It’s kinda hard to say all the numbers at this speed, so you’re off the hook. OK, now we’re gonna take it up to record tempo. Take your time, and have fun! If you can play these rhythms accurately at a slow tempo, you’re gonna sound like a total boss when we speed it up. If you didn’t nail it, go back and do it as many times as you need to until you’ve got it. Clap with me everywhere we’ll be playing notes on the harmonica.Count the beats out loud with your mouth.So there are three things you have to do at the same time: Remember you have to say the words with your mouth, “One and two and three and, One and two and three and…” If you’re not saying the words out loud, then you’re cheating! ? Looking at the chart above, try counting out loud with me nice and slow, and clapping on the beats where we’ll be playing notes. The 1st and 3rd phrases have very similar rhythms, and they are the trickiest to play. The easy way to count eighth notes is simply to add the word “and” in between every number. The fastest notes that we’re gonna play in this song are called eighth notes, which are twice as fast as what we were just counting.
Those notes we were just counting together are called Quarter Notes. Piano man is in 3/4 time, also known as “Waltz Time.” What that means is, in order to count along with the song, you’d repeatedly count to 3 over and over, “ 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3….” Try listening to the song and counting along out loud.
Piano man free how to#
I’m gonna teach you how to nail the exciting rhythms exactly the way that Billy Joel plays them. It’s another thing to be able to play Piano Man in time. It’s one thing to know how to play all the notes of the Piano Man harmonica solo.
Piano man free pro#
The #1 difference between a pro musician and a hack is having a killer sense of time. So sit back, relax, and let’s take a trip through the time of Piano Man… Level 2: Learning the Real Deal Rhythms These are called “double stops.” The nice thing about playing double stops in a song like this is that we can have a chance to play a great song before we even need to learn the technique required to isolate single notes.īut in order for the Piano Man harmonica riff to sound truly great, you have to nail the rhythm of the notes like a boss. You can see that all of the notes are played 2 at a time. Here are the harmonica tabs in C for Piano Man:
(Tip: you can tell how well you know a harmonica song by how well you can sing it.) Tabs are most helpful when you already know a song really well. The not-so-great thing about tabs is that they don’t indicate how long or short to hold each note.
The great thing about harmonica tabs is that they tell you which holes to play in what order. So don’t hesitate to take some time really getting secure in the Deep Relaxed Mouth Position before you tackle this song. In my Beginner to Boss course, we actually do 24 lessons before we get to Piano Man, because I believe it’s so important to develop the right fundamentals from the start, and to avoid picking up bad habits.
Putting it all together and playing Piano Man like a total boss.Įven though Piano Man is a good song for beginners, if today is your very first day playing the harmonica, I’d recommend that you consider first learning the Deep Relaxed Mouth Position.How to play it with single notes, injecting soul and feel with bending.How to play the right rhythms like a ninja master.I’m going to teach you how to play this song in 4 levels: