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Tell me about it . . .tell `er about it! But you can use it to your advantage if you`re devious enough . . .!

Offering to play piano for the social security agent to get a better monthly rate is probably not gonna work for you either, but it's worth a try.

Your enthusiasm for this tells me you are going to find success, but again a lot of these breakthroughs you are going to have sneak up on you, sometimes in the middle of the night. The next day, you just take off playing better, then you work some more until the next insight occurs. It may happen with the fingers, the eyes or the ears ... at least that's what I saw happening since I started.

1) Mark the sheet music with clear BIG BOLD letters or numbers. these are the starting points. I do mark any points where I do know I have memory or finger slips... usually after a quick runs.
2) don't keep playing over and over and over and over the entire piece... you will never learn it. instead first go through the whole piece, once, and after you did solve all the tricky passages.. than start learning it 2 bars at the time, from the end. if you can't remember 2 bar at the time, go to 1 bar... if one gives you trouble, do half.
3) at a certain point you will be able to play all the "units" ( group of 2 measure in the previous case ) without fumbling if taken one by one... start putting stuff together.. than do 4... if you can do without fumbling, good.. and expand to 8... if you keep having trouble, go back on the spot and isolate it. looks like a long process, but it's way faster than hoping to get a piece under your finger playing over and over.

Note:
my teacher says that to have a Chopin piece safe for performance you need to hold onto it for at least one year after you finish reading it and you have it at speed... so, the theory of getting bored of it somehow fit the envelope.

I'm kinda new to this forum and not certain if this is the way to add to my own post, by replying to it. If not, my apologies, please advise if there is a more appropriate way. This could be another new thread but I thought it best here. About the metronome and dealing with tricky rhythms such as dotted quarter or dotted 8th notes. I find the metronome stressful to deal with. It seems to only help in letting me know if I am started and ending each measure on the beat but within the measure, my brain can't keep track of playing the correct notes and trying to count between the ticks of the metronome. My teacher had me trying to mentally divide and count one tick into 4 'sub-ticks' and hit the next note on the 4th of those 4 sub-ticks (I think I was dealing with a dotted 8th note). Also, sometimes I can play much better without the metronome because it becomes a stressor for me. If I slow it down to deal with the more difficult parts, it's like being late for an appointment and being stuck behind a slow driver doing 20 in a 45 zone. I can look at the notes and know intellectually how the notes are to be played but making that connection from my brain to my fingers in due time is very difficult. Sometimes you just need to feel it to play it rather than try to count it in a clinical fashion. What is the best way to deal with the dreaded metronome?

Regarding mistakes, yes, they just creep in to anything we haven't played in several days. Except maybe with pieces we've performed many many times over a period of years. (And then sometimes even in those.) Pieces get rusty and that's why daily practice is important. Don't worry about trying to keep your entire repertoire in performance shape all of the time, but you might find it rewarding to choose maybe a few every week that you enjoy and revisit them every day so you can enjoy playing them fluidly and well. Change them out for other old favorites if you get bored.

As Dr. Suzuki said, knowledge plus 10,000 times equals ability

Metronome: Why not set the metronome at the eighth note or 16th note? I do this all the time. For example if the quarter note is supposed to be 72, you can set it at 144 to hear eighth notes. I find an eighth note metronome helpful in getting accurate dotted rhythms -- easier to mentally cut an eighth note in half than a quarter note into four.

That's right. I recall some famous pianist (or cellist?) once said, "If I don't practice one day, I notice. If I don't practice two days, everyone notices" or something of that sort. Maybe someone can help.

But we are all human.

"If I miss one day of practice, I notice it. If I miss two days, the critics notice it. If I miss three days, the audience notices it."

http://quotationsbook.com/quotes/tag/practice/

credits that to Ignacy Jan Paderewski (November 6, 1860 - June 29, 1941). He was a Polish pianist, composer, diplomat and politician, and the third Prime Minister of Poland.

Thanks! that was quick

14 MONTHS? I AGREE

This is a great thread!! Like 'Musical Therapy'! Thanks

Yes, I agree that "me an my piano" is a pretty good title for that film.

Good advice by all. First, SLOW down. Mistakes means you are rushing. It sounds like you are trying to memorize the fingering and not truly playing by ear.

That's the key to having the music come from within. Try this. Take simple songs, just play the melody in 1 key, like C or F. See if you can play it without using sheet music at all.

Like Happy Birthday. That will tell you how developed your ears are. Or close your eyes and play through a tune.

Here's a song I played: https://app.box.com/s/ept21qrf8iqffc5by1hm

It's Mercy Street by Peter Gabriel. I am playing by ear. Listen to the melody. This is my process:

Brain -> Ears -> Fingers

I am hearing the notes and flow and then the fingers play what is in my brain.

Nice work TW particularly playing that melody on and off the beat while doing the rest. You have some good rhythm working in those ears.

thank you Rerun, very kind of you to say that. Alot of practice and hard work but it pays off.

I'd never heard that tune before that I can recall, but then I listened to Pete singing it, then a few others playing it ... interesting how some players use that Latin beat, others take it somewhere else and it still sounds very good. Rhythm is fun stuff to work with by ear.