Music

How to learn piano from scratch

An adult who practises half an hour a day can usually play simple pieces with both hands from sheet music after six months. The hardest part of that road is not the notes but making your hands independent, so the plan is built around that. Below is what to work on month by month, how to learn to read music without misery and what to listen for in a recording.

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Acoustic, digital piano or keyboard#

For practising on your own, a digital piano with 88 weighted keys is the most convenient: it never needs tuning, it plays through headphones, and it feels close to an acoustic. A keyboard with light, unweighted keys is fine for the first months, but your fingers do not build strength on it, and the move to a real keyboard is harder later. If you have an old acoustic piano, have a tuner look at it once — an out-of-tune instrument makes it hard to hear your own mistakes.

Posture: sit on the front half of the bench, elbows slightly above the keys, hand rounded as if holding a small ball, shoulders down. If your shoulders or neck are tired after practice, you are playing with tension — take a break and change how you sit.

Month 1: the keyboard and the treble clef#

Find all the C's on the keyboard: each sits just to the left of a group of two black keys. From there it is easy to count out the other white keys. Learn the notes on the staff straight away — first the treble clef for the right hand, then the bass clef for the left. Do not pencil note names into your music: labels stop you from learning to read.

Play the right-hand five-finger position starting on middle C, each finger over its own key. Simple melodies in this position let you think only about notes and rhythm, not about moving your hand. Count out loud — "one-and, two-and" — a counting habit saves you later in pieces with rests.

Months 2–3: both hands and the bass clef#

Hand independence develops slowly. The method: first each hand separately until it plays confidently, then hands together at half tempo, two bars at a time. If you slip, do not start the piece over — repeat that exact bar five times in a row without a mistake. That way the hard spots stop being hard, and the easy ones do not get overplayed at the expense of everything else.

Add the C major and A minor scales, hands together, one octave, with the correct fingering: tucking the thumb under is the foundation of fluent playing. Three to five minutes of scales at the start of practice is enough.

Months 4–6: pieces, chords and accompaniment#

Get a collection of easy beginner pieces — children's albums by classical composers suit adults too. At the same time, learn chords: the triads on the main degrees of a key and a simple accompaniment for a melody. Being able to play along to a song from chord symbols brings a lot of joy and motivation to keep going.

Theory helps directly here: once you know that a major triad is a major third plus a minor third, you can build the chord from any key. The basics are in ear training and music theory.

How to structure a 30-minute session#

  • 5 minutes — a scale and a finger exercise.
  • 15 minutes — the new piece: hard bars separately, slowly, with a metronome.
  • 5 minutes — sight-reading an unfamiliar easy melody.
  • 5 minutes — playing something you can already play, just for fun.

Practice journal and self-check#

In your journal, write the date, what you played, the metronome tempo and one specific note — "bar 12, left hand is late". Once a week, record the piece on your phone and listen with the score in front of you: are the eighth notes even, does the melody come through over the accompaniment, are there any stops? The stage is done when the piece goes from start to finish at the target tempo without stopping twice in a row.

Step-by-step plan

  1. Week 1 — instrument and postureA digital piano or a tuned acoustic, bench height, a rounded hand.
  2. Month 1 — keyboard and treble clefEvery C on the keyboard, reading right-hand notes, the five-finger position, counting out loud.
  3. Months 2–3 — both handsHands separately, then together at half tempo two bars at a time; C major and A minor scales.
  4. Months 4–6 — pieces and chordsA book of easy pieces, triads, accompaniment from chord symbols.

Start learning this in your own space

The plan goes into your repository: tick off stages, keep notes — the change history shows how far you have come.

Start the plan

Check yourself

1.Between which neighbouring white keys is there no black key?

2.How many keys does a standard modern piano have?

3.How many semitones are in a minor third?

Sources

  • musictheory.netFree lessons on reading music and a keyboard note-reading trainer
    free
  • IMSLPA free library of public-domain sheet music, including beginner pieces
    free

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