Heidi’s Piano Studio: Learning to Play Hymns - Piano Practice Steps for Success

Learning to play hymns is a goal for most of my piano students who belong to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (LDS), or at least that's the aim their parents are hoping they will achieve.

Learning to Play Hymns, LDS Hymns Piano, Practice Steps for Success

Before jumping into the regular hymn book, I first have students play hymn lead sheet style in the simplified hymn book.

Interval and Pattern Recognition

Hymn playing can be more challenging than some lyrical pieces because of the thicker musical texture. The 4 part harmonies in hymn playing require fluent interval recognition, and spotting chord patterns quickly definitely helps speed up sight reading instead of having to read every single note in isolation. Marking patterns in music consistently with erasable colored pencils can help students sightread complex music more easily.

Write Fingering in the Music

To create a legato melody line, pianists often encounter a lot of finger crossings, expansions and substitutions. It is important to become familiar with the steps for choosing fingering to create legato lines, and choose fingering that you use with consistency.

Practice Continuity

I learned from an awkward experience that if an accompanist starts, stops, or hesitates, it can be quite an embarrassing experience in front of a congregation of hundreds of people!

When I was just out of high school, I was asked to play the organ for church services. Most hymns have simple repeating verses, but when I didn't notice the middle repeat in Scatter Sunshine and jumped back to the beginning it was hard to get back on track with hundreds of people singing a different melody than what I was playing!😕

Practicing with a metronome or playing along with the sacred music app can help prepare you for the pressure situation of accompanying because it makes starts and stops in your practice more obvious.

Practice the Suggested Intro

The hymn book has suggested intros marked with brackets above the measures. Often the suggested introduction for a hymn is the first or last phrase, but with hymns that suggest combining measures from the beginning and end, it's important to prep the "jump" in advance so you don't have an awkward pause trying to find the rest of the intro.