I just created this one page piano arrangement of “At Calvary” this past week for one of my hymn playing students.  I’m teaching her to branch out from the middle of the keyboard when improvising hymns for prelude or congregational style.

She is accustomed to playing octaves with her left hand and now we’re trying to condition her right hand to play an octave higher with some fullness (up to 3 notes) and will gradually work into more right hand octaves.

Editor notes for the free piano arrangement of At Calvary:

Measure #5… Right hand plays octave higher for brief moment before working back to middle of keyboard in measure #7. (Notice the gradual transition)

Measure #8… double duty octaves on the last 3 beats.

Measure #15…Octave workout!

Measure #16…Just had to give her at least one 4 note chord 🙂

*Click the following sentence to access the music examples:

Improvising_Idea_Contrary_Octaves *pdf example

Here’s a simple improvising idea to dress up

hymns with few chord changes.

Use contrary octaves between both hands to produce

a more interesting sound.

In today’s examples, the contrary octaves will occur

when the V chord leads to a I chord.  The contary octaves can

occur in other chord progressions but  I’ll address those at

another time.

After playing these examples, try the contrary octave idea

in the following hymns:

“Showers of Blessing” ( 1st sentence on words: “…showers of….” )

“Redeemed” ( 1st sentence on words: “…love to pro-…” )

Editor notes on today’s examples:

Description of left hand octave pattern:

1st octave is same note as right hand

2nd octave steps down

3rd octave skips down