Category Archives: Piano

A Step in Time Saves Nine

I was teaching ‘finger-swaps’ today in a piano lesson; something along these lines… It was the last lesson of the day, and the young man at the piano had more or less used up all his brain-power for the day. … Continue reading

Posted in Lessons that have happened, Piano | Tagged | Leave a comment

Questions, questions, answers, answers

The ‘asking questions‘ method that I was using for teaching children to learn, and trying to improve their practising at home, seems to be working. Now, sometimes, in a lesson, I hear the student asking themselves useful questions as we … Continue reading

Posted in Lessons that have happened, Piano | Tagged | Leave a comment

How to Practice for the beginner pianist

This week I have been creating practice charts for many of my beginner students. They are tailored to the age and ability of each students, and how (if?) they are progressing. This example is roughly what I wrote into their … Continue reading

Posted in Learning, Piano, Practising | Tagged | Leave a comment

Bricks – Following a Melody

I’m spending more and more time in lessons with beginners working on identifying ‘steps’ (seconds) and ‘skips’. Reading music becomes much quicker when you don’t go to the trouble of working out the letter name of each note, but merely … Continue reading

Posted in Learning, Lessons that have happened, Piano, Resources | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Questions, questions

I was trying to motivate a young pupil to SUCCEED in getting through a line of her piece without being frustrated and over-faced by the size of the task. We were sweating our way through the last line of ‘Train … Continue reading

Posted in Learning, Lessons that have happened, Piano, Practising, talking to yourself | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Building Chords with Bricks

I’ve been trying to think of an interesting and portable resource to help with uteaching chords and inversions. I never got the hang of these, never ever, until I started learning to harmonise Bach Chorales as part of my teaching … Continue reading

Posted in Learning, Piano, Theory | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Everything in G major – Piano

Here you go – increased level of difficulty for the little ‘tune’ bits. The idea is that you pick and choose what your student it ready for, and award points/stickers or ‘well done’s as appropriate. Add your own fingering, write … Continue reading

Posted in Piano | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Everything in C major

Almost everything. The Music Hub I work for has revised the curriculum for each of the Stages in piano and keyboard teaching. So I now find myself teaching things that I was never taught, rather I ‘acquired’ the knowledge much … Continue reading

Posted in Piano, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment