bit.do/billsbook Plenty of people have trouble developing their hand independence (i.e. getting their left and right hands to do different things at the same time on the piano keyboard). In this tutorial I deal with a couple of exercises you can use to develop independence and improve your piano playing. If you’ve ever had any classical piano training, then playing some classical music should be your first port of call. Classical music promotes hand independence since your left hand has to work almost as hard as your right. This makes it impossible to rely solely on your right hand to do all the work. You can also have a go at this series of exercises. If you lean to play these with confidence you should find that your hand independence will improve rapidly. Firstly, try playing a basic 12-bar blues pattern in your left hand. For each beat in the left hand, hit 3 beats on the same chord with your right hand. You could also try increasing the difficulty by playing a slightly more complex pattern with your left hand while keeping the right hand part the same. This is tricky at first, but is a really useful exercise. Even if you’re not particularly interested in playing blues piano, these exercises are brilliant for promoting hand independence. You could also adapt the exercises for rock or pop piano. Just make sure you choose a fairly simple left hand part with a little movement and keep up those rapid chords with your right hand. Focus on precision with your left hand while maintaining the right hand part. If you found this video useful, take a look at some of my other videos (try www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEmjNnRdifw for more hand independence exercises). You might also be interested in my book, How to Really Play the Piano. As well as being full of useful tips on chords and learning basic harmony, it has the second exercise from this video written out in full.

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