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[b][i][i]Hey Mali I advise you start pratice now while you can. If not actualy playing the Piano at least reading "Muisc Theory" to get an understanding of music it self. I actualy did it the opposite way,I learned the scales and things and play the keyboard, but was told that reading theory was supposed to be first. But anyway I'm passing on the correct way to study and learn it. I'm currently in my 6th month of keyboard playing it I love it! Sometimes it may seem tedious with the lessons ( Self Taught, Using Book "Idiots Guide to Piano 3rd edition") It helps yet it get's a little lonley.
Best of luck!

I'm Happy to be aqauinted as well Sharon, Is nice to know others who share the same love of music as I and play the same instrument.

Hi everyone,

I've been on the forum for a month or so, but haven't yet introduced myself. Making music has been my life`s work and pleasure. I have played the piano since I was four years old. I continued taking lessons and eventually studied long and hard enough to get three degrees in music performance. I am now a teacher and performer and love sharing my music with the world. I have had the joy of teaching piano to many wonderful students over the years and I especially enjoy helping adults discover the joy of playing the piano.

I look forward to "meeting" more of you.

Dr. J - The More You Play the Better Your Day

I'm glad to read that

24 yrs young, originally from Austria, living + studying in the UK at the moment (going back at the beginning of Sept.). BA in Japanese Studies (love, love, LOVE Japan... culture, language, anything really :D), on my way to a MA in Professional Translating for European Languages (working on my final project/dissertation)... as you can see I am a bit of a language geek

I was put into keyboard lessons for a year when I was 14... hated it... loved the piano parts (for training both hands)... 10 years later I finally had the money, the time and the space (my brother had just moved out) to start piano lessons... so I've been on it for a bit over a year now...

Apart from that, I love horses and riding (though I haven't done any in a long time), traveling, learning languages (who'd have guessed? ;)), reading (you can never have too many books, just too little shelf space :D), taking walks, my cat (she loves to nap on the DP speakers... and seems to enjoy the dissonant sounds of her jumping onto the keys and walking over them... while I'm trying to play... >.>)

I envy my friends, who have had piano lessons as a child (could play to a fairly high level)... unfortunately none of them care for it much anymore, so I'm pretty alone in my obsession

Hello,

I just joined and am so glad I found this site! I am spending hours reading posts and gaining so much helpful information!

I am 57 and female. I started playing when I was 5 on an old upright built in the 1800s that my parents got for $5. They put it in the basement and it became my best friend. My mother gave me my first lessons. At 6 ot 7 I began formal lessons and took lessons for 7 years. I "took lessons." I did not practice. I just "took lessons." My teacher said my greatest fault was that I wanted to play a piece perfectly right off the bat and didn't have the patience to learn it little by little. Practice frustrated me, so I'd spend my time at the piano fiddling around making up melodies which I enjoyed doing much more than practicing. Somehow I managed to learn some classical pieces but even then I still got in trouble because I played them the way "I" wanted to play them and not the way they were written. I played by ear because I didn't like to read music. Reading music was hard to do -- too many keys and only 10 fingers. Improvising was much easier and more fun. One day my teacher really got mad at me and laid it on the line. She said I had the makings of a concert pianist and that if I would only try I could make it my life's goal. I thought she was nuts. After all, she DID lay down on the floor with my foot in her hand to teach me how to use the pedals correctly!

After a few years my mother decided to get a spinet and put it in the living room. I was no longer to play in the basement where I was alone and felt safe with my piano best friend. I hated the spinet, I hated being in the living room, I hated the comments made about my playing when I did play. Everyone wanted me to play show tunes and I hated show tunes. I liked classical. The family would put on the TV to drown me out.

The last straw for my mother was when my teacher began to teach me theory and how to compose. I LOVED that. Mom had an absolute fit! She said she was paying to have me learn to play, not "this other rubbish." She made me stop taking lessons. I was in my early teens. My teacher didn't want to let me go but my mother wouldn't listen. So I gave it up. I didn't realize it then but I lost a big part of myself with that decision.

I always regretted giving it up and constantly felt the call of the piano in my soul but life went on and I tried to ignore it. The only piano available to me was the one in my parent's home and I knew if I played the criticism would start all over again and I did not want to go through it again.

My parents died, I moved away. A few years later I was out Christmas shopping with a friend who was my former boss. In the mall they were selling pianos. I made a beeline to them like a nail to a magnet. Someone on the grand piano was playing "Let It Be" by the Beatles. I went over to an unoccupied piano and hit some keys. I couldn't play standing up and there was no bench, so I knelt down and played. It was like old times in the basement. The tears started coming uncontrollably, my friend thought I was having some kind of a breakdown, and I didn't even care. I just KNEW I HAD to have a piano again. It's taken me a few years to afford a decent one as I've been on a limited income, but I am back to playing again and it's like being a kid again. There is no one here to criticize me. I play what I want, when I want, how I want. And I compose and improvise and have an absolute ball! And I finally know what I want to be when I grow up -- a piano teacher. I would also like to be a music therapist.

For 40-some years I've wondered if I ever could have been a concert pianist. Only God knows. Knowing what I know now, feeling how I feel now when I play, I think maybe yes, it could have been if I had put the effort into it. I play and I feel a connection with the instrument, like it IS an extension of myself. Now I figure I can spend the rest of my life wondering what might have been, or I can spend it finding out what CAN be from here on. I choose the latter. I have no desire to play long concert pieces. I like Solo Piano and composing. I play what my heart feels like playing and it is bringing me immense joy.

I can well sympathize with all of you who are beginning to play and your struggles. Fortunely for me, returning to playing came easily BUT I have also taken up the violin and that is a whole 'nother matter entirely! I was not allowed to study that as a child and now I am free to do so. I'm horrible, but determined to play well. Whether or not that happens is yet to be seen, but I will know at the end of my life that I gave it my best, and I think that is all that really counts when one takes up a new skill in adulthood. I think we are responsible to ourselves, not our parents or children or even spouse. We set our personal goals and have become wise enough to know that it's not the goal itself so much that matters but how much pleasure we have trying to achieve it. I laugh at my mistakes. I don't put undue pressure on myself. I am more disciplined now because my time to achieve grows less each year and now time is beginning to matter, but the past is the past and I will make the most I can of the future.

To all of you who are beginning or returning, GO FOR IT!!! If it is meant to be, it WILL be. Let your desires and hopes fly free and see where they take you. You might be very, very surprised. This might be the best time of your life!

Welcome to the forums DL33 and enjoyed your thread. I don't beleive you mentioned what kind of piano you purchased? and have you stumbled across the Adult Beginner Forums? Their having a recital, digital on line, and your more than welcome to submit a song. Beginners Forum

dl33 - what an engrossing story!

DL33,
Your story is so wonderful I feel compelled to respond. When you went into the piano store and knelt down to play, I got tears in my eyes too. This is such a beautiful story. When I finished reading it, I felt like I just finished a very sweet novel, and the wonderful thing is, unlike a novel that ends, yours is an ongoing story.

BTW, you write naturally. You could be a writer too, other than concert pianist, therapist and teacher!

Welcome to PW-ABF!

Welcome back to playing DL33.

DL33........Wonderfull story.

Welcome back home............

Music is a way of living, you know. For me.........some similar story. I played the organ in the church from the age of 12 till about 37. Then I left church and so the organ...........and what is worse.......left active music....

When I was 53 I got a burnout...and rediscovered music as way of life......what relaxes me........

Now I play every day some hours my digital yamaha clp.....and I like it.

DL33.....keep on playing....music is such a beautifull thing....

Best regards,
Johan B

Thank you all for the encouragement and the compliments!! I think I will feel at home on this site.

To answer some questions, I first bought an inexpensive 61-key keyboard (all I could afford at the time) which although I was grateful to have it, it felt like a toy and the touch was SO sensitive that I kept hitting "mistakes" when my fingers just slightly rested on a key and I thought I had lost my ability to play. I got so disgusted I gave it up and started on the vilolin but I made the same mistake by buying a cheap violin and that sounded so bad I went back to the cheap keyboard LOL!! I finally found an old Roland RD-150 at a nearby store. It has 88 keys, weighted touch, and sounds like a real piano. I had no idea what I was getting but I went for it because it was the right price and felt and sounded right. It came with a cumbersome, heavy "speaker"(correct term ?), no internal speakers, but it does have a headphone jack. It also has all kinds of other places to plug in things which I have no idea how to use! An Internet search indicated it's a stage piano, about 9 years old, and at the time got rave reviews. It only makes 16 sounds whereas the keyboard made hundreds but I really don't need to play something that sounds like cartoon characters, 'ya know?

So now I'm saving up for a new Roland or something of equal or better quality with added sounds because I want to be able to record my music somehow and I can't with this one, and it has no "organ" mode and I love to play Bach in organ mode. So I'm slowly making my way up the scale to a $120,000 concert grand Steinway (yeh, right). The salesman told me if I bought one the store would fly me to New York so I could pick just the one I wanted (the least they could do I would assume!). I told him if I bought one, I would make a will instructing someone to upon my death remove the strings from the inside of the piano and place me in there and bury me with the strings alongside me because for THAT amount of money I certainly WOULD try to take it with me! He failed to see the humor and very seriously said he had never heard of anyone referring to a Steinway concert grand as a coffin. Hey, I'm small. I COULD fit!

As for writing, yes, I do write. I will be doing grant writing for a music institute and I'm working on some short stories by request.

And yes, I have found the beginners forum. I like it very much. Thanks for inviting me to play in the recital but I'm not ready for that yet!! I'm enjoying the solitude of just me and the paino at the moment but I AM anxious to hear others play!!!

Thanks again for welcoming me!!!

DL33
Time passes too quickly. Follow your dreams.

Rosanna,
Sorry you cried!!! I didn't mean to make that happen! Perhaps I didn't express myself well, but I cried in the mall because I felt such extreme JOY at being at a piano again. It was a life-changing moment for me.

Listen, I could have played my parent's piano at any time in the intervening years but I got lazy and didn't feel like putting up with the criticism. It wasn't until they had died that I felt free enough to try again. AND, my teacher was so mad at me for playing by ear that she made me play Bartok which I hated in the extreme so there was definitely a part of me that was truly glad I had to stop taking lessons. In the years afterwards I tried various hobbies for entertainment but nothing gave the the pleasure that piano playing did and I did not realize this until I was into my 50s.

I made mistakes but I intend to profit by them. I think I have a better insight into what returning adults feel and as a teacher I will be especially careful to watch out for them and children who don't practice and see if I can get to the cause of this instead of just reprimanding them as my teacher did to me. I was too ashamed to tell her what went on at home and I let her think I was lazy. She lived only 3 houses away and I didn't want her telling the neighbors how dysfunctional my family was. Things like that were not spoken of back then.

I believe there is a reason for everything that happens and it is all meant for our good. I will gain what I can from my past and as a teacher hopefully help others from what I have learned which for me would be a more personally satisfying way to spend my life than being a concert pianist. After all, I was too shy to play in recitals for the parents of 10 kids. Me, a concert pianist? Get real LOL

DL33,
Oh, I cried for joy too, not sadness. That part of your story was like these moments in wonderfully romantic (or sob) movies where two long lost lovers ran into each by chance after 30 years of thinking they have lost each other!

Sounds like your students are lucky to have you.

Rosanna, yes, you're right. That's how I felt. My "Significant Other" is my piano! Is that weird or what? LOL

Hi, everyone! This is my first time on any forum. I "lurk" here alot and have learned alot from all of you. I starting taking piano lessons when I was 7. I only kept it up for about 5 years. When I got to college I took a few private lessons again - some classical and some keyboard harmony (not much, tho). My husband and I met in college theatre productions. (He's a great singer, I was just acting and being an extra.) I also was and art major and eventually got my master of fine arts. For MANY years we just played out of fake books and mostly music from musicals. This past year we had our piano tuned again and also had new casters installed. WHAT a wonderful difference. (It had been about 20 some years since the last tuning.) So...naturally I got the bug to start playing seriously again. Boy, did I have alot of brushing up to do! Anyway, after brushing up on my Beethoven (easy stuff) and Bach inventions, I decided to delve into Chopin, Brahms, and much much more. After a couple months I decided I was totally obsessed with getting better.(Wish I had done this 20 yrs. ago).
Naturally, I went on a sheet music buying spree..still going on. I just can't get enough like many of you!
Also, I decided I would progress alot further if I started seriously taking lessons again and found a wonderful teacher. As of today I've only had 2 lessons and WOW do I ever need them. I'm so excited about all of this I don't seem to be able to practice enough.
Thanks to all of you who have shared similar experiences. It's helped me forge ahead. Hope to join in on some other topics soon. And I also hope to be able to record something when I feel I'm proficient and figure out how to record myself! Cheers!
CMohr

Welcome, CMohr! 20 years without a tuning?! Better not let them see that over on the technician's forum.

That's so sweet you can share playing/singing with your hubby.

Hi there from the Quad Cities in Iowa. I just found this site today while reading Perri Knize's (excellent) book "Grand Obsession: A Piano Odyssey."

I'm 37 and my daughter, age 9, and I are starting piano lessons this fall.

My background is that I wanted to to take piano lessons and begged to in 3rd and 4th grade but my step dad refused and said it would "turn me gay." (Yeah he was a moron but I think the truth was that we were too poor and beer was a more timely investment than lessons!)

I always loved music so I learned, on my own, guitar and harmonica in medical school, in Houston, in 1996-1998. I didn't really like either but the books at least taught me some music theory, scales, notation, etc. In residency I splurged for a $200 keyboard before my daughter was born and learned the "fake" method, which sufficed to play simple songs for my newborn daughter, and every night loved "twinkle twinkle little star" to fall asleep too. After residency I realized I played that little keyboard every night and loved it, but was still not going to live in one place for more than a few years so bought a well researched Yamaha PF500, which I still play every day and love. Because of learning the piano, I started writing my own songs and invested in some music and recording software and put out a CD as "Dancing Baptists" which is on Itunes and got some satellite radio play on XM! (I can't sing - I heavily rely on Autotune!) And that was fun and all but I find myself limited by depending on "faking" and my improvisations to make songs more interesting, so I am taking the plunge into lessons with my daughter at my geriatric old age of 37!

I suppose in 2 years we will be ready for a "real piano" but I haven't found an upright that I like more than my PF500 so will probably hold out for a grand and will be stopping in from time to time. Your forum seems really interesting and full of knowledge.

Oh well that was a bit rambling. Anyway, see y'all later!

A warning to you Alpha Terminus - make sure you and your daughter have different method books, so you don't feel silly when she outdoes you! I bet the two of you will have a great time playing -

Glad to have you here. We are an, er, uh, interesting bunch When you start looking for a different piano be sure to post in the Piano Forum, and when you get one, be sure to post pictures.

Cathy

Thanks for the welcome, Monica! I've listened to some of your recordings/videos - very, very nice! I hope I will be able to gain the confidence and grace you show while playing. CMohr