DHamlinMusic 2 points 1y ago
Pianist here, as someone mentioned someone with more experience would come along eventually. Fortunately I learned to play piano when I could still see, and have been playing piano for over 20 years which does not do you much good regarding how to learn to play. The biggest problem I have run into since losing my sight is reading sheet music, Braille music does exist but I have been having difficulty finding it a source to learn to use it as the Hadley School for the blind offloaded their program on the national library system and the NLS has no clue. Any reasonably competent piano instructor should be able to teach you without needing to be able to see the keys/music, but it probably will be a little slower going then if you could see the keys clearly.
Additionally, I noticed when I attempted to say unfortunately it auto corrected the unoff sorry about that but I am bad at editing so it's going to stay reading that way.
CosmicBunny97 2 points 1y ago
Not a pianist - I tried but didn’t really click - but I recommend getting lessons. However, the way I tend to orient myself is feeling the gaps between the black keys. For example, there’s a gap between B and C that is bigger compared to, say, A and B or C and D. I hope this makes sense.
suitcaseismyhome 2 points 1y ago
Somebody with far more experience will come be along soon I am sure but when I was learning piano as a child I recall a cardboard overlay which had the keys marked on it.
Perhaps if you have still enough vision to make out colours such a thing would exist with colours?
To be honest learning to play the piano was a little bit like learning to use a typewriter so if you can use a keyboard hopefully you can adapt to a piano as well. Good luck!
wonder_wolfie 1 points 1y ago
Feeling for the black keys to see where there are two and where three helped me orient myself the most, other things just come with practice as your feeling for the keyboard improves
QuentinJamesP89 1 points 1y ago
I think getting a teacher is the best route for anyone, visually impaired or not. It's going to be extremely difficult to learn proper technique without a teacher, even more so if you're visually impaired and can't as easily learn from observation. When I started lessons like 28 years ago, I was blind in one eye and low vision in the other but could read enlarged music just fine, so I don't have the experience of learning without sight. I gave lessons for years, though (had to stop when my vision became too bad to easily read the music or see what my students were doing with their hands). Dancing Dots has some helpful resources you could look into as far as enlarging music, since it sounds like that's still an option for you. There's also braille music, which isn't easy, but might still be useful. I know there are a lot of great blind musicians who play/played only by ear, but in general I wouldn't recommend learning solely through audio (especially without a teacher) as I think reading music, and understanding theory are extremely important skills. As far as figuring out the keys and positioning, I suspect you would find that is actually one of the easier skills to acquire without sight. (Decent sighted pianists aren't going to look down much except for large jumps.) The spaces between the black keys can help to orient you, but over time you will develop proprioception through repeated practice, and especially practice of things like intervals, scales and arpeggios, chords (shapes) etc. Even beginners shouldn't be looking at their hands excessively anyway, and good technique and fingering will help with this. Again, a competent teacher will be able to help you with all of this, and really is essential.
bradley22 1 points 1y ago
I don't have any tips but could you look for a teacher?
No-Satisfaction7842 1 points 1y ago
I’ve been wanting to learn piano too. I’m into home recording and I have a bunch of synths that I’m able to hack my way around on but I’d love to be more fluent in actually playing them properly. I called about piano lessons here locally a month ago and the guy seemed really hesitant about working with somebody who was blind. I just want to find a teacher who’s willing to think outside the box and not rely on sight reading.
I would say my knowledge of music theory is somewhere between intermediate and advanced so I don’t think I would have any trouble with the conceptual aspects of it. For me it’s just the coordination, like how do I just throw my hands down across a keyboard 88 keys long and know that I’m going to hit the exact right notes without seeing them?
Kelashara 1 points 1y ago
look up a guy by the name of Bill Brown, he teaches musical instruments by the ear, meaning, that you can learn to play piano by ear, without having to read sheet music, also, he teaches how to play guitar the same way there are many different instruments that he does teach. Also, if you’re a part of the MLS library for the blind, you can find quite a bit of his material up there on the Bard website.