the idea: make an interactive piano curriculum

I’ve taken classical piano since I was about five years old.  I had a wonderful, patient teacher who worked with both me and my sister through the tough years of family divorce and elementary school.  She even dealt with the two of us in middle school, which can’t have been an easy feat.

Once I got to college I had another wonderful piano teacher.  She was intense, slightly terrifying, and made me actually practice.  Part of the reason I was finally practicing was because after eight years of lessons, I finally began to enjoy piano when I was in college.

Both of my piano teachers were strictly classical.  I learned scales, key signatures, time signatures, and various old dead composers.  Every once in a while I would have something contemporary and mostly I didn’t know how to play it.  After learning to read music very young, I didn’t develop much of an ear.  I also tried to learn swing and jazz by counting out the rhythms.  You can guess how that worked out.

I wish there was someone out there who had a more holistic approach to teaching piano.  There are plenty of children you hear about who are simply naturals on the piano.  They can play along to anything as soon as they’re big enough to reach the keys.  I do believe that there is a certain level of natural ability, but I also believe that you can learn your passion.

My lessons, as wonderful as they were in the traditional classical style, did not connect throughout my entire childhood.  I used to sit at the piano bench and cry instead of practicing.  If only some teacher had taken the interactive teaching tools that I’m learning at Lesley University and had applied them to teaching piano.  Maybe then I would be a completely different person.