Piano With Jo

Good quality Yamaha U1 pianos up for auction with no reserve on Ebay.
Mark Goodwin Pianos is a well respected piano supplier and I know several teachers who have purchased from him.

These pianos will be absolute bargains for anyone considering an upgrade to an acoustic upright piano now.

Please mention my name if you win an auction.

My student , V, has achieved her amazing goal of practising an astounding 100 DAYS IN A ROW.

CONGRATULATIONS! Your commitment is humbling but shows in your very rapid progress.

Have a lovely Christmas

😅😅

http://www.coverbandcentral.com

Out with the old, in with the new!

I love my new Petrof piano, delivered today

Joanna Garcia has put into words what I try to tell all my piano parents!

I was at a course on Saturday, and one teacher said sometimes his students’ parents felt like their children weren’t getting “proper” homework, and they couldn’t help them, unless it was a “real” written down piece of music.

So I was thinking: what would be five points I’d *really* like my students’ parents to know about practice?

🔥 When teachers set listening as a homework, it’s not just something to gloss over. It’s not just an “add-on”, particularly where rote pieces (ie learnt by pattern, sound, focus on colour and technique etc) is concerned. It’s FUNDAMENTALLY important. Like….imagine your school sending your child home with a reading book in English, but they’d never heard English spoken at home? If your child is going to be studying a rote piece, it’s terribly, terribly difficult for them to learn it if they haven’t spent days being absorbed in listening to it.

🔥 Practising the piano isn’t playing through pieces. It’s working on technique; improving dynamics; working on small, small sections to learn them, internalise them, get them better. One of the best practice methods, even when a piece has been learnt, is slow practice. Ah yes - and getting your child to audio record themselves playing and listen back can be a very useful learning experience for them!!

🔥 When you want your child to play “something they know”, you hear a piece of music you like. We see a score with notes not yet learnt, rhythm patterns never experienced, five part chords when the student is still learning to coordinate two hands, extended hand positions that the child has never experienced and will detrimentally affect their developing hand alignment; in short, a bunch of new learning concepts that would cause cognitive overload and overwhelm. Trust your teacher to have the pedagogical experience to provide the next little rung in the learning ladder that ensures maximal progress. Then, the student won’t even need a teacher to show them; they’ll be able to learn independently!

🔥 Learning the piano is NOT just about learning to read music. Notation is only one part, and is just a graphic representation of sound that the student learns to read *for themselves* with guidance. So practice assignments are likely to involve lots of different aspects of learning, all equally important.

🔥 When your child turns up at their lesson saying they’ve not practised because they’ve got a new hamster/ had their piano under the decorating sheets / been out with Auntie Marjorie all week at the haggis festival…. just know that your piano teacher is silently weeping inside / having a mental breakdown / planning to set up a pet shop in Milton Keynes / wondering if one bottle of red wine will suffice with dinner.

It was also my introduction to Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody, which is a fantastic piece of music!

https://youtu.be/QpEfHVFilRc

🤷🤷🤷

Sometimes I like to share piano-themed gift ideas on here, especially around Christmas time....
Well, here's a very "special" piano gift for the pianist in your life:

https://www.funkypigeon.com/gift/npp/toilet-piano-mat/185657