Learning how to play piano like a pro is much easier than you might think. You can study for years to learn the classical repertoire of the masters. Or, you can learn how to fake piano playing! Not everyone can practice for hours every day and it is important to have an appropriate balance in music when you start your studies.
Of course, there is work involved to gain the basic skills and understanding to play the music you are interested in. But, you do not need to drive yourself crazy with endless hours of tedious practice. Check out these magic piano hacks and learn how to fake being good at piano today!
4 chords make a rockstar
Many famous songs from the last 100 years or so use only four chords. This phenomenon is so ubiquitous that the Australian band Axis of Awesome did a medley performance of over 35 songs that use the same four chords!
Fortunately for you, these four chords can be played with just the white keys on the piano. No crazy math to remember, no confusing chord shapes, just basic finger positions are all you will need to instantly play literally hundreds of songs. You will sound like you know how to play piano like a pro!
The four chords are C major, G major, A minor, and F major. Check these piano chord hacks out on the piano:
C major:
G major:
A minor:
F major:
You can practice playing these four chords with your left and right hand separately. Once you feel comfortable with that, try playing them with both hands at the same time. You can then try playing the root note with your left hand while playing the chord with your right hand. The root note is the main letter name of the chord. For example, the root note of C major is C, the root note of A minor is A, etc. This is a quick and easy way to learn how to fake being good at piano.
After that, try to switch it up and play the chord with your left hand and the root note with your right hand. Once you can do all of those things, you will have gained enough skill to create some patterns of your own! You are one step further on your journey to learn how to fake piano playing.
Lead sheet notation
One of the simplest piano chord hacks is lead sheet notation. Lead sheet notation, or fake book notation, is a short-hand method of notation that simplifies complex pieces of music into basic bits. A lead sheet generally includes one line of melody, notated in treble clef, with chord symbols notated above. Here is an example of lead sheet notation:
Learning how to read lead sheet notation is not very complicated and will allow you to instantly access hundreds of songs that would otherwise require more difficult and advanced reading skills. It is an easy trick to learn how to fake piano playing. Using these piano hacks will give you quick and amazing fake piano skills that will make piano playing fun and also impress your friends and family!
You can often play lead sheet music with the 4 simple chords you just learned. Some examples of lead sheet notation even have the note names written in the melody, which simplifies the music even further.
Simple soloing hack
Once you learn these four chords and feel comfortable playing them around in different ways, try these magic piano hacks for amazing piano solos. It is so simple, you will be amazed. If you combine all the notes of the 4 chords, you can make a scale. Let’s move through it slowly. C major is spelled C – E – G. A minor is spelled A – C – E. G major is spelled G – B – D. F major is spelled F – A – C. This is a great way to improve your piano technique and apply your fake piano skills in some context.
Excluding repeated notes, when we combine the pitches from these four chords we have C – D – E – F – G – A – B. This is called the C major scale! If you play it on the piano, you will find that it is literally just the white keys on the keyboard. So, if you play around with these four chords in your left hand and play around with this scale in your right hand, you will instantly sound like a legitimate pianist!
Tying it all together
Learning how to fake being good at piano is not rocket science. There are simple and easy secrets to sounding like an accomplished pianist without having to spend hours and hours studying and practicing. These simple steps to fake piano skills include:
- Learning piano chord hacks with a few basic chords C major, A minor, F major, and Gmajor
- Learning to read lead sheet notation, which consists of a melody notated in treble clef with chord symbols written above.
- Learn how to play the C major scale, or the collection of all white keys that outline the simple four chords you learned
- Combine all of these elements, have fun, and be confident and you will sound great!
Best of all, Skoove is here to help you on your journey to piano greatness. Whether you are a beginner with no experience or an intermediate student looking to expand your skills and have some fun playing piano, Skoove’s learn piano app for every style and schedule. So if you want fake piano skills or want to learn how to play piano like a pro, check out our 7 day free trial and see how much fun you will have today!
Author of this blog post
Eddie Bond is a multi-instrumentalist performer, composer, and music instructor currently based in Seattle, Washington USA. He has performed extensively in the US, Canada, Argentina, and China, released over 40 albums, and has over a decade experience working with music students of all ages and ability levels.
