MY PIANO

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Yippee...tomorrow happens to be the day I clock a quarter of a century. So I have decided to talk about one of the many things that have helped shape the past 15 years of my life. My easily accessible memory of me playing the keyboard was as a 9 year old kid in Sierra Leone.
The picture above is my piano. It's an all white Yamaha Portable Grand DGX-650 about two years old now. It has a range of functions aside it been weighted keys. Personally, all I care about is the fact that the keys are weighted like I mentioned. The tone color of such pianos are way more amazing than those with softer keys. It has a sustain pedal too which can prolong or shorten the duration of a note played on it depending on the configuration. Okay, enough of that.
When I started playing the piano, I learnt playing short melodic phrases with just a finger initially. When I was 10, I moved to Ghana where a brother(from another mother), James who was way older started tutoring me classically using Smallwood's Tutor. I managed to learn the basics but stopped at a point. But not before I had grasped fingering, playing with both hands and other techniques. This is why I tell people you don't have to finish a practical music tutoring text before you can play the piano. I returned to Nigeria by late 2002 and started playing gradually in my youth church. I learnt a lot from watching others play then going back home to practice what I could remember. Trust me, scoring by ear is harder than sight playing from a sheet music. I realized this as I began to listen to more contemporary songs and did more of ear-scoring. Eventually at some point when I was in the university in 2011, I decided to go back to learning Smallwood, completing excercises till I got tired once again. At least this time, I got to half of the book before abandoning it.
So my sojourn in the music world has revolved around playing the piano. I learnt to write songs, direct a choir and many other things just because I could play the piano. These days I play a little bit classical, a lot of jazz and more of contemporary black gospel chords. Playing the piano has immensely been so much fun. I'm still learning a lot, I have a couple of videos out there though. You can check me @hekins on Instagram. I wish I could post a few here.....anyways in a few hours, it'll be my birthday. So kindly wish me a 'Happy Birthday'. I'd appreciate that.....Let's steam on..!!