Performance-readiness is like peak physical fitness: it must be maintained, or it disappears. That’s because rehearsing and performing, in and of itself, does not develop any of the skills required for retaining long-term piano skills. Here are three ways of playing that are essential for keeping piano skills for life.
Like everyone else, I have experienced a very steep learning curve by embracing online teaching. I have developed skills I never thought I’d have: camera use, audio adjustment, screen-sharing – the list goes on! Teachers have been SO generous in sharing their insights, discoveries and expertise with each other that I think I have actually become a bit overwhelmed with all the information.
So this short post is about the ONE thing I have found to be most useful in online teaching.
Me, the week before last: “I DREAD online teaching!” Me, last week: “I HATE online teaching!” Me, this week: “I LOVE online teaching!” Me, all of those weeks: “I’m EXHAUSTED.”
So, it has been rather a roller coaster ride. And every single piano I teacher I know is taking this ride along with me.
After years and years leaping at every opportunity and upskilling myself as much as humanly possible (and often more), I’ve learned five things that I think every person aged 8 or up who’s got that perfectionist streak needs to hear. Everything in moderation – especially moderation! Here they are.
If you’re anything like me, you’ve probably read many blogs on motivation. Most of them deal with how to motivate our students, our children, ourselves – and it’s usually about positive, intrinsic motivation. But motivation can actually be negative, or at least result in negatively engaged students/children/self. In this blog I am going to simplify […]
In Part 1 I talked about this matrix: Practice Not much or No practice Support 1 Fastest possible progress 2 Slow progress Not much or No support 3 Reasonable progress (unusual) 4 No progress In Part 2 I’ll talk more about each individual quadrant: what support means and what marks progress, and how to […]
I am a member of several piano teacher groups on Facebook. To me it seems that the conversation that comes up most often is on how to retain students who don’t practice. There are rants about the schedules that don’t permit enough practice time, the parents who expect everything to be fun and easy, the arguing between parent and student at home (and sometimes between student and teacher in the lesson!) and the expectations from all that are rarely met.
I’ve created a very specific list of piano performance criteria that can be applied to any student, at any level, playing any piece. This list contains what I believe to be the components of any great performance, whether it’s given by the tiniest beginner pianist or the most accomplished recitalist.
What do we do when pushy parents insist on an exam being undertaken when they don’t leave enough time in a child’s day for the practice to be done?
Last month there was a discussion on Facebook about the Suzuki method. However, it was not the usual Suzuki discussion, which consists of traditional piano teachers lamenting the lack of sight reading skills in Suzuki students…