 Hello, I'm David Wong and welcome to my channel. I'm starting a new series on teaching you how to play piano by ear. Today I'm going to show you my process of what I do when I hear a song that I never heard of and then start to play it on the piano without any music. So I'm gonna start with this new popular song that just came out called Promise by BTS. And I only heard this about two times. So I'm gonna show you what I do when I hear the song and then start to decipher it and convert it into piano. So first, what I do is I listen to the song to figure out the basics of what the structure of the song is and what key it is in and what time signature it is in. So let's just listen to it. So first, the simple part is what key is it in? What key is it in, okay? How do you know what key is it in? Well, we've got to figure out what chords are playing and what notes are being played. So the first note, we're just going to, if you don't know any piano, you can just randomly hit something on the piano and see if that hits the pitch. So the first pitch is, so you're singing it out. So try to find where on the piano that is, okay? So it's higher than that, right? So I gotta go higher. That's getting closer, but not quite enough. So I'm gonna go to the next one. So yeah, that actually sounds like the note. So I think that is the note that we start on. So we go, it goes with one note and goes higher by one note. So let me play that again and see if that's correct. Good, so it sounds like a match. So now we figured out that that is the note to start in. So the first two notes are, which are A, B. So does that sound like it? How about B major? But no, that doesn't sound like it. How about this one? E minor. Maybe. How about E major? That doesn't sound like it. That sounds like it. So you got G major, maybe, E minor, B minor. Those sound kind of close to it. How about C major seven? No, that doesn't sound like it. How about B seven? How about B minor seven? Duh-duh. Nope, not really. E minor seven. Duh-duh. That sounds close. How about E major seven? Duh-duh. That doesn't sound like it. So there's four chords that are possible with this first chord and the first note in this song. So let's see which one's the closest. Let's listen to it again. So let's play that again. It doesn't actually sound very close to it, so I'm gonna cross that out. So these are gonna be G major or E minor. So an easy way to figure out which one it is, is you wanna ask, does it sound happy or does it sound sad? First chord. Does it sound happier or does it sound sad? Okay, does it sound happy? Or does it sound sad? So most people would say that it sounds happier than sad, so I'm guessing that this is G major, okay? And if you actually get the music, it's gonna be G major seven, okay? Because if you listen to the guitar, they have this on top. Listen to it again. Duh-duh, right? So that's what's being played with the guitar. And now we know that G is the chord. So actually what this first chord is, is G major seven, okay? So we play a guitar and then the melody is. So you add them together, it's gonna be. So that sounds like what's happening in the first bar there. Okay, so we know now that the first chord is G major seven. So what I would do is I would go and write out a basic chart for bars like this. And then in the first bar, I'm gonna write G major seven, okay? And then I'm gonna write the notes, what are the notes? A, B, okay? I'm not gonna worry about the rhythm because I memorized the rhythm in my head. So A, B are the notes. Now we have the first chord. Let's figure out the rest of the melody. So that first part, it goes. Du-du-du, du-du-du, du-du-du. Okay, so we're gonna play it out. It's gonna be, oops. So if you don't know how to figure out, just think about what scale we're in. Because we're playing G major seventh and the scale of G major seventh have these notes. It has G, A, F sharp, G, okay? So those are the notes that you can use when we're playing the melody. So we can write that somewhere. So if it's G major seven, G major seven, the notes that we can use are basically G, A, B, C, D, and then E, and then F sharp and G. Okay, so I'm gonna use those notes and then figure out what notes are being played when the melody comes. It goes du-du-du, du-du-du-du, du-du-du. So I know it first two, and then du is lower. So I'm gonna go lower than the next one. No, that's not low enough. That's not low enough. Okay, that's low enough. And then it goes from here. It goes du-du-du-du, du-du-du. So it sounds like just the regular scale. Du-du-du-du, du-du-du, du-du-du. That's still A, B. So I'm just gonna go because that's still A, B. And it goes back to A, right? So that's how I figured it out. I wanna know what the relative position of the note is, whether it's going up or down, what the interval is, because if it's just a short interval, then it's probably close together. If it's a longer, bigger interval, that means it's farther apart. So you can just test out and see which note. Is it this one? Is it this one? Is it this one? Is it this one? Right, find the interval between the notes to find the proper one. Du-du-du-du, du-du-du, du-du-du, du-du-du. In this case, it's du-du-du-du, so I know I'm going to a D. Okay, so now that I know what the melody is. Du-du-du-du, du-du-du, du-du-du. Okay, that's the melody, so I'm gonna write it in. Now, if you're good with writing it on a staff and with all the notes on different lines, then that's good, but for me, it's easier for me to write like this. I don't need a staff paper, and I don't need to write the rhythms because it gets complicated to write. Yeah, it's complicated to write rhythms, especially for pop songs and the phrasing is very difficult. So, I'll just memorize the rhythm on my head and then I'll just write what the notes are and then I'll remember what to play when I see that. All right, so now we just figure out the first part. Let's figure out what the chords and the melody is for the second part. Okay, so you know the first one? It's du-du-du-du, du-du-du, du-du-du. And it goes du-du-du-du. You listen to the guitar, that's what's happening. It goes du-du-du-du, du-du-du. So, since I know it's going down, it goes du-du-du, and then it goes du-du-du. Then, my intuition tells me that it's actually going down also in the bass. It goes du-du-du. And that's actually exactly what it is. It just went from G major seven, du-du-du, sharp minor seven, du-du-du. And then what's the next one? Let's... So it goes down again. So actually that is a F major seven. So let's play the bass. That's the bass, and then we add the melody. So see, I'm figuring it out as it goes. So let's do it one more time. Get used to playing the chords along with the rhythm, along with the melody. So you have the phrasing correct, and you have the timing of the notes correct. Once you practice that and get good at that, the next step is to add the chords together with the bass. So what you can do is play the chords like this. So G major seven, and then F minor seven, F major seven, E minor seven, and once again, G major seven, minor seven, and then F major seven, E minor seven. So what you can do is just play the chord in the left hand while you play the melody. So we can do this. That's the basic. Now you have the chords with the melody, but for some reason it doesn't really sound that good because the chords are really modeled up in the bottom. There's too many notes on the bottom. So what we wanna do is spread out the chord. Instead of playing in clustered like that, we wanna spread it out. And usually what I like to do is play only the root, the fifth, and the third. Okay, or if you can't reach that far, just the root, the fifth, and then the root again. So if you convert it to that, it will just be like this. And then E minor seven. Okay, so you spread it out. It won't sound so modeled up in the bottom. So let's try doing that with the melody. So as I'm changing the rhythm in the bass too. So it's not just a, it's boring, right? So I'm matching the rhythm with the melody. So it'll sound something like this. Next step after that, you got some rhythm happening in the bass. It's kinda like a bass line. And then you have the melody. Now what you wanna do is fill in the melody with some chords. So now you wanna play the chords on the right hand and play the bass on the left hand. So let's practice first by just playing the bass. That's one note, so keep it simple so you can focus on the right hand, okay? So let's play the chords on the right hand. It's gonna be like something like this. G major seven. F sharp minor seven. F major seven. And then E minor seven. E minor 11. Get back to E. G major seven. F minor seven. F major seven. E minor seven. E minor 11. So that's what you're gonna play in the right hand. Left hand, you just play the single note for now. So you go one, two, three, four. Some rhythm to it. You just do the chord and then now you can add the bass line. You play some chords and now you got some bass line. Now you want to do is add the melody together with the chords and with the bass line. So it should sound something like this. Sometimes I'm playing just the chord to fill in the gaps. Sometimes I'm playing just the melody and sometimes I'm playing the melody with the chord itself. So that just takes practice and you can play by playing everything separately, right? So just start beginning by just playing the melody. So now see where you can add in the chord. And the best place to add in the chord is on the first beat of the bar. So you go on the chord there and then add in one here. So you have one chord per bar, chord there because too many notes. So I go to the next one. There's a chord there. So this one is actually an E minor 11 chord. E minor is 11, that's right. Okay, so if you practice more, then you can add more interesting rhythms and you can add more interesting lines and then add more expression in your phrasing. For example, you can go, okay. So there's phrasing, there's some notes are short, some notes are longer. There's crescendos and basically getting louder, getting softer. You want to sound like you're singing it, but with the piano, okay. That's what you want to do. The process for the rest of the song, eventually you're going to get the whole song and we'll get to that in the next video. So thanks for watching. You'll be interested in learning more about how to play piano by ear without any music and how to play any song and press your friends and have fun and to play all the music that is popular, that you want to play on the piano and subscribe, like and comment and share and ask any questions that you want on this video in the comments sections and we'll see you in the next lesson.