks.

The obvious advantages of piano workbooks are the ability to set your own pace and practice at your convenience. Just sit down at the bench after dinner, crack open the

book, and hear your playing improve.

The only downside is that you must develop self-motivation to flourish when studying from piano workbooks. Like any great discipline, you must develop some kind of regimen

to progress. With a teacher, you’ll always have someone keeping track of how well you’re doing. By studying from a workbook, you’ll have to keep an eye on your own

progress.

Piano workbooks range from those that focus on the basics to those that provide a comprehensive explanation of musical theory. The best offer a good amount of theory,

exercise and musical notation. Whatever type of study you are seeking, there are certainly several piano workbooks available that suit your needs.

Some piano workbooks may be a look and listen experience. They may come with CDs that let you hear the examples listed in the book. This is great for the unsure learner who

may need more than just text to explain a concept. It’s also wonderful for hearing how an exercise is supposed to be played or how a particular piece is intended to sound.

Many books give examples of practice methods. Be sure to follow their instructions so that you don’t overexert your hand muscles, especially if you are a beginner or trying

advanced techniques. Warm-up your hands with simple and light playing for a little while before going into an extended run across the keyboard.

Workbooks also contain essential piano pieces that combine theory and technique into music. The pieces provided range from simple pop songs to classical standards that will

put your skills to the test. Piano workbooks often include biographical information on the composers of each piece so that you can learn the history of the instrument.

Besides simply playing, a deep understanding of the piano and pieces composed for it provides an appreciation for musical history.

Piano workbooks can offer an extensive training course to anyone willing to invest the time. Since they’re often compiled by a company, they contain more information than

any one person can offer. Though a book can’t make you practice, they can be a benefit to dedicated students. So when you decide to fancy yourself a pianist and set out to

master the works of Franz Liszt, consider the tutelage that piano workbooks can offer.

If music in general and piano in particular interests you, then now is the time to begin. When it comes to learning the piano, age is no barrier. If you truly desire to learn the instrument, you will apply yourself accordingly no matter what your age.

While we do absorb information like sponges in our formative years, we do not necessarily have the deep interest and sense of commitment that we do as we mature. That’s why adulthood is a great time to learn a new activity, such as the piano. Think of it, you are making a conscious, independent decision to develop a new skill. No one is telling you, or making you, take lessons. You are studying the piano because you want to study the piano.

We tend to throw ourselves with verve into activities that interest us. That’s why, if you have the interest, you can learn the piano from scratch in adulthood. Music is a great avenue for creative expression. In our fast-paced lives, learning to create music may be exactly what you need as a break from your daily routine.

The approach you take to learning the piano is important when you’re an adult. In our jobs, we tend to work at a harried pace and often expect immediate results. This attitude can spill over into our music study. If you desire to learn the piano, you have to take a systematic approach and set reasonable goals.

Decide whether you want to take private lessons or self-teach. You might want to take a few lessons to get the basics down and then continue study on your own. You may choose to do web-based studies. Whatever learning method you choose will only take you as far as your attitude does.
To succeed at learning the piano from scratch, as an adult, consider these suggestions:

* Have fun. You didn’t decide to take piano to add extra stress to your life. If you miss a day of practice, big deal; it means you missed a day of practice. Besides, you don’t want to practice seven days a week. Piano is an interest, not your career.

* Take the first step; don’t try to take five steps at once. Learn a concept or element, practice it, and then move to the next step. Trying to leapfrog steps because you’re in a hurry to get to Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven will only get you frustrated. Frustration leads to giving up your dream.

* Set reasonable goals. Remember, you’re new to this and you may feel overwhelmed with all that piano playing entails. Set a daily goal and focus on that alone. Do the same the next day.

* Get tips and ideas from other adults who successfully undertook piano studies. Ask them what worked best for them and what pitfalls to avoid. You will gain valuable insight into proper study methods. You will have someone you can bounce ideas off who can relate to what you’re doing.

* As you progress beyond the basics, make sure you gravitate to music you enjoy, not just music the lessons tell you to play. You will continue with a lifelong study of the piano if you learn to play your favorite music.

Learning to play the piano is not just for children and teens. It is a creative pursuit for all ages. Decide today to begin your study of the piano – it will be music to your ears for tomorrow and beyond.

If you’re looking for a perfect way to keep your mind sharp, piano playing is the solution. It exercises several different parts of the mind and body, while providing you with years of musical enjoyment. Whether you play piano currently or are thinking about starting, playing piano is great brain food.

Our population is aging. People are living longer lives, and they are constantly looking for brain food to keep their mental prowess in peak condition. One of the best ways to keep those hamsters running might be sitting in the corner of your living room gathering dust. That old piano of grandma’s has more than its share of brain teasers.

Here are 7 benefits of learning to play the piano:

1.Piano playing increases coordination. In order to play piano, your hands must develop independent coordination. This is one of the basic ways to keep your mind sharp. Each hand must often perform entirely different movements, and the brain must tell each hand what to do. By learning separate hand coordination, you stimulate several different areas of the brain. Practice each hand separately, and then combine the movements of each hand.

2. Piano playing increases hearing awareness. Not everyone is born with a good sense of pitch, but people can develop it through exposure and practice. When you play piano, you train your ear to hear pitches and tones in relation to one another. This makes developing a sense of relative pitch possible. Intervals stimulate your mind in slightly different ways. A perfect fifth will cause one reaction in your brain, while a seventh will cause an entirely separate reaction. This trains the mind to recognize pitches and intervals, even if beneath the level of the concious mind.

3. Sight reading offers the brain another workout, as the eyes must follow the music while the hands play it. The ability to sight read is similar to knowing a foreign language, yet also requires extreme hand-eye coordination. The eye muscles are also strengthened as they move up and down the staff across the page.

4.The analysis of musical passages and learning the theory involved is another mental exercise when you play piano. It’s brain food at its finest. Chords, melodies, and changes are all rooted in complex musical theory. It pays dividends to learn and understand how music is put together.

5. Piano playing increases social participation. When you play piano in the presence of others, you are participating in a valuable social exercise. History is filled with participants and spectators in the world of music. You have the ability to make others’ time more enjoyable. You also meet other musicians who can share knowledge with you, expanding your understanding of the piano.

6. Proper piano playing, whether done for leisure or profession, keeps the fingers nimble. It strengthens all the muscles of the hands, which helps in other lines of work. A maintenance man with strong hands is more valuable than one with weak digits.

7. Besides all this, piano playing is great fun. It lets you create your own tune for the day. The piano has provided society with over a hundred years of enjoyment and will do so for hundreds more. It’s not only an instrument; it’s a social communication tool and a brain exercise, as well. Play piano for your brain. It’s lot more fun than Sudoku, and it’s great at parties.

Here’s a 30-second video about the “Crash Course In Exciting Piano Playing”. It’s amazing how much information they packed into 30 seconds — see what you think when you click on the link below:

“Crash Course In Exciting Piano Playing”