How To Build A 'MELODIC' Left Hand Piano Pattern... In 5 Steps

Welcome to Creative Piano Academy with me, Joseph Saikora, and we are here, part two. I'm so excited about this video because this is where you're going to get to see how we layer up that left-hand piano pattern from scratch, so you can see exactly how you can start out with something nice and simple, layer it up in stages to something that sounds way more melodic, way more interesting, and you can then apply those techniques to your own left-hand patterns. Let's quickly remind ourselves of what we're actually learning here. Now, remember, you need to have that right hand nailed, so do check out part one if you haven't seen that yet. So, this is how to build up a left-hand piano pattern from scratch. I've just got to do the intro, you know, roll it, whatever. You know how it works. It's that time again, guys. You know, you want more videos like this, don't you? More simple techniques to become better pianists, so smash that subscribe button, as well as that little bell thingy next to it, so you know when I upload new videos. But that is enough of that. Let's go. Glasses. All right, guys, so welcome back to this little mini-series we're doing, where I'm showing you something really nice, really beautiful. Now, make sure you've gone over part one before this video. Very rarely do I have these videos where, you know, you have to go through another video before you start this one, but for this one, I really do recommend you go through part one, you learn that right hand, and you get somewhat comfortable with it. So, this is the final product. Check this out. So, that's the piece of music, the little loop that we're going to play. So, let's get straight on with this. We'll dive into that left hand, and we'll start off with stage one. I did hint at this, I did show you this at the end of part one, just so you had something to kind of anchor it, but we'll go over it again in this video, just to make sure you've got it maybe a little bit more in depth. But here, your left hand wants to come in on each one, each first beat of the bar. So, if I count you in, for instance, that goes one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four. So, those first two notes, we've got an A flat and an E flat, okay? You can use your second finger or your third finger, it's entirely up to you. I tend to use my second finger here. So, here we go. Counting in again, three, four, one, and two, three, four, and one, two, and three, and four, and. Now, the next note, we've got a B flat here. So, it's one, two, and three, and four, and C, two, and three, and four, and. So, that's our left hand. That's, you know, that's all you're doing. Just four notes on the beat, job done. Complicated bit comes when we add the right hand, because remember, we've got a funky little timing rhythm here. So, let's try this from the beginning. So, we've got three, and four, and one, and two, and three, and four, and one, and two, three, and four, and. Okay? So, that's parts one and two. So, all sections one and two. One, and two, and three, and four, and one, and two, and three, and four, and B flat. 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and... 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and... OK? Now, this can sound really nice just on its own, OK? This is the very basics of the left hand. But if I play it together with the pedal and with a little bit of emotion for you... OK? So it doesn't sound as nice as the full-blown piece, but it's definitely something. And if you are a relative beginner at the piano, then, you know, you can just stop there and that'll be a really nice piece of music for you. But anyway, so that's Stage 1. Now, if you were intrigued by how I was adding that emotion in, I do have another video on that called How to Add Emotion and Passion into Your Playing. Something like that. I'll put it in the cards. You can check that out. It's got some really nice sort of entry-level ideas for you as to how you can add that emotion in. So check that out if you want to. Stage 2. Now, this is where we get a little bit more interesting. We add a bit more harmony in here. Now, I must stress, you have to... don't attempt Stage 2 unless you're comfortable with Stage 1. This is in stages, you know, you need to be comfortable with the previous stage before you move on. Just, you know, building up those layers, OK? So, Stage 2. Instead of playing single notes, like this, we're going to bring in power chords. Simple as that, really, OK? So we're going to look at the 5th note above this Ab, which is an Eb here. You can use your thumb. So now you can get into this power chord position. And you just set yourself into that position and just move it around to where you need to. So we've got an Ab and Eb. That's chord 1. And then we've got Eb and Bb. That's chord 2. Bb and F, like this. That's chord 3. And then C and G, which is chord 4. OK? So I'm not going to stress about this and go over it in lots of detail again, because it's pretty much the same as Stage 1, except you're adding in that extra little note at the top. So if I play it for you, with the timing... 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1. OK? Without me yapping over the top. OK, so that was Stage 2. Now make sure you're comfortable with that. Then we'll move on to Stage 3. This is where it begins to take shape, OK? So this is where we start to sound like a piece of music. It starts to sound a little bit more professional. So what we're going to do is take this power chord here, spread it out. We're going to add this top note in as well, OK? And we're going to spread these notes. So we're not just going to play it as a block, like this. We're going to spread them out. OK? So we're going to go 1 and 2, like that. 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4. So just like we played these power chords here, and we've added this A flat at the top, same with the E flat here. So we've got this power chord, bringing that E flat at the top. So we've got 1 and 2 and 3 and 4, OK? And you're coming in on beat 1 as well, on each time. 1 and 2, OK? So this time we've got this B flat at the top, on this B flat. So B flat, F, B flat. And then C, G, C, like that. OK? So we've got 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4. Now incidentally, this is where we're beginning to use more common left hand pattern techniques because breaking up power chords like this, you know... this kind of stuff... is all really common left hand pattern techniques. I am planning on doing more videos about this, you know. There's just so many ideas for videos. It just keeps... Every time I do a video, I have two more videos like, Oh, I could do this, I could do that. Anyway, bear in mind, now we're into proper left hand pattern stuff. So, if I put that together for you... OK? Now on this B flat here, you might notice... we're sharing this note here. So our thumb comes here, our thumb comes here. Just get used to it here. OK? You can still play it. No problem. OK. So that was stage 2-3. That was stage 3. Yeah, stage 3. Now we're on to stage 4. So again, make sure you're comfortable with stage 1, 2 and 3 before we move on to stage 4. So stage 4, I mean, I'm going to link to another video of mine as well. You know, it's going to feel like one of those videos where I just link to every other video. But, you know, everything's all connected. That was my ambition for the YouTube channel. So, check out the video I did called... I think it was a left hand pattern called... Iron Audi... Get Your Iron Audi On. Something like that. This will be really helpful for you for this particular stage. Because what we're going to do is, instead of just playing our power chords like this... We're going to bring this thumb up to the C, alright? Now that might seem like a really big stretch for you. So if I play it... Like this, OK? And it is. It is quite, you know, if you're not used to it, that is a big stretch, OK? But the trick to this, or the key to this, is to roll that wrist, OK? We don't want to be, like, hopping like this. We want to nicely sort of roll our wrist. And notice how, if I roll like this, and I've got my pedal down as well, it doesn't matter. I can hold this down. I'm holding this down with my pedal. And then notice when I turn my wrist, my thumb has that space to come forward to that C, OK? So I'm going here. Alright? So that's our pattern one. OK, so instead of this, that was stage three. Now we're onto stage four. And this is where, you know, we've got that third note at the top here. Notice how a third is the C here. We've got that third, which gives it its major sound, OK? We use the third note to tell us whether it's major or minor. So now we've got a proper harmony going on, as opposed to just this, which is a power chord. Power chords could be major or minor, depending on what other stuff's going on. Now... Boom! We're saying we've got a major chord here. So here we go. That's chord number one. Then we're going to move to chord number two, which is E-flat, B-flat and G, like that. OK? So same again, you can turn that wrist. So we've got here, two, three, four, one, two, three, four. And then we move to the B-flat. OK? So that's one and two and three and four and. So that's a D at the top. So this was our power chord. That was our power chord with the octave. Now we've got this D. So now we're on to chord four, which is technically C minor, but because of what the right hand's doing, this is going to be slightly different, OK? So chords one, two and three, we basically used our nice triads, like this, just spread out. With this one now, with C, I'm going to keep this D at the top, and you'll see why when I bring the right hand in. Just in this particular piece, in this particular instance, that D just sounds beautiful over the fourth chord. So here, that's all we're doing, which is a C add nine chord. OK? And if you're wondering, it's the ninth, because one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. OK? We're adding in that ninth note above that. OK. So our full sequence goes like this. One, two, three, four. So now I'm going to bring the right hand in, and you can hear how adding in those third notes at the top, that major or minor sound, adds so much to the overall sound. OK? So check this out. There you go. And you can also hear on this C... how that D, just that D at the top instead of the E flat, that D just adds that beautiful sense of tension that I think sounds really nice. And that's the only reason I've put it in. That, and it's quite difficult to actually... like, my hands are getting caught up there, so I had no choice, really. That's the real reason. OK. Again, make sure you're comfortable with stage one, two, three, and four. Now we're going to bring in some timing in the left hand. So this is where it starts to get really complicated. If you are struggling with this, please do not stress out. Don't worry about it. Just keep at all those previous stages and have a go at this when you're ready. OK? So, what we're going to do is, it's the same as stage four, pretty much, except what we're going to do is we're going to play that top note twice. But there's a specific timing to it. OK? So here... So if I put a count to that... So it comes on the and of three each time. OK. So, I mentioned this in the other video as well. Another video for you in the cards. Three rhythm exercises you will love to hate. This video is full of exercises that you can do away from the piano just to practice getting your timing, getting your sense of rhythm up. So that will really help you for this. So, speed that up. One, and two, and three, and four, and one, and two, and three, and four, and one, and two, and three, and four. Now, you need to get used to that timing first. But when I bring that right hand in, the reason why we've got this specific rhythm is it brings like... it adds to that sense of melody that the right hand's got as well in certain places. Now, I'll play it, and then I'll point those out for you. So here... OK. So particularly with this B chord here. OK? With this B flat chord. Listen to this. OK? So my thumb at the top is adding to that sense of melody in the right hand as well. If I was going to do that in just the right hand, it would be like... Yeah? But my left hand can come in and do that for me. And it adds that really nice melodic interest at the top. So that's about it, guys. We've got five stages there of how to build up a left-hand pattern. Granted, I'm going to hold my hands up and say, you know, that right hand isn't particularly easy to play. But, you know, I was so excited about this piece, and I just wanted to throw it out to you guys and see if you could grapple with it. And I think there's a tremendous amount of value in here so you can see exactly how a left-hand pattern's built up. And it also gives you a bit of a challenge to put that right hand in with it. And hopefully, you really like this piece of music and it gives you some inspiration to sort of take it in different directions, make it your own, just play around with those different notes. In part one, I showed you that E-flat major chord. Sorry, E-flat major scale. Get used to that because you can play any notes within that scale and you can play around with that and put it in and just create different kinds of melodies. And you should be good to go. So again, I enjoyed creating this piece of music and playing it, so hopefully you will too. Back to me. Okay, guys, I really hope you've enjoyed this video as well as part one. And don't forget, you know, try not to get overwhelmed because I'm fully aware there's a lot in these two videos. You know, we're looking at right hand patterns, we're looking at timing, quite an intricate timing in the right hand, left and right hand together, so there's hand coordination in there. And then we're looking at building up that left hand pattern. So in just two videos, there's so much to go over. The videos are going to be there forever for you, so keep going to that stage that you're comfortable with and then, when you're ready, move on and just keep revisiting. Do let me know if you're enjoying it in the comments below. Head to creativepianoacademy.com for my latest premium video. At the time of this video, it's all about the best adult practice plan, so grab yourself a copy of that. Like the video if you liked it, subscribe to the channel and I will see you, I will see you in the next video.