Hello and welcome! I'm Joseph Hoffman and by the end of this lesson you'll know
how to play "Everything is Awesome" from The Lego Movie.
Let's come to the piano to get started.
First I'll just play through it once and you can just watch,
and then we'll start learning it.
Now, first I'm going to show you how to play the right hand part which is the melody,
and if that's all you want to learn that's totally fine!
For those who want the extra challenge of learning the left hand part,
I'll show you that in the second half of the video.
So first off on your own piano, just take your right hand
and let's find what I call the F major pentascale.
This song is in F major so you'll have an F
but you can play with your finger 1, your thumb.
1, 2 on G, 3 on A, and then your finger 4 is on this B-flat.
Normally we'd have a B right here, but in F major it becomes B-flat and then your finger 5
your pinkie is up on C. So just make sure your fingers feel comfortable there.
To get your finger 4 on that black key, you might slide into the keys a little bit,
and just try playing each note 1 2 3 4 5.
And so I might finger numbers today and so just remember your thumb is 1
and it goes up from there. So your finger 4 actually gets the first note,
and we have five B-flats in a row for ♫Everything is awesome!♫
And on that last syllable it just steps down to A. 4 4 4 4 3. Now you try.
Good, now as you're learning and practicing this song,
I highly encourage you to sing along as you play,
because the words of the song will help you remember
how the notes go. So, again as you're playing
go ahead and sing along ♫Everything is awesome!♫ Now try it one more time.
Now notice with me for a second in the music you'll see this curved line which
connects 'awesome' to this dotted half note. That dotted half note lasts for
3 beats, so when you go ♫Everything is awesome!♫ 1 2 3
you have to wait 3 beats there,
and then you'll see this black rectangle that's called a half rest,
and that means silence for 2 beats, so while your left hand is playing,
you'll wait for 2 beats. 1 2
and then we go on to ♫Everything is cool♫
Notice that that's five more B-flats in a row, so you try now.
Good, then after ♫Everything is cool♫
then notice these next three notes all step down.
♫when your part♫, which is 3 2 1. Now you try.
Good, now lets' keep going we're going to start on,
♫when you're part of a team.♫
and in finger numbers that would be, 3 2 1 2 3 2 Now you try now
Now let's connect that what came right before.
♫Everything is cool when you're part of a team♫
or in finger numbers we have 4 4 4 4 4 3 2 1 2 3 2
Now you try.
Good, and going on we have ♫Everything is awesome!♫ This time it goes up,
4 4 4 4 4 5
Now you try.
and then we have this eighth rest,
which means to just have sounds for half of a beat,
and then your finger 1 is going to have to slide down here to
middle C on your piano ♫When we're liv♫
and then notice my finger 3 is gonna come back up to this original F major pentascale.
1 1 3, so practice that,
it's kind of a little shift you have to do there, 1 1 3. Now you try.
Again you're going from C C up to A with your finger 3.
1 1 3. Try again.
Good, now let's go on, 1 1 3 3 2 1 1
Now you try.
♫When we're living our dream.♫
Try again.
Good, now let's back up and notice some of these
ties, remember this curved line that connects two of the same note
is called a tie, so like here on 'team', ♫cool when you're part of a team.♫
1 2, this time it's a half note without a dot,
and a regular half note without a dot or just a half note, lasts for 2 beats. So you go
♫cool when you're part of a team♫ 1 2, ♫Everything is awesome♫ 1 2 3
Why 3 beats? That's right once again we have a dotted half note.
Dotted half notes get 3 beats, and then that quick rest. Rest, ♫When we're living our dream.♫
So listen to the whole thing that far from the start.
♫Everything is awesome!♫ 1 2 3 1 2
♫Everything is cool when you're part of a team.♫ 1 2
♫Everything is awesome!♫ 1 2 3 rest, ♫When we're living our dream.♫ rest, rest.
Okay, so we notice that sometimes I'm counting 1 2 3, sometimes I'm
counting 2 beats for the rest.
Those counts will really help you keep the correct rhythm of the song.
Now, I'd like you to go ahead and pause the video so you can practice this section.
By the way, in a link below this video
you can find the sheet music, which I highly recommend getting.
It will make it a lot easier and faster for you to learn this.
So, pause to practice on your own, then press play to go on.
Okay, so we just played ♫When we're living our dream.♫ Then we get another half rest.
You'll recall that means 2 beats 1 2.
Then down in measure eight, another half rest 1 2, so two more beats,
and now we have the melody again, but you'll notice this time we have a chord.
These two notes stack together means to play two notes at the same time.
We're playing this F and the B-flat at the same time
to make it even more powerful.
♫Everything is awesome!♫ Notice on 'awesome' you just hold your thumb on that F.
♫Everything is awesome!♫ Now you try.
Good, once again we hold that for 3 beats, ♫Everything is awesome!♫ 1 2 3 1 2 for the rest.
and then once again we have this same chord of F and B-flat,
♫Everything is cool when you're part of a team.♫
Now you try.
♫when you're part of a team.♫ is the same
as before so the only new thing now is really that we're adding this F on the bottom.
for ♫Everything is cool when you're part of a team.♫
Now your turn to try it one more time.
Good, and then once again we have this same chord this F and the B-flat
♫Everything is awesome!♫
Now you try.
Good, and then once again our thumb's going to come down here to this middle C
♫When we're♫ and then finger 3 comes up to A,
♫When we're living our dream.♫ Rest, rest, now you try.
Now, to finish it out, we end with this high F
and I like to use when I'm gonna
play note really strong I like to use my finger 3, and sometimes I'll even
brace it together with my finger 1 and just drop nice and strong onto that.
♫When we're living our dream.♫ 1 2 plunk!
Great! Now that is how to play "Everything is Awesome"
using your right hand. If you
feel good about that and want to stop there, perfectly fine.
If you'd like the extra challenge of learning the left hand part,
that can make it sound really cool the left hand's doing actually a fairly simple pattern.
This is called a fifth in music
when you're the distance of five notes apart like this, one two three four five,
music you count the bottom note as one, so this is a fifth and so you can use
your finger 5 and 1 and just go back and forth
and if you do kind of this gentle rocking motion,
that's, you know, kind of a pro-tip you
know you'll see professional pianist using their wrists a lot like that
rather than trying to use only finger motion, just kind of rocking back and forth
will help you stay really relaxed as you do that.
So, just try this motion with me.
Finger 5 and 1.
Here's my middle C so you're gonna come down an octave
and that will make it sound cooler, right?
That doesn't sound quite as cool as this, right?
So find this place on your piano, and just practice this rocking motion.
Back and forth.
Okay, pause the video if you want some extra time with that,
but otherwise let's notice something in the music here.
Up above the staff you've got these chord symbols.
Chord symbols are just letters that tell you what chord is being used,
and so that will be a clue to you
where your left hand needs to move. You'll notice in this first measure
'Everything is awesome!',
you have that F up there which tells you you're going to be
doing this F chord.
Bottom note is how we name chords we name them by the bottom notes.
So this is an F chord, then you'll notice in the next measure you see a C
so you're going to come down to this low C
and play the C chord, again it's a fifth, you're just going back and forth.
So you have F, 2 3 4
C, 2 3 4
back to F, 2 3 4
C, 2 3 4
Okay, now pause the video and I want you to just practice going back and forth.
The back and forth happens four times in every measure,
because we have 4 beats per measure,
which is based on the signature,
which if you know about music theory that's great you know what I'm
talking about. If not don't worry. All you need to know is there are 4 beats per
measure which means you're going to go 1 2 3 4, You're doing that pattern of back
and forth 4 times 1 2 3 4 and then 1 2 3 4
1 2 3 4
and the trick is to be able to do it without a pause.
You don't want: 1 2 3 4, 1
you know, music doesn't give you that time to shift you just have to kind of
make it instantly. Listen, 1 2 3 4
1 2 3 4
1 2 3..
It needs to happen pretty smoothly, so your hand has to shift between those two postitions
fairly quickly. Pause the video to work on that pattern and those shifts,
and then press play we'll go on.
Now let's take a look at how we would put the two hands together.
You'll notice at the start the right hand is playing but the left hand just has this rest,
so the left hand should hang out, but it should already be in position.
So with both hands in position the right hand starts, 'Everything is', and then on the
next note that's where the left hand starts its pattern 'awesome!' 2 3 4
then switch.
♫Everything is cool♫ Now you notice I'm playing it kind of slow.
That's really helpful when you're first putting something hands together just go way slow.
♫awesome!♫ 2 3 4 1
2 ♫Everything is cool when you're part of a team.♫
Notice right there, 'part of a team', switch.
So right after 'team' is where the left hand goes down to that C chord.
'part of the team.', switch.
'Everything is', and that's as far as we've gone.
Now, if you want to pause and practice that hands together you can.
Or if you want to just wait till later to put it hands together,
we can go on and take a look at this next chord the left hand does
after the C chord in measure five we go down to a B-flat chord.
So your finger 5, it's gonna play B-flat, your finger 1 is on this F.
1 2 3 4, now you try.
Good, and then it shifts back to C, 2 3 4, then back to F, 2 3 4.
Now notice here in measure eight we finally have something different. We play these two low C's.
and again, use your finger 1 and 3 together in kind of a brace to
make that note extra strong. 1 2 3 4, boom, boom.
Or if you just want to use finger 5 that's fine,
but I find that doesn't make it as strong as if I use a finger 3. Okay?
But, let's go back and look at that hands together from measure five we have,
♫awesome!♫
Switch, ♫When we're living our dream♫, 1 2, boom, boom.
And you know, making that shift down and doing the brace may again be too much to worry about.
Feel free to just use finger 3 or finger 5, whatever is the most comfortable.
Okay? So, let's look at the rest. Then the right hand comes in
with these chords ♫Everything is awesome!♫ 2 3 4, switch,
♫Everything is cool when you're part of a team.♫
♫Everything is awesome!♫
♫When we're living our dream.♫
Rest, rest, boom.
And that's it!
Of course at first you're going to go pretty slow,
and then as you get more and more comfortable you'll go up to the full speed.
Etc.
Nice work today learning "Everything is Awesome".
I hope you enjoyed learning with me, and if you did,
I hope you'll check out some of my other videos too.
Thanks for watching, and happy practicing!
I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to be playing on Mr. Hoffman's piano right now.
I'm gonna have to report you---
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Oh man, hey wait!