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You know, Cruiser, that I'm looking back at what I had to work with in myself in 1971 when I started to teach piano lessons for Sherman Clay in Topanga area of California. I played well despite 12 years of having no piano in my home from age 15 to 27. I had 5 kids at home that required a major part of my 24 hours a day and I had spent a lot of time, energy and effort in raising and educating them through their early years before entry into school. Coming up with projects and lessons and early education things to do were easy for me and I considered it as a careet at one point - I basically had my own nursery school - home grown.

I wondered how the first 10 lessons for 10 students would go, as I had not actually taught anyone piano before. Making music and singing, drumming, dancing, acting, charades, art, reading with kids, yes. Applied piano? No.

I think I came at teaching through my experiences when I was a learner, age 9 to 15 - I knew what I didn't want to do - I wanted to do better than my teachers had done with me. They were inspiring in their own musicianship and I heard and watched them often with their professional endeavors. One was a bandmaster and choral music director at a service academy, and one was my high school orchestra and choral director - both were fine and long term musicians. Both played piano but were not piano teachers per se. I had a previous piano teacher who had me for two years as she was my 3rd grade teacher at school. She was not a "real" piano teacher either. She did it with only a few students as a group and then we shared the music time hearing each other play. I was newest, youngest and weakest in the group - with 2 older kids that had studied with her for several years. I always felt at a disadvantage at piano lessons. My first 2 years were barely significant to me, but it was when I transferred to 3 years with the military teacher and then in high school the next teacher that I made incredible accomplishments in sight reading and interpretation and repertoire. One of the things both teachers had me doing, boy, was I scared in the beginning, was accompanying for their choirs! The orchestra teacher gave me a viola to play as the other piano accompanist also played viola, and one of us would play piano and the other viola - sometimes both being the viola section.

One of the 'hairy' things I remember was giving a recital by myself at age 11 and at the last minute before going to the piano, the teacher said, "I'm going to ask Betty to introduce the pieces and the composers before she plays." OMG! I didn't know how to pronounce some of the pieces I played, nor the composer names, it had never been mentioned before. So I just shut up and kept playing without saying a word. He stood and introduced them after the first several went by.

It's stories like this about what wasn't part of the lesson that made me aware that even with very adequate learning situation, teacher's don't always cover what you need to know.

I decided that if I were going to teach piano, I would be the kind of teacher I needed to have...and much of that has come from study, reading pedagogy, joining a professional group, taking lessons from very well prepared teachers, working very hard myself...but most of all, I think the nurturing and relationship part of the teaching has been a factor that I insist upon...we just have to connect and communicate together...or I don't think it works in the same way to really be of influence on another musician and guide his development.

That to me is what is missing when we give up being an influence or guide to allow students to master mind the pieces that we will teach the concepts from. I think it's important that he chooses some materials, but the system and logic of music learning works so much better when there is a guidance to what comes next, and knowing the how, when and why of choosing the next piece is NOT a given among most teachers. They turn pages to turn pages without the emphasis being on what works best for the next step.

Scala is a ladder - we should be accountable for our students climbing the ladder making progress on their way to success - which is to me musicianship and independence - the reason for teaching - the reason for being a piano student.

The joy of it is really in the accumulation of worth while experiences, I think.

Cruiser, you would be most welcome here. I would love for you to find that teacher who makes a big difference to you. Do you know what is missing? Find a teacher who has studied pedagogy and you will begin to find the type of learning you crave.

Best!

Betty

KBK, are you talking about classical pedagogy? Isn't any book or teacher going to help you with this? After all, how many ways are there to play it "correctly?"

By 'it', eweiss, I mean the piano and though some disagree there is a correct way to play it - with the greatest ease possible.

I don't believe it, you're missing something.

Something that feels awkward? What do you mean?

Like wrapping a violin 'round your chin.

Yes, you're right, I am missing something, and when I find it I'll let you know.

I think dRummie's experience is common enough. This is one of the reasons why I still occasionally monitor my son's practice and offer my advice (for what it's worth) about how he practices.

Here's a concrete example of a recent dad intervention in his practice. On the last page of Gershwin's First Prelude there is a rapid right hand passage that starts .... D-E-Aâ™­-D-E-G-Aâ™­(octave). He would make little slips repeatedly in the octaves at the end, and the middle notes (E and Aâ™­) seemed to get swallowed up and indistinct sounding. He would repeat the pattern over and over hoping just to get the pattern in his head, but I could see that slight concentration lapses crept in as he shifted his attention to the left hand issues. The right hand simply needed to be on autopilot and that required some analysis of why repeating the notes over and over wasn't working for him. He was really having two problems, and two little 'tricks' solved them. The jump from Aâ™­ to D (3rd finger to first) was the first problem ... that thumb sliding smoothly underneath and then landing a firm forte on the D. Repeated practice of the first four notes, with special attention on the jump, and bingo, problem solved. The second problem was landing the first octave smoothly. That required going from the third finger (on G) to an octave on Aâ™­. Repeated practice of just that one move solved that problem. What I was able to do was help him break down his issues into tiny little parts. It was those parts that caused all the problems. Five minutes of practice and voila, problem solved.

Should his teacher have caught this? Well, maybe. And maybe she did. She sees him for one hour per week, and they have a lot on their plate. But I have the luxury of being able to work with him at will in the comfort of my home. And I can focus on helping him see how I broke apart his one little problem. Hopefully, that will help him think through technical issues more quickly in the future.

In order to help him refine his practice technique, I will gladly accept the darts from those who think I'm a micromanaging and overbearing ogre. There is something about those high school years, some combination of light rebellion plus other social and schooling demands, that can easily pull a young person into developing a series of bad habits. They're easy to fall in to, and if you're good the consequences aren't hugely noticeable to the student. This is true in part because the student cannot easily imagine what their trajectory might have been if they had learned how to work more efficiently.

If a musical instrument "feels pretty awkward" to you, you are going to transmit that mistrust to a student no matter what you say or try to demonstrate.

That's a very important point (I feel a thread coming on). The sign you are a good player is when you sense something as awkward but have no awkwardness interacting with it. It's a kinda out'a body thing. Poor players subsume the awkwardness as unnecessary tension and it disappears from their radar. In other words, never lose those initial awkward feelings - keep the feelings not the tension.

"You sense something as awkward but have no awkwardness interacting with it"? Well that was certainly an awkward sentence and I'm probably going to have an extremely awkward time in trying to interact with it. I'm really struggling to determine any faintly practical point, beneath all those vague, empty words.

"Poor players subsume the awkwardness as unnecessary tension"? So awkwardness is 'subsumed' into unnecessary tensions? Really? Unnecessary tensions don't CAUSE even greater awkwardness? Feelings of awakwardness just 'disappear' beneath the surface, when this happens? And feelings of awkwardness wouldn't suggest in any way that muscles ARE being subjected to unhealthy and unnecessary tensions in the first place (whether the player is aware of them or not) before anything starts to be 'subsumed'? I'm getting a strong suspicion that you are keen to use a new favourite word, but really haven't stopped to think your argument through.

It seems that you're trying to say is that you should feel that something is awkward but just not tense up when it becomes awkward? If that's the mind-set it sounds to me as being indicative of problems that have yet to be solved being left to their own devices- not a practical mantra. If feelings of awkwardness remain, you still have problems. Simple as that. Whether you're consciously tensing up as a result of them or not doesn't make that underlying awkwardness any better. You need to find the cause of that. It should not be there to begin with. In many cases, counterproductive tensions can be freed up very easily, once you have uncovered the reason why the mechanism is forced to resort to them. You can release those tensions a thousand times after the event, but until you understand why your body needs to keep resorting to them (by dealing with the underlying problem that continues to induce them) the real problem (or base level of awkwardness) never goes away. Just because you've never learned how to fully remove awkwardness while playing, does not mean that you should start preaching some absurd mantra about how feelings of awkwardness might supposedly serve a valuable purpose to others.

Are we talking about the kind of 'awkwardness' that might occur from a totally impractical basis for technique- say one in which the weight of the arms is never permitted to settle upon the fingers for an instant (forcing the muscles that support the arms mid-air to work extremely hard on a constant basis)? I can certainly see why feelings of awkwardness might never seem to go away, when following such a method...

Have you specifically requested this? While there are some teachers who might start imposing a regime on a new student from day 1, that would not necessarily be normal, even with a good teacher. Especially with older students. If you're looking for this kind of approach, it could be that there are teachers who could offer it- provided that they are aware of what you are looking for. I suspect that many teachers would be quite capable of giving useful advice in these respects, but would consider it patronising or off-putting to launch into such things with a new student. If they realise that you want them to run over the absolute fundamentals, I'd be amazed to think that there wouldn't be a teacher in your vicinity who could offer some good advice. A lot of very capable teachers would sooner keep a student happy, than risk being seen to come down upon them like a tonne of bricks from the very first lessons- and possibly put them off entirely. However, if a student makes it clear that they want to be led through the fine details, I'm sure that there are a decent number of teachers who can offer that.

Cruiser:

Apprehension, anxiety, uncertainty, conflicting, or too complex thinking can create a heavy, unmanageable mindset that feels like stumbling and mumbling in our brains.

It comes from not giving clear, astute, one impulse directions to the body when moving about on the piano. Movements are "jabby", unspecific destinations such as an approximate area for the destination of the hand, instead of a shaped hand and finger trajectory heading to a specific note.

This is often a mishap because of physical size if you have a large hand and wide fingers, or if you keep your inner arms close to your body, the hand just doesn't travel well across the keyboard using a straight line or an arc, there is no freedom in motion.

I am suggesting that you listen to your self as it thinks through a piece you play well. Exactly what words to you use - make a list. Do the same with a piece you are seeing for the first time. Keep the music materials fairly simple if possible. And you don't have to do a lot - just get a sample of what is being said with your inner voice.

I am thinking there are "issues" in the way you approach your music from the first note onward - that the issues come from having your own sense of direction from having to find your own way on the piano.

I think my comments would apply to any self taught player - IF - the pianist were to willingly meet with a teacher who knows pedagogy and technique and body movement appropriate for the instrument, the pianist would get some new directions as to how to "BE" at the piano. Some examination of the brain and it's thinking process for making music, and the physical impulse that results from the thought being also examined for efficiency and effectiveness might make you a better, cleaner, controlled pianist.

The path to "bettering" yourself does not have to be painful or diminishing, although I know some would go that route. There are ways to get through this process of examining and restructuring and have it be a wonderful "freeing" experience. Once improvements start you begin to glide and thrive on the improvements.

I think I am feeling your "mindset" as being part of your problem as you have substituted what the teachers did not tell you (they may have not at all known these concepts) with your own mannerisms, unchecked, and the lack of information/guidance on their part, have left you without the efficiency you need. The "machine" (you) is off enough to provoke you in many, possibly, every way.

I am taking a risk by saying these things to you - we'll never know if I could find and fix what is bothering you - but I know I've done it for others in the past. I wish I could skype with you or see your playing videos as it would give me some "meat" for discussion of specific things - as would your "list" of your thoughts while playing.

So, it's brain and being at the piano that would need examination and gentle restructuring. There is also the possiblity that many helpful things that would have made the difference have not been in your keyboard orientation or in your playing experience to date.

I believe these things exist in us as "unfinished business."

I hope you don't feel picked upon, and if you totally object to this post, please say so. I can cease and desist easily.

Betty

Why not contact the abrsm and see if they have a teacher in or around your city? The abrsm progression of pieces and technique is very well thought out IMO. ABRSM is becoming more and more popular with adults.