PA Shorts: Interference! No Penalty.
Last week I found myself focusing on practice strategies again and again—specifically how to change up passages and scales/arpeggios etc. when practicing with repetitions. I have quite a few new…
Scales. What? Double Thirds
I loved hearing about how you all teach scales and your plans to incorporate the paired fingerings from Scales. What? into your personal practice and teaching. JP and Marie, among others,…
Resolutions: Salvage & Recycle
It happens to all of us. We set goals and start out with such good intentions. Then, the world gets in the way and, little by little, we lose our…
Piano Pride
“I’m so proud of myself!,” said Marty. She has been taking class piano since August. Before that, she had a few lessons, played the violin, and taught herself the basics.…
The Anti-Masterclass
Antimatter: Any substance that, when combined with an equal amount of matter, results in the complete and direct conversion of all substance to energy. () Anti-Masterclass: Any masterclass that, when…
Vintage PA: Yodeling Puff The Magic Dragon
It started with a performance of a method book piece with the word Yodel in the title. “It sounds weird,” said my young student, “and I don’t understand why that…
PA Shorts: Not Exactly Pre-Reading
My students have been full of questions about how to best help their beginning readers- especially those who look at the score as though it had lobsters crawling out of…
Creativity & Method: Redux
It's the start of the school year and with it has come much discussion among colleagues, questions from new students, and personal observations about transfer student readiness. I have read…