I mentioned in an earlier post that I’m learning how to compose my own music by learning chords and rhythmic patterns.  In the Play Piano Today course, he shows you how to play the piano to accompany vocals — meaning the piano is accompaniment and the vocalist carries the melody.

Since I’m interested in playing different arrangements of hymns for prelude music in church, I’m taking what I’ve learned from the course and adapting it a bit. I created my own arrangement of one of my favorite hymns.

First, I went through the piece and identified all the chords, then I used some of the patterns and my own creativity to write my own arrangement. My version of “Know This That Every Soul Is Free” still carries the melody.

Since it would probably take a year to memorize all the patterns, I’ve used them to create my own sheet music, which I can then read and play. Can you tell I’ve never been incredibly patient?

Here’s my version of the sheet music — I don’t imagine it’s perfectly written or timed, but it should be close.

And here’s me playing it a couple times through on my old upright (circa 1910):

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