Mar 15, 2018
Try it. Swimming with a life jacket is really hard, almost impossible to get anywhere. But if you have a top lifeguard watching you and teaching you strokes, you can learn how to swim much better. Why is piano teaching any different?
Reach me at julian@oclef.com
Mar 14, 2018
Pushing students to stretch in piano is a great way to help them grow. But recently, I learned about how important it is to have milestones or markers along the way. These can be obvious like recitals, tests and competitions or they can be less obvious. Like learning all your notes on flash cards, not having to have mom...
Mar 9, 2018
It’s all about character. The values and habits that I hope to instill in students are, to me, more important than how well they play a crescendo. But in reality, behaviors and habits are extremely tough to guide only seeing students once or twice a week. That’s why parents are so important. And as tests or recitals...
Mar 7, 2018
Alert! Your child or student may not actually know what they're playing. There's a really easy way to check, but without checking it's almost impossible to notice the difference.
Just ask them to start from anywhere. Pick a random spot in the music and if they aren't able to figure out the hand position, note, rhythm...
Mar 6, 2018
Every music teacher can spot it. The student who has "practiced" all week by playing their music over and over. What they don't know and their parent doesn't know is that doing that is often worse than not practicing at all. It develops bad habits and there actually isn't any growth. It's like playing a game of pick...