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I agree with you, ryan.. but not 100 %

I am an adult piano learner. Most pieces that I studied goes through these progressions;
After the 1st week, 1) All notes played correctly (~10% memorised) 2) Rhythm almost perfect at almost transcripted tempo. 3) Simple expressions like dynamics, crecendo, decrecendo attempted. 4) Simple tempo variations perfected. 5) Phrasing attempted 6)Pedaling attempted

After the second week and with the help of teacher, 1) fingering optimised thus full speed achieved, complex expressions possible 2) Simple expressions perfected 3) ambitious expressions attempted 4) Phrasing understood 5) no gross error in pedaling

And I move on to the next piece.

Currently challenges I face are: 1) expressions like "poco piu mosso", my teacher demoed it beautifully but I still unable to recreate the sense of 'agitation' during the passages. 2) Rallentando or Accelerando WITHIN one bar, there are too few notes for me to express the change in tempo. 3) My triplets tends to be louder according to my teacher, although I cant tell the different, the trick is to relax fingers, obviously I still need to work on it. 4) proper phrasing is very difficult for me for some pieces, although I can appreciate it when its demoed to me. 5) ditonic 3rd's legato is impossible, I am not surprise if my teacher uses some magic chant to play it.. j/k


All these difficulties will be resolved in due time, I am eager to see what face me down the road.

Subarus,

Sounds about right. I like John's approach as well. I also tend to play things slower with more exression these days. I enjoy the practice time more and I think I get a lot more out of it.

The thing is, you make an honest attempt to catch what you can and continue to work on what you can't. I can't honestly say that I can sit down to a new piece and play it perfectly. But I can play it with enough expression that it sounds like music, and I continue to refine it until I am satisfied (or ready to move on ) What I object to is this complete seperation of notes and expression. Music isn't music without both - if one if missing then it just isn't music.

Ryan

I'm WAY behind subarus, but it's not a race, it's a journey. As long as I'm enjoying it as much as everyone else, that'll do.

Sorry to mislead you, I am not by any means, an advance pianist. My teacher rated me at mid-intermediate. For your reference, I can't even play Fur Elise, I can if I force myself to do it but I decided defer. It's not my goal to play recognisable pieces just to impress people, I will only play it if I have sufficient skill to tackle the piece. I work only with pieces that are graded by levels of difficulties. Using these pieces, my teacher gradually impart to me the skills, techniques, and the ability to play and enjoy piano music. I am glad that I really enjoy my pieces although they are obscure to layman.

It takes a long time and effort to become a good pianist. I am willing to spend the time and the effort. I have also met many people who tried to learn, invested the long time and effort but failed, sadly due to poor guidance. I pray to god, I am not one of these people.

It's not a race but we must be sure we are on the right track. And yes, it is a wonderful journey indeed John..

I whole heartly agree and ask myself this question several times a week. We could have gotten so much more out of him. I just wish that there were some way that he could come back. (Other than through visiting Rosemary Brown in her sleep!!! ).

Wasn't there some 20th century psychic woman (a medium) who claimed to have contacted a spirit with a french accent calling himself 'Frederic...Frederic Chopin'? Well, it's all a load of twaddle anyway I suppose...

Oh yeah, and he supposedly contacted her, not the other way around. She was also "visited" by other dead composers such as Liszt and Schubert. I kinda believe in her ability to do this becuase of some of the facts that I had read through reading books. She didn't know anything about music, she just coppied down what she was told to and how, and the styles were very near identical to the styles used by the composers that she claimed told her to write them. I don't know, it could have been a very well played out trick or it could have been real. I believe in the 6th sense and all but you never know...