Counting Stars - OneRepublic

'Counting stars' is yet another example of what magic a nice arrangement, -production and - different vocal melodies can do to yet another, mere four chord progression.

In this tutorial I'll show you some various ways of playing them, using some Pop-Piano techniques to both copy the original piano from the record, as to simulate a different instrumental parts and create a unique piano version. 

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Cups – Anna Kendrick. Intertwined ukulele's and the piano part.

Let’s keep it real..

..that ‘cup-beat’ is definitely awesome, but try and do that with a cup, not a piano ;).

What I WILL teach you in this tutorial is how to play that awesome intro which, on the record, is played by multiple ukulele’s (“what the heck is that?” you ask? A tiny guitar.) by showing a cool pattern over the ruling harmony at that moment in the song: the extension-chord C6add9.

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Hey Brother - Avicii

This guy just keeps pumpin' out hits. 

In this lesson I'll show you once more how to use Pop-Piano skills to translate guitar parts to piano and create your own unique piano versions.

Add some vocals (optional) and you're good to shine.

This two part tutorial for 'Hey Brother' features:

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Michael Jackson - Man in the mirror.

Talk about a classic. 

Michael Jackson... yeah.. I'd really like to write a million words, but nothing that I'd jot down would come even close to doing this man the right he deserves.

He touched, moved, brightened, enlightened, brought joy, tears, moved hips and stirred souls, all through his ground-breaking music.

King of pop. Well, let's just say that sounds like someone that might be fun and educational to learn from! Right?

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All of me – John Legend

Yes. This is what being in control of chords and patterns, bringing it back to a fairly basic, but really wonderful piano arrangement means. John Legend is of course a master of the pop-meets-soul-piano-song, and uses the exact methods of playing Pop/Chord/Pattern piano from ‘Hack the Piano‘ to build his beautiful piano songs with. So, for ... Read more

Coldplay - Atlas

And what an absolute magical track this is. As we've seen quite a few times already, Chris Martin (singer and pianist of Coldplay) really knows how to put his chords and patterns to good use. He is a truly marvellous example of a Pop-Pianist.

This new song of theirs, yet again holds a wonderful (and quite extensive, 14 different chords/voicings for just the verse) chord progression using really nice voicings and inversions and a hauntingly beautiful broken-chord pattern.

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Avicii - Wake me up

5 easy chords (just triads with a few inversions used, nothing too advanced here), a killer guitar-strum transformed into a piano pattern and a melodic hook + left hand 'comping' that will seriously challenge and improve your technical skills and voicing-knowledge.

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Cheating - John Newman

This week I have a very nice one for all you up-tempo lovers, blues-piano style lovers, Motown-feel lovers and Northern-soul fans out there.

John Newman, the up and coming rising star (his first hit "Love me again", has already topped the English charts at peak position no. 1, click here for my lesson featuring that song if you missed it earlier), is about to officially release his second single: 'Cheating' in the first week of October 2013.
However, the official music video on youtube has already reached an outrageous 2 million views in just over three weeks time.

Want to be the first to play this song, even before it is officially released? Well, I got just the thing for you right here! :). 

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Bare essential keys to harmony – The free manifesto

Hi to all you piano-lovers and (aspiring) pop-pianists.

Here is my gift, my free manifesto, written and freely downloadable especially for all of you that:

  • Are interested in finding out how Pop-Piano actually works
  • Want to find out what exactly this ‘piano-hacking’ approach is all about
  • Would like to know the way Pop-Pianist and Pop-Musicians think when they play
  • Would like to find out about the Pop-Piano mindset and how to use it to learn piano in the fastest way possible
  • Want to learn the first few chords and tricks that will transform the way you study forever and make your level of playing shoot for the stars

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Roar - Katy Perry

Many of you like her, probably just as many of you don't. However, she's big and she knows how to make her hits.

This lesson teaches those of you that do like her how to play her current biggest hit. For the rest of you it's still a nice exercise of stripping down a monster production and building it back up to a fuller piano-part (chorus).

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bare essential keys to harmony

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