July 9, 2011

I've been asked to take over the piano playing for the Worship Team at my church. I learned to play the piano as a child, taking lessons through most of high school. There were several kids in my class who also took piano lessons. I was one of the kids who took the lessons, but did not do much practicing in between. The other kids who were taking lessons then were much better at playing then I was. I'm sure it was mostly because I did not apply myself and it is something I regret now, but I do know my abilities on the piano are not a hopeless cause.

For many things, I've had to go back to the basics. While I can play most intermediate pieces with some work and practice...some of the basics of music I have forgotten. Like exactly which note is which on the piano keyboard. If the music I'm reading is in the center part of the keyboard I'm OK, but go to high or to low...I have to stop and figure it out going back to basically following the scale...A, B, C, etc. Also the dynamics of when to repeat, skip forward, go back.

I am nervous about doing this, there is no doubt. Playing with people who are singing and also someone on drums and guitar..well, if you goof you can't just stop and restart. Plus, it's probably been over 15 years since I really played the piano regularly. Actually I would guess to say it was over a 15 year time span that I never even played at all! So, talk about being rusty.

I do have a good teacher who is helping me relearn a lot of this. Plus a new found desire to actually play again. And also the fact I will be playing for the joy and praise of worshiping the Lord it makes it much easier to face my fears of playing with a group like this.