Watching someone play piano is mesmerising isn’t it? How on earth do they play with both hands at once and whats more, how do they read music for two different hands at once and produce something so brilliant and beautiful?
For many people who will have attempted to learnt he play the piano or keyboard in their life, they will have been faced with a situation like this:
‘I can play the right hand part perfectly, and the left hand part perfectly on its own. But when I try to put them together, I just can’t do it.’
Experienced pianists have been through the exact same experience at some point in their lives. Sheer determination and practice is the way to learn to play will two hands at once.
There are a number of ways that pianists will learn to deal with playing with both hands.
One method is to focus on the rhythm and timing, they can count out loud, in their head or tap their foot to keep their fingers moving in time to the rhythm. This helps to align notes and to keep the hands moving to reach the same point at the same time.
By breaking the each bar of the written music up into single notes, a pianist will be be able to practice certain parts over and over again.
Ultimately a pianist can play with both hands thanks to hours and hours of practice. Just like you can type on a computer or your phone with two hands whilst not looking. (You start to memorise and know where the keys are before you have hit them.)
There are a huge number of daily activities that we do without thinking about that involve the left and right hand working together in harmony.
This is how a piano player eventually plays fluently with both hands, practice, practice and more practice until it become second nature!