Q: hi bill, your keyboard playing is very inspiring; do you have any tips on how to practice hand independence? it feels quite overwhelming as a process, i'm not exactly sure on how to babystep my way into that. thabks
A: this is actually a relationship for more than 2. your right hand, your left hand, your voice, another person as the bass player, another singer, another person as a guitar/keyboard player, ...... Check around your ensemble (maybe just you) and tally up HOW MANY of those items are in your ensemble. (i listed 6 things, now that i count them). And now, keep in mind that there are maybe only THREE ROLES that those must play, IN TOTAL. not each. Basically it's 3 jobs to do. so think about how many people/things are doing them. If the amount of things/people doing the jobs is more or less than 3, then there will have to be some interesting agreements made. everyone probably can't/shouldn't do all 3 at the same time, unless they are very very coordinated with each other. And yet, on the other hand, if there's only 2 things/people, they will have to juggle the 3 roles. the 3 roles are bass, melody, chords. So let me give you some examples, and my point is that your hands have different jobs depending on the personell situation. so for example: let's say it's just you. and let's say you are using both hands and your voice. that's pretty clear, your left hand takes the bass, your right hand takes the chords mostly, and your voice takes the melody. Well, imagine, instead, that you already have a bass player in the band, and let's say you are NOT singing. In that case, the bass player plays the bass, and YOU will be playing NOT the bass, but the melody and chords -- probably 1 with each hand. This is an entirely different configuration because now you are playing chords with your left hand. Let's imagine a different situation-- let's say you are playing with no bass player, you are not singing, but you have another person who is the singer. In this case, you will be doing bass in left hand and chords on right. Let's look at another example: if it's you on keyboard, and someone else on guitar, and the guitar player is singing. Well, the 2 of you need to come to an agreement and one of you should take care of the bass, and the other should take care of the chords. An important hint is that there should not be more than 1 person taking care of the bass (unless it is written EXACTLY, AND if it's neccesary to be full of BEEF at that particular moment.-- this will only be good for a non-musical sound effect / rumble sound. will not really work musically/tonally.) Also the other combination i forgot to mention is, if you are playing piano by yourself with no other players and not using your voice-- in that case, you will be dividing the 3 roles amongst only TWO players (your 2 hands) so in that case, you sort of have to magically somehow juggle the 3 of them.
So, between different combinations of bass, chords, melody, ... and the players: your left hand, your right hand, and your voice, there are many different combinations for what jobs your hands are going to play. So it's important to take a moment to notice which of these scenarios you are in. And beyond that, the strategy is essentially the same, which is to use your imagination and try to play songs in any possible way you can, because someone's gotta do it