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My daughter has been learning piano for almost 5 years now and she has been progressing well. She is 10 and recently performed an advanced Bach medal program for Piano Guild and got a very good score. She handled the Bach Sinfonia very nicely, learned a few Chopin Waltz and just learned her first (easiest I suppose) Liszt Etude. She competed in a piano competition last year and got a second place (we see it mainly as an excuse for a NYC trip and a chance to play in Carnegie Hall (recital hall of course))

What I want to ask is at her level, does she need anything more than weekly lesson? On one hand she has been doing well so don't break what's not broken, but on the other hand, if she has true talent I would love for her to blossom.

In terms of Guild, I'm not sure one good PG score is worth a lot though as judges can vary quite a bit in terms of their grading just like school teachers.

Just curious, what was your daughter's PG score/level?

FWIW- I'll share my son's scores (he's 12). This year he scored 36 C's and 2 A's at the IB level. I also know my son was not the top scorer either at his studio. He is also not playing Chopin.

I'm just another parent so take my advice for what it's worth but I don't see piano as a competition really. There are so many AMAZING talented young pianists. I think piano should be about just trying to do your best .

Did you ask her teacher?

It's always nice to have more frequent lessons. Or maybe pay for longer lessons each week so you can save the commute time.

More importantly, make sure you have a quality grand piano at home and keep it well maintained. A couple of my non-musical friends have extremely talented, musical children, but their pianos are deplorable. They never bothered to get the action fixed.

PianoMom - she is at PS (prep special) level this year, her score is 36C no A. That judge probably is a generous one though. And I agree there are variation in scoring - my daughter has taken PG for 5 years and her score range from 32C to 36C (1-2 A).

And I agree, music is not a competition, and our experience with piano competition was not great. They won but we refrain from any competition this year. I just wonder if I am doing my part enough as parents to nurture her if she does have talent.

AZNpiano - we do have an Estonia (and tuned) grand piano. We asked her teacher and she mentioned maybe holding a recital for her and her brother only, maybe that’s the next step.

It's good to keep the instrument in tune, but that's only one part of piano maintenance. The tuner I used in high school and college never mentioned anything about voicing or action regulation because he was incapable of doing anything but tuning. When I finally hired a better technician and got the piano fixed, it was like a brand new instrument.

Now if I had to perform on a poorly-regulated instrument, it would bother me to no end.

Hi Claiz
What you don’t mention is how your daughter feels and what she would like to have happen. Does the idea of a recital make her excited or fearful? How does she feel about competitions? Extra time for lessons? Does she enjoy practicing and taking lessons?

There is always a fine line between ‘allowing to blossom’ and a child doing what they don’t enjoy because they want to please parents and teachers. I’ve seen it cut both ways. Maybe discuss all of this with her.

I'm impressed .

There are vertical and horizontal ways to grow. Your daughter has probably been doing well vertically, which is to say handling more complexity in the music, and increasing in dexterity and technique.

However, she has likely missed whole tracts of music in her rocket-like ascent. I would teach her more pieces from the earlier grade books and increase the breadth of her knowledge. Does she know the difference between a Gigue and a bourree? Has she studied any music history and harmony? That's what you need to understand advanced music.

Also, I would have her learn several pop pieces which improve syncopation and timing. A good one to start with is Fireflies by Owl City. Also, there are rags she could learn by Duke Ellington. She could learn several show pieces, such as Durand's Valse Op. 83. I would also teach her to play many chordal works (often found in pieces entitled Prayer), singing each part, (soprano alto tenor bass) while playing the whole.

I would ask her current teacher to explore these options in a second lesson each week.

dogperson - my children enjoys music and performance, less so on practice, much less so on exam and competition. She just picked up Viola at school as second instrument and for that she have complete control (what material to practice, when, for how long) - teacher is not strict at all and she dictate her own material and pace. It's interesting to see the difference. She progresses reasonably (but not exceptionally) well. Yet she keeps experimenting (playing tunes she hears in movies, making modification on songs, etc). Will be interesting to see how it goes.

Candywoman - thank you for your input. That's very insightful and I agree those horizontal learning will be valuable for her. Especially different variation of music (pop, Jazz, etc). We may need a different teacher for that though.

I'm wondering if talent matters, except for the occasional natural genius, or the unfortunate opposite.

Gladwell suggested something like that, in his book Outliers.

But more recently Carol Dweck has been arguing that something she calls "growth mindset" is far more important than having talent or being smart, and in fact according to her being labeled talented hurts progress for many people.

More problematic than that is the word "talent" itself. What does talent really mean, anyway? And how to quantify musical talent, if that's even possible?

The OP's daughter is indeed playing music that is significantly more difficult than what her peers are playing. But so what? I've seen kids who are force-fed difficult music, and then they can't sight read anything. Worse, if they pick up a wrong note early in the learning process, it's like the wrong note is forever engraved in the student's brain--it can't be erased!!

And then I heard kids who play super difficult music, sight read easily, and play all the scales and chord progressions beautifully--and they actually sound musical. There's a vast difference between kids who are force-fed 3 impressive pieces per year vs. kids who can play 40 difficult pieces beautifully and do all kinds of other impressive stuff to go with the 40 pieces. For me, being musically talented is much, much more than playing 3 impressive pieces per year.

For me as a parent, it was useful to focus on raising my daughter to become a decent human being, rather than worrying about nurturing any particular talent. Of course we gave her opportunities to breeze through, to work hard, to succeed and fail and everything in between. She's turning 30 this year and so far, so good.

Same here. My son is turning 29 this year, and also so far so good....

Raising a decent human being is the most important thing in being a parent. But giving them many different experiences can only help them grow.