How to Play This Is Me on Piano
The song sits in D major, and the verse progression is pretty straightforward once you get the voicings right. I spent weeks trying to play this cleanly after someone asked me to teach it at a church gig, and honestly the hardest part isn't the chords themselves. It's the rhythm and the way the left hand jumps around during the chorus. Here's the main progression for the verse: D - A/C- Bm - F#m - G - D - G - A. That last A is your turnaround back into the verse. The chorus moves to D - A - Bm - F#m, then G - D - Em - A. Simple enough on paper. The problem most people run into is the bass movement in the A/C#. You want that Cin the left hand while the right hand plays the A major shape, and if you're not careful your thumb gets tangled up. I ended up just playing the A/Cas a simple triad in the right hand and dropping the Cwith my pinky in the left instead. Worked fine, sounded cleaner than fighting for the inversion.
One thing nobody mentions is the dynamics. This song builds from a quiet intro into something pretty big by the end, and if you play everything at the same volume it falls flat. The first verse should be light, almost hesitant. Then the pre-chorus pushes harder. By the time you hit the second chorus you want full chords with some weight behind them. I keep a pedal down through most of the chorus changes and lift briefly between progressions to keep it from sounding muddy. The key change at the end shifts everything up to E major. Same chord shapes, just moved up one whole step. If you're playing with a singer who can't hit the original key, you can drop it down to C major or even B major. Just don't go too low or the piano sounds boxed in. I ran into an issue once where my keyboard was set to a different octave range and the G chord sounded wrong because the notes got transposed. Took me ten minutes to figure out I'd accidentally hit the transpose button. Pretty standard issue with digital pianos, but worth noting if your chords look right on paper but sound off.
