Hey Scott,
Thank you for making me feel Iām not quite alone! I settled on a Roland LX708 - very much enjoy it.
Welcome aboard Arun. This is a fantastic opportunity for you indeed to get those fingers moving and enjoying the journey like the rest of us here. Enjoy 
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Arun,
Just checked out some videos of your pianoāitās a stunner! Brilliant sounds. I didnāt know Roland made an upright with speakers. Since I live in a condo and have to work with headphones, I got Rolandās latest stage piano, the RD-2000.
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Welcome Arun! You have taken some beautiful photos! I, like you, work with numbers for a living. I believe there is a strong tie between math and music. Like you, I just started again about a year ago. It has been a wonderful year of music for me! Enjoy your journey!!! Even in our 60s, our ears and minds can stretch more than we thought possible!
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Welome @arun
Photography and painting have so much in common with music playing ā¦ i wish you a lovely journey
This piano seems a great piano and a good companion for this journey ā¦ have fun !
Hey Celia, thank you for the kind words and glad you enjoyed the photos. Coming to music though, to say Iām overwhelmed would be an understatement - itās like jumping in the deep end of the pool when youāve barely learned to paddle. This will take me a while wrapping my head around the chords, intervals, triads and chord inversions!
Thank you Pierre, iām such a newbie here Iām feeling quite out of my depth. I know itās early days yet and I do intend to keep at it till I hopefully feel not quite the fish out of water,
we will try our best to make this feeling go away as soon as possible
take it easy one step after one step . And dont fear to ask anything Hayden is really very reactive for helping us.
Even i still have sometimes this feeling of being overwhelmed with all what i need to learn. Those times i stop all my playing ā¦ good breathing ā¦ and fix more reasonable and smaller goals ā¦ i think particulary as adult who are always looking to program and try to plan things , this feeling is pretty natural and usual
it is also a great feeling of excitement to be able to play all what we love to hearā¦ and thats the joy of the child within us ā¦ So enjoy this moment ! 
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Thatās awesome! Good for you!
Hello everyone 
Iām Caroline from France. Iāve spent a few months on PianoGroove for free, and I decided to subscribe for one year. Iāve got difficulty with constancy for studying (too much time on my iPhone 
), but a real passion for music and for Jazz, so ā¦ letās do it ! Iām also a guitar player. So glad to be part of the community now
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Welcome on board and enjoy the journey 
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Welcome to PianoGroove @caromobile
Have a read through this thread as it contains lots of useful information for all levels of students.
If you have any questions with the material donāt hesitate to ask.
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Was browsing this thread and just want to say that I, too, would love a composition section here! That would be super cool.
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Welcome in Pianogroove Another frenchy here Bienvenue sur le forum !
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Thank you so much for the guidance in how to get started, Hayden! As it turns out, Iāve been extremely busy in the weeks leading up to Christmas, so I may just start with the two courses you recommended after all now that I am on my Christmas holidays.
I did my very first public piano performance in over 25 years last week. I teach at a Catholic school and I accompanied our choir as they sang Amy Grantās āBreath of Heavenā. It went wonderfully and was a huge confidence boost for me. Iām jazzed about diving into jazz now that Iāve got that one performance under my belt.
Pascale
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Hi Hayden,
I just wanted to introduce myself as Iām new to Pianogroove.
My name is Dave Stafford - I live in the lovely Peak District countryside, south of Manchester in the UK. Iāve been looking at the free Pianogroove material for a while, and finally decided to jump in with a years subscription just after Christmasā¦!! Iām really impressed with the quality of the material and the way itās put together, and Iām really looking forward to getting into itā¦!!
Iāve been playing jazz tenor sax for 20+ years, and 3 or 4 years ago, I started to get interested in studying the piano. I play with a couple of small jazz groups (in fact, I lead one of the groups), doing fairly regular ālocalā gigs. My motivation for learning more about jazz piano is multi-faceted - Iām keen to develop my harmonic awareness, to develop my abilities as solo pianist, and also to be able to contribute to the band performances from the pianistās seat (our regular pianist also doubles on sax). In addition, I would also like to start composing my own music at some point, so good piano āchopsā would certainly help with thisā¦!!!
In terms of what Iām listening to at the moment, much of this is European artists e.g. John Taylor, Gwilym Simcock, Django Bates, Esbjorn Svensson (EST), and a particular favourite is Marcin Wasilewski from Poland - wonderful stuffā¦!!! I also listen to Bill Evans (of course) and Brad Mehldau, and some Kenny Barron.
Iām still finding my way around Pianogroove, but itās really interesting to hear what others are listening to, and to pick up on some of the questions being raised, and of course the answersā¦
Best Wishes from the UK,
Dave
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Welcome Dave!
With your previous experience on sax Iām sure you will be able to jump into any of the material on PianoGroove.
You can find lots of common Q&As in our jazz theory section here: https://community.pianogroove.com/c/theory - it might be nice to browse through some of those threads.
I generally recommend that students follow the courses from beginner through to advanced but if there are any course topics that interest you Iād recommend diving straight in.
Our course index page is here: https://www.pianogroove.com/course-index/
If you have any questions with the material, or how the website works donāt hesitate to let me know and Iām here to help.
Enjoy the lessons and I look forward to hearing on your progress.
Cheers!
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Hi Hayden,
Many thanks for these links - Iāve actually been working through the beginner material, whilst also looking at some of the intermediate and advanced items, which look greatā¦!!
Iāll check out these links - Iām sure theyāll be very usefulā¦
Cheers, Dave
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Hi Everyone. My nameās Ivor and I live in London, UK. Iāve just joined PianoGroove. Iām so excited, it feels like Iām starting a new adventure !
But Iām also a little daunted - Iāve read through a lot of the posts of people here and it seems that so many of you have a lot of music and piano experience.
My experience is pretty limited and Iām worried that maybe Iām going to find it too difficult.
Having said that, Iāve been playing around with the āNearness of You for Beginnersā Tutorial and Iāve played the first couple of lines so thatās kindof inspired me. Iām not exactly sure about what Iāve been doing (I havenāt come across sus chords before, for example), but I guess Iāll learn more in the theory sessions.
A little about my background: Iāve mainly worked in IT and after programming and system analysis jobs I started a training company (for the techies out there, we mainly taught Unix and Oracle).
I sold the company a while ago (not for a great fortune, unfortunately !).
Now I work from home and have an internet company (Meditations UK) selling devices that help people relax and meditate. Iāve been interested in and practiced yoga and tāai chi for many years.
Anyway, Iād love to become a reasonable jazz pianist and Iām really impressed with the training material that Hayden has put together.
One more thing, I have fairly small hands - I can just about span an octave. Does anyone else out there have small hands ? And if so, any advice about how this might affect my ability to play ? ( I noticed on the videos that Hayden seems to be able to span almost the entire keyboard !).
Ivor
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Hi Ivor 
Welcome to the PianoGroove community.
I recommend starting with our āBeginner Jazz Syllabusā and I can see you have already found some of those lessons.
Here is the beginner jazz syllabus overview page: Beginner Jazz Piano Syllabus | PianoGroove.com
You can download the practice planner here:
Foundations_Practice_Guide.pdf (3.5 MB)
Spend a few weeks following that practice plan and you will feel more comfortable with the theory areas. You will also be able to play a few jazz standards which is a nice feeling of accomplishment.
As a beginner, building your repertoire of jazz standards should be a key priority. Playing jazz standards is more enjoyable than theory drills, and I feel that itās important for students to get a good balance of theoretical studies, and the practical application in standards.
Yes thatās a beautiful tune; one of my personal favourites!
Once you can play the first few lines you actually know most of the tune so always keep the form of the tune in mind (AABA in this case).
And yes we do cover Sus chords in more detail in the upcoming courses. Right now donāt get caught up on the theory. Itās in essence just a variation on a dominant chord.
Here is our lesson on sus chords if you are interested. That lesson is in our āIntermediateā category so perhaps save it until you have worked through more of the āBeginnerā lessons.
Having a wide reach helps to play particular chord voicings, but we can always rearrange the notes into a smaller register of the piano.
This is something Iāve become more aware of when Iām teaching. In my newer Iessons I always offer alternative voicings for those with a smaller reach.
Here are a couple of forum posts where small hands are discussed:
Perhaps our advanced jazz teacher @Tuomo can offer some more advice/guidance here. Tuomo is one of the most talented jazz pianists Iāve met and he has smaller than average hands. We certainly donāt need big hands to play jazz!
Cheers,
Hayden
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