Andy McKee's "Drifting" - piano solo

Probably because I am not good enough on the guitar to cover it ;-), I thought it would be interesting to adapt to the piano this masterpiece of fingerstyle guitar. I took a couple of liberties with the original piece, but that's only anecdotal. The guitar version is impressive beacause of its visual aspect. With the piano, the whole thing gets much more static. So I chose to improve the visual aspect, by changing camera angles. Since I obvioulsy have only one cam, I had to shoot three times and spend the night on video editing! And you know what? THAT was the biggest challenge.
When I first tried to play Drifting on the piano, I started by playing the tune without trying any tapping whatsoever. It's only after a couple of hours, when I roughly mastered the melody, that I considered adding it. It took a few tries to start getting the whole thing right, but less long than expected. I messed up about a hundred times, but with a good hour's work per day, I had the song right in 3 or 4 days, I think. I only decided to shoot this after seeing Ahmad's video (thanks mate), but as you can see, the tune poses no more problem. I'm past the technical difficulties and I can now really have fun concentrating on the interpretation, even adding small variations at times.
All it takes is perseverence. Look at young Ahmad.He's got the groove and lots of ideas... Check him out...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0vLYyOG1KI

Category:

Music

Tags:

• andy
• mckee
• drifting
• rylynn
• acoustic
• piano
• guitar
• fingerstyle
• candyrat

[TimoKreischer]

Fred I love your performance! Beautiful adaption. You got a great playing style and feel!

[freddh2]

@TimoKreischer Thx mate. Thanks to you, I spend yesterday night playing Hunter's moon (among others) :D

Pretty cool. Didn't have time to shoot a video, though. Thanks for checking out my channel.

[traveler2oo8]

Dont u think ur piano would get some marks from the taps?

[freddh2]

@traveler2oo8 I'm only scared one day it slaps me back! XD

[IbanezHunter]

You are AMAZING! :) Can you pleassseeeee upload a MIDI file of this so I can learn it!? :) Please please please please reply!

[freddh2]

@IbanezHunter Hey, thanks. I ain't got a MIDI file for that tune, but I'm sure you can figure out most of it by just watching and listening carefully. Otherwise, you may be able to get sheet music from Andy's website. Usually, the tabs he sells come with sheets. ;)

[freddh2]

@darkstar4137 Ha ! Ha ! Lmao. You know, Andy's a genius, Vish's a master but I'm just some guy ;)

Thanks for making me their equal. For a minute there, I thought I was Superman !!! :)

[freddh2]

@TheSuperdude247 I believe so as well, but without it, it feels like there's something missing, and I haven't figured a way to replace the tapping yet. But I'll sure work on it one day cos' I'm definitely not satisfied with this version.

[11Kris1995]

keep it up dude! You have got some serious talent

[traveler2oo8]

Awesome!!

[freddh2]

@Ethanwazere Hey, why not? I haven't played the tune in 2 years I think, so I'll have to practice again to sort a few things out, but I'll keep your request in mind. You can check out the Rylynn tutorial, and I plan on doing one for Dreamcatcher. No promises though. ;)

[Ethanwazere]

I hope its not too much to ask, but would it be possible for you to create a video tutorial? or maybe just write down the chords and notes for each hand. If so then it would be greatly appreciated and Im sure it would get a lot of views.