Michael Griffin, developer of the Music Education World website and author of the Music and Keyboard in the Classroom curriculum, has just posted eight episodes of a new Great Pianists on Piano Playing Podcast (scroll to the bottom of the page for the links). The eight episodes range from 5 to 18 minutes in length […]
Teaching
Piano Camp Planning
Next week will be my week of piano camps and I’m sitting here at my dining room table with papers scattered around, jotting down ideas and finalizing the daily outline while the strains of Vivaldi’s Oboe Concertos quietly escape the speakers of my CD player in the background. There are always so many ideas and […]
Don’t Slam on the Brakes!
Lately I’ve found myself using the same analogy with a number of my students because it seems to be very effective. I tell them to imagine that they are riding in the car with one of their parents and are approaching a stop sign. Then I ask whether their parent waits until they are right […]
No Such Thing As Piano
This is a great point by Mike over at the How to Practise website. I’ve noticed how often my students, who play well with dynamics at their lessons, often can’t get the same good sound when they perform in other venues. I’m definitely going to start using this principle of “no such thing as piano” […]
New Blog: Journey to Self-Publishing
Things have been a little quieter on the piano teaching front this week, but I’m ready to officially announce the launch of my new blog – Journey to Self-Publishing. Yes, I’m in the process of writing a book and after considerable thought I’ve decided to go the route of self-publishing. The thought is both exciting […]
Survey Question #8
Another random, non-musical question. These are fun just to get to know the students a little better! After this my creativity ran out, so this was the last of the survey questions for this year. If anyone has ideas for other survey questions, I would love to know what they are! A lot of my […]