Hey guys, first time here, thought I`d throw a question out there.

I am a pianist but only for myself, I haven`t had professional training or study, nor do I play publicly. My dad is a piano technician so I`ve always been around them and had plenty of books and such to use.

Needless to say, I became a pretty good sheet reader, but no good at playing by ear. I hear some music, takes me ten minutes to find the right chord. I`d like to know where is a good place to start learning how to pick out songs by ear and learning them. Also, in transposing music. Such as playing songs by chord numbers (i.e. I chord III chord and so forth) so that my playing is key independant.

I`d love to be one of those guys who has some music and over certain words are chord changes to the effect of "III add 9" and just play it in whatever key. I know it takes practice but I just can`t play diddly squat without music in front of me.

What can I do? I play pretty good until someone says, "hey, can you lower the key?" That`s when my hands fall off the keys and I want to jump off a cliff

Any ideas?