Tell that to the harpsichord or lute.

I took twelve years of piano starting at age forty.

That was when two of my three kids and my wife also took.

We practiced on my Fender Rhodes piano and another electronic keyboard until we bought a Yamaha baby grand.

The third kid took pedal steel lessons and I taught him guitar and bass.

My oldest son plays guitar, piano and bass, but taught himself drums with some help from drummers that have passed through my band over the years

He's drummed a few times at gigs with me and is very good.

With practice and steady gigging he could play with almost anyone.

My daughter was a nanny for several families and she started several of their kids on piano and then supervised their practice time when they moved on to a professional piano teacher.

I've played bass in working bands since the late fifties and still play gigs two or three times a month.

I use my keyboard skills for pleasure and digitally recording sequenced tracks that we use to thicken our sound when we perform.

For example, on the chukka-chuk muted guitar part on the Reggae tune "Stir It Up" and the brass on such as "25 or 6 to 4" bt Chicago or "Crazy in Love" by Beyonce.

We play other bass, drum, keyboard and guitar parts along with the sequencer and also sing the vocals.

We do this on maybe ten songs a night to produce a bigger sound.

We also perform "Chicago's "Colour My World" using the sequencer to play the piano arpeggios and the flute solo, while we play the bass, drums, organ and the guitarist sings.

Another song we sequence is John Waite's "Missing You," but our girl vocalist does the Tina Turner version with my digital recording providing the synthesizier sounds and extra percussion parts.

All thr sequenced sounds just mix in with what we are playing live on our instruments and I doubt anyone listening realize anything different is going on and it all sounds really good and full.



I think piano playing skills are very valuable.

Piano lessons still have their place.

I don't think it's dying out, just a lot of modern synthesizer sounds are in use.

Most garage bands don't have a good piano player and they want a guitar driven sound anyway.

But if a band wants to be have a wider palette of sounds, the easiest way is to have a keyboardist and those who can use the skills they've learned from piano lessons on a synthesizer are invaluable.

Our band's keyboardist learned on piano and still plays it a lot on our stuff, but he also has two other keyboards on a rack so he can switch off.

He'll play horn parts on his synthesizer and organ parts through an electronic B3 organ.

Sometimes his right hand will be playing on one board while the other five fingers are playing another one.

In fact, on most songs he plays parts on two or even three different keyboards.



And if we add in some sequenced parts I've recorded.......


Gig 'em, FAST FRED '65.

Before the world wide web, village idiots usually stayed in their own village.

[This message has been edited by FAST FRED (edited 12/15/2009 7:38p).]

Alicia Keys plays the piano all the time in her sets.

And she's a hottie too. Lady Gaga is a troll.

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"Crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentation of their women."



[This message has been edited by TxAginAz (edited 12/15/2009 7:00p).]

B3, Wurlitzer, and Rhodes in rock music.

People forget how much it adds to have a good keys player.

I looked up some of the suggestions in this thread, and I'm glad to see there is still some piano music out there.

I also watched "The Hangover". Ed Helms rocks the Grand with his original "Doug".

My appreciation for piano is renewed. Thanks to all.

Now if I can find some 3 chord Christmas songs!

- Linkin Park

My fave player at the moment: Jem Godfrey of Frost*. Here he is w/ Declan Burke playing "Hyperventilate" from their first album: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3JMIAPIpDg.

I've been putting off relearning to play for way too long (took lessons from 2nd to 6th grade, still can read music). Looking for something to tide me over (Hanon/Czerny exercises and the like) until I'm able to start lessons again.