My students love playing New Age music on the piano. It’s fun to play, and pieces can be learned quickly. The music is quite repetitive, and it creates a nice flow, filled with emotion. It’s one of my favorite types of music to teach. New Age music is intended to create a peaceful sense of inspiration and relaxation in the listener. Often used as a background for yoga, massage, and meditation, it gives students a relaxed and peaceful connection to the piano.
One of the composers most popular for New Age piano music is Enya. Her music is very well known and many of her pieces feature piano as the key instrument. New Age piano music is recognized by the feeling it produces. Sometimes the music is punctuated by long sustained, swirling chords. Harmonies are often hypnotic, the listener being drawn into a world of color and imagination. Pieces are often long, sometimes thirty minutes in length, compared to the short songs found in pop music. The music often is characterized by arpeggios in the left hand, and melodies in the right hand. Students taking piano lessons or keyboard lessons will definitely want to try some New Age music.
Vocal arrangements are not that common, but often found in Celtic, Tibetan, or Native American variations. New Age music crosses into many genres and is written not just for solo piano, but synthesizers, keyboards, acoustic guitars, drums, flutes, horns, stringed instruments, and just about any instrument found in a band. Generally, songs are either in electronic or acoustic form. A wide variety on ethnic instruments are often found in New Age recordings.
New Age music was originally influenced by diverse artists from many genres. Musicians such as Leo Kottke, Steve Reich, Philip Glass, Pink Floyd, Brian Eno, Keith Jarrett, Pat Metheny have all helped shape the current sound of New Age music.
Some popular New Age composers are:
Vangelis
Paul Winter
Will Ackerman
Jim Brickman
Enya
Jean Michel Jarre
Kitaro
Sandeep Khurana
Yanni
Andreas Vollenweider
Peter Gabriel
Taking piano or keyboard lessons opens up a whole new world of learning and creativity. Children and adults will discover a great avenue for personal self expression and a way to have fun. Playing piano is probably one of the most satisfying and fulfilling activities that someone can do. Learning to read music will inspire and challenge you, and make you a more confident person. You might also find it interesting learning to play by ear, doing blues improvisation, jamming with friends, or accompanying a friend singing.
