My Childhood Love for Music
I’ve always loved music. For as long as I can remember, I was creating songs and coming up with different tunes in my head. When I was little, I had an iPod Touch where I recorded voice memos of the songs I made up. In elementary school, I learned to play the ukulele, which was my only instrument for a long time. But I always dreamed of playing the piano.
Piano Lesson
In the summer of 2023, a close mentor who plays piano decided to teach me. We had only three short lessons where she threw the beginnings of music theory at me (major/minor scales, chords, inversions), and then basically told me to go figure out the rest on my own.
Practice
At home, I would spend hours on my keyboard, practicing scales, discovering chords, and experimenting until I found sounds I liked. After practicing for at least two hours a day for two months, I could play pieces like “Bohemian Rhapsody” by Queen, “City of Stars” from La La Land, “Gymnopédie No.1” by Erik Satie, and Beethoven’s “Moonlight Sonata”.
A New Language
What I love most about learning piano is realizing its overall simplicity. What once sounded complex and indistinguishable became familiar scales, chords, and notes as I played. Piano feels like a new language—one that allows me to express emotions I couldn’t put into words. The best songs are those that are dynamic, with dramatic peaks of emotion and quieter moments where feelings simmer. This contrast in music reflects the complexity of human emotion: how we can feel pain and joy simultaneously.
Letting Go of Perfection
While the idea of learning piano originally seemed difficult, I decided to get over any pressure to be perfect, and instead just have fun going through the process.
