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Hi, everyone! I've been reading posts every now and then but haven't been active. So I thought today would be a good time to check in, tell you my progress and frustrations, and ask for some feedback.

Short background: I started lessons in August. I have some prior informal musical training, but not lots (mostly choir--I was an alto; can't sing any more). I seem to be able to play some by ear. My teacher uses John Thompson for all her students, and I have just finished the first book. Along the way, I also have played pieces out of a book she brought me (Adult Piano Method book 2, from Leonard), plus I bought a few of my own that looked like I might be able to play from them in the not-so-distant future. I have also used some books from my children's childhood lessons (mostly Alfred--not the adult self-teaching books that many here have been using).

One of the books I bought has a lot of short classical pieces that stretch me; I can't play them all, but I am making some progress. The first piece I played in it is called "Nannerl's Minuet," written by her father. There are other minuets (Diabelli) various waltzes, gavottes (Telemann, Hook), "dancing lessons," and other short pieces, from the mid 1700s into the early 1900s. They sound like "real" music, and I'd be happy to play these pieces for anyone. I've also been playing "Romantic Sketches" by Martha Mier (UK early intermediate). I believe I have made great progress in 8 months.

I have done a little outside practice of scales and such, including the first "Dozen a Day," a very little Robert Pace, and slightly more Czerny. But my teacher generally isn't interested in scales and exercises, generally believing I can get the practice through pieces designed to teach certain skills (in John Thompson). She also has had me learn keys, scales and chords by playing "This Old Man" starting in C and progressing through all the sharps (I have been stuck for awhile on B flat). I forget the exercises, and the books got buried in my piano bench as a result.

But this last week has been hard. My teacher has been assigning me pieces to play out of these books I bought, and I think many of them are too hard. Several of them require me to move large distances over the piano, which is difficult even when the fingering is included (and these pieces generally don't have that). This is not to mention difficult timing, variations in dotted and sustained notes, etc. Today I protested, and I got conflicting responses from her:

1. The hard pieces are meant to stretch me. I should just work on a measure at a time until I can play it.

When I objected that I did this with the Moonlight Sonata when I was 16, and I could "play" the piece but that "playing" it didn't mean I understood anything (nor could I play anything else), she responded:

2. I was the one who bought the books. She was giving me pieces out of those books, even though she wouldn't have chosen them for me herself.

I know I am "all over the map." I am something of a holistic thinker, and I imagine I must be somewhat difficult to teach. Being eager and agreeable is one thing, having an uneven musical background has pluses and minuses, but my mind going in all directions has to be a challenge for any teacher! I wonder now if my teacher is giving me my head to the point that I can't build any discipline?

I revisited my first post back on October 20 or so, and noticed I had some of the same concerns, and everyone told me drill, scales, exercises. So I talked with my teacher about this today. She has lent me a couple of books that look very good: Michael Aaron Piano Course (grade two) and John Schaum Piano Course (D - The Orange book, grade 2 1/2). They are heavy on the drills. I hope for a better week.

Is there a different approach I should be using? I know there are different approaches to teaching, but I don't know how they differ, and whether I require something specialized, or what. I really enjoy what I'm doing, but the past few weeks have been distressing. I could use a little pep talk.

Perhaps because you "chose" your own music by bringing in collections of music you like, your teacher has decided that maybe she should try to accomodate your tastes rather than try to be prescriptive. I think some teachers just have a hard time reading their students needs. I've talked to my teacher about pieces I'd like to play when I get so such-and-such a level, but she never takes that as an insistence that we start right away. I think she has a realistic idea of what I can do, but there are times when I think she overestimates my ability. I don't think it's unusual for teachers to "stretch" their students.

My teacher isn't really big on exercises either, and I'm actually grateful for that. She has me on a regimen of Hanon, with some variations that she has thrown in, but for the most part she has me playing real music. I've been working on the "infamous" Clementi Sonatina for a couple of months now, but then I only just started up again 19 years after finishing a college piano class, so I wasn't that far along to begin with.

(BTW--I just finished Nannerl's Minuet myself--that little bugger drove me nuts for at least three weeks! It looks like it should be a toss-off, but not in my case)

I think you are like many adults who are just very enthusiastic to the point that you will go out of your way to add to what is already on your plate. The best thing you can do is just work on what your teacher gives you for now, and don't add to it. If you are bored and don't have enough to work on, then wait until the next lesson and let your teacher know that you could do with a little more work this week. But really, you're going to have to trust your teacher to give you what you need. You handed her a bunch of books, and in her attempt to please you she assigned ones that she probably thought would be doable out of the whole book. Probably the book was too advanced for you right now, and that is what you're finding out now.

So why is it you are taking lessons? Do you want your teacher to guide you and assign pieces in an order that will help you progress, or do you just want to pay someone to listen to you play? Sorry to put it so bluntly, but there's no reason to beat around the bush. You are paying your teacher presumably for the former reason, therefore, let her do her job. You can give her feedback as to how much you'd like to do, and if there's a particular style you are enjoying or if there's a piece you've heard and if you can't learn that now, that is a goal of yours, etc. Those are great clues that will help her tailor lessons to help you achieve what you want.

Don't get me wrong, the enthusiasm is great. Now it just needs to be channeled into one direction so that you will reap the most benefits from it. Give your teacher a chance at the reins for a bit and see how it goes. I'm sure you will be much happier with the results! Best of luck to you.

Spotnik and Morodiene, I think you both understand the situation perfectly. And it sounds like my discussion with her yesterday was as good as it's going to get. She WAS trying to accommodate my tastes, but the books simply are beyond my abilities. So she agreed to give me more exercises.

Stretch is good, but I've felt what I've been doing is beyond stretch--it's strain. In fact, I feel like I played Nannerl's Minuet better a couple of months ago than I do now. I can't figure that one out at all.

Morodiene, you ask whether I might just want to pay someone to listen to me play, which is a fair question. Actually, I probably tend the other direction. I am shy about playing something for her if I don't feel I have any handle on it at all, if I feel lost. But I like to play a piece if I think I know where my weaknesses are and can talk knowledgeably about what I have experienced while working on the piece. And once I master something, I want to move on to learning new techniques. Sometimes she assigns me a piece and declares me to be master of it when I feel it is not the case, and moves on even though I say I want to work on the techniques a little longer? I am a terrible perfectionist.

Incidentally, I do read music on a fairly basic level, and I am improving. That is gratifying. I am not having any success remembering keys with sharps and flats beyond G and F. I am very frustrated by this--I can't ever answer her when she asks me for the name of the key.

Oops: Clarification...

I meant that the conversation I had with my teacher yesterday was a GOOD one, and that the worries I brought up were resolved in a very positive way. I concluded that based on what you wrote about my difficulties.

What I am seeing is something like this: You have a mixed background in music and so are "all over the place" in abilities. Your teacher is giving you what she standardly does via the method book, as well as repertoire you brought in, in order to cater to your wishes. You have gleaned some info. about technical things such as scales and exercises, so she is following your wishes on that too. You feel lost without a sense of direction.

Your teacher is trying to meet your wishes. Our wishes can come in two forms. The first involves repertoire, and even scales and studies can be a shopping list of repertoire in a sense. The other form is a wish to get skills in playing the piano, and the teacher fulfills that wish by choosing repertoire, exercises, scales etc. to give you those skills. Often students will balk at a particular piece or exercise so that a teacher can't really do option 2, which is why option 1 gets used. I think you are trying to get at option 2 - the skills one. But in your effort to get a program through your teacher all you have managed to do is create a shopping list. If you say you want scales and studies, she gives you these because you asked for them, because she is following your wishes. That is not the same as a teacher creating a program.

A couple of friends have been in that situation, which is why I'm seeing it that way. You might want to talk to your teacher again. Tell her that you would like her to choose for you whatever it is you need to learn to play the piano well and understand music - and that you would like the selection of repertoire to be according to her judgment (for what will meet those goals) and not involve what you brought in. This may change things slightly.


Do you have a strategy for acquiring this? Do you have a method of practising, and have you asked your teacher how you might practise (anything?). If you are struggling with a piece and after weeks you cannot understand it, do you know how to ask for help in how to approach it? Do you have a sense of direction and clear specific goals to work toward when you do your assignments?

Just some thoughts.

KS

Keystring, I think you have hit the nail on the head. In addition to my mixed background, I also have the experience of watching my children learn. Each had a separate SET of books. I still have on hand Alfred's set, level 2--theory & repertoire & recital & lessons. This serves as a loose model for what I had expected.

My teacher has brought in several ideas together, tailored more for what she thinks is good for me, based on our original interview, when she learned that I had a grounding in chords, harmony, and basic sight reading. (All good.) So her choice of John Thompson, which she uses for all of her students, covers a basic repertoire and technique. Sometimes I don't know what is the reason for a particular song, and she will explain the technique behind it. So that's good. She added a basic (level 2) book of tunes. And then she added "This Old Man" as a way for me to learn keys and the chords building it. (Most of her students start with "Mary had a little lamb.")

But I have so much music sitting around, from my kids and my father, plus a long interest in piano music, that that probably interferes with my patience for following her scheme without asking for more. And that's when the program goes "all over the map." Perhaps I should ask her for more repertoire, of her choosing, ignoring the music in the music cabinet?? Including the music I bought in December?

As for memorizing keys, sharps, flats, etc. She is trying, but she is working with a middle-aged mind that was never very good at memorizing. I remember Every Good Boy Does Fine from my childhood (and FACE). I noticed how, when I play a scale in one key, the 4th note forms the next key, and from then on the seventh key is sharped. So I can notice patterns and form conclusions, most of which my teacher confirms for me. But I cannot just look at a key signature and have it say to me what it is. Pretty miserable. (I didn't learn times tables either and still struggle with basic mathematics, even though I went through trigonometry, if that helps....)

I have had a sense for what I'm missing when I can't get the hang of a piece within a week or two. Sometimes we just drop it, sometimes she can help. But if, after 3 weeks, I still can't get the problems ironed out, my anxiety level makes further attempts impossible. I have had that experience the past 3 weeks with some pieces that require me to travel constantly beyond the 5-finger pattern, in both hands, with no logic behind the design that I can unlock on my own. And I don't know what to ask. Does this make sense? I hope so, because this is where I feel I am unnecessarily lost, and would like to back up and pick up some more basics.

Some of the pieces in the Thompson book require me to pick up both hands and shift both the same number of keys out of the beginning position, and I despair over my inability to handle that, even though we are now long past those pieces. I spend a lot of time searching over the keyboard, then losing my place in the music, and this says to me I am missing a skill that should be drilled, drilled, drilled. So that's why I asked her if we could add more exercises, beyond "This Old Man."

There a number of tricks you can use for key signatures. Here is an easy one to tell what the letter of the key is if you look at the sharps/flats on the staff. If it is one flat, it is F (just remember that one), if there are more than one flat, the key signature is whatever line/space the second to last flat symbol is on. For example, 3 flats has the second to last flat sign on E, so the key sig is Eb.

For sharps, it is the line or space just above the last sharp sign (for example 2 sharps has the last sharp sign on the C line (in the treble clef), therefore the key is D).

Another handy trick is to memorize the sequence BEADGCF this is the order that flats are added and is also the progression of 4ths going up, and its reverse (if you are not good at reversing it in your head) FCGDAEB, this is the order that sharps are added and is also the order of 5ths going up.

Personally, I just memorized the BEADGCF sequence, from this you can derive all the keys in your head without looking at the staff. For example for the sharp scales, start at the end of the sequence, 2 sharps has F# and C#, and the key sig is D (one step up from C), 5 sharps has F#,C#,G#,D#,A# and the key is B (one step up from A). The flats start at the beginning. One flat has a Bb, and the key is F (imagine the BEADGCF wraps around like a snake eating its tail) 3 flats has Bb,Eb,Ab and the key is Eb (second to last flat).

Get yourself a copy of the circle of fifths and see how they are all related. There is a nice interactive one here: http://randscullard.com/circleoffifths/

None of the standard "tricks" for remembering key signatures ever worked for me--I finally figured out a system that allowed me to visualize the cycle of fifths on the fretboard of a guitar. I wouldn't call that memorization, exactly--just a sort of mental calculator that happens to work for me. There are many different ways to recall information like key signatures; brute- force memorization is only one, and it is probably the least effective for most people. And, you may find that it's not all that necessary anyway. If you're playing a piece with two sharps, simply remembering that you're playing in the key of D (or B minor, its relative) should be enough to form the mental connection between the presence of two sharps and that particular key. You'll never see two sharps anywhere but on C and F anyway, so two sharps will ALWAYS be D major (or B Minor--don't worry about the other modes for now!) There's no practical reason for spending any more time than that on key signature memorization. You'll have plenty of practice time to remember what key your piece is in, and you'll be making more music in the process. One day you'll wake up and realize that you can remember them all without even thinking about it!

Spotnik, you said,

"don't worry about the other modes for now!"

Can I tell my teacher that?

I have in my list of favorites the following link for Circle of fifths:

http://www.pianoclues.com/2008/03/31/fun-with-the-circle-of-fifths-part-1/

I remember my teacher didn't think I should use cheat sheets, and she considers this a form of a cheat sheet. But it's good to know that others of you think that memorization isn't the only way to do things. I have a friend who must write each note and each finger position on every note of every thing she plays, and she has the same teacher, so my teacher really can't rap my knuckles if I deviate from her standards, right?

Overall, though, it sounds like I need to follow her teaching style methodically and keep from flying off in all directions.

Thanks, all, for your feedback! When I need another talking down, I know where to come!

Well, I thought I had reached an end on this topic, but I just happened to browse in the "Alfred's Basic and All in One" forum at http://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/1177469/2.html. I was thrilled to see a little conversation that addressed one of my worries perfectly.

The first person said she had just started book 2, and said the following about her teacher:

"She doesn't require perfection on songs. I'm of mixed feelings on this. On a certain song we'll work on timing and on another song we'll work on something else, but I'm always surprised when she says, OK, we can move on now. I'm kind of a "work harder," not "work smarter" kind of gal, so that throws me for a loop, a bit. I want to make sure my progress is proper."

The following post was this:
"My teacher is the same way she doesn't expect note perfect but she wants the dynamics, rythym and tempo perfect.

As she says note perfect will come later and I agree with her on this."

Well. A great sense of relief has come over me. I am going happily back to my piano, trusting it will all work out.

Piano World Forums rock!

--Arpeggio Paola

Sure! I mean, if you're playing something with a key signature of C, but it has minor sound to it and seems to end on D a lot, it might be handy to know that you're now playing in the Dorian mode (as opposed to the relative minor, A, which would be the Aolian mode). But that's knowledge you can assimilate as you go. Unless you're trying to pass a theory exam, I'm not sure why you would need to memorize them all. There is so much piano you could be playing in the meantime.

Ask your piano teacher if she writes out a shopping list, before she does her weekly shop.
If she replies, "yes", then ask her if that isn't a form of 'cheat sheet'