The forum is great for help if a student ever wonders about something. He or she may have a question, frustration, and achievement they would like to share, but I want something from teachers instead. If possible, would the teachers out there provide lessons over the forum or email the lessons directly to me? You do not have to grade my performance. I can simply record and review my own work and compare it to other students.

I am able to read music and sight read a little. I would like to work on my technique and rhythm.

do you know that some teachers will teach online (live lesson), through some online classroom type of technology, which is already available though not yet widely used. you will need a computer, high speed internet connection and webcam for it though.

just do a search online, and you might find some teachers like that.

i know however the teachers frequent at this site don't yet do these types of things. at least, there're no teachers here yet having announced that.

I have plans for a website, and on it will be short clips detailing some of the more basic practices of piano, such as posture, hand position, finding the notes, etc. That's as far as I want to go as online teaching goes.

But to tell you the truth, the reason why a lot of teachers don't do online lessons is because it is extremely difficult, if not impossible, to teach someone when you cannot see, hear, or touch firsthand. I'd feel like a deaf-mute in that situation, without being at the piano, demonstrating, hearing the sound that comes out, moving your arms or helping you support the palm.

This was done experimentally on another site for another instrument and had mixed and limited success. Instructions are too easily misinterpreted or taken like a magical formula. There is nobody to observe the student, no regular lessons, and even if a student provides feedback in detail, the lack of observation is still a major problem. Physical actions are hard to describe and can be misinterpreted by the student while describing them, and the description can be further misunderstood by the teacher because it's all verbal. Video clips help bridge the gap to some degree. Even audial clips can yield a wealth of information becuase of what an experienced teacher can extract from what he is earing toward what the student must be doing. But it is still not the same as live lessons.

But in addition to this, teaching is work. Teachers make a living teaching. Ongoing systematic free lessons involves planning and work by a teacher, unpaid work and that is not fair unless a teacher really wants to be doing that. I think that the other students in this forum are grateful, as I am, for the amount of advice and insight that is provided by the various teachers and advanced students that come here.

I think though, setting all that aside, there may be a worry that some advice can be taken the wrong way, a student goes off in the wrong direction and there is no series of subsequent lessons to correct that and the error stays.

While most of the teachers here are happy to answer the occassional question or two, I think what you're asking is unreasonable. Why would anyone want to do this?

Teachers are running a business. Its no different if you were a tax accountant and some member said, please do my tax return for me.

I hadn't even thought about the money aspect. The lack of physical presence was the biggest concern!

Yeah. what i am asking can be considered unreasonable. what I wrote may sound demanding but that is not the intention. I did not ask the teachers to grade my performance. I simply want lessons. It's more like, "hey go fetch the ball."

Woof Woof

I want to make sure I'm not misunderstanding you (rethinking the comment I made). Are you offering to pay them the $60-$100 per hour that they would normally charge their students in exchange for the time they spend giving you lessons?

Latefingers,

Let me ask the bottom line question here:

What's in it for me?

I don't think I need your willingness for me to give you free services on demand to add to my already fine reputation.

Make your way to the finest piano teacher you can find at going rates in your community and pay attention and do your best. You will benefit from one on one attention.

If you want to collect teaching video, you should have a budget to purchase them with.

If you want "free information" do a "search" on my name in PWF - you will find over 1700 entries, mostly giving advice or a lesson or encouraging other posters here. I get the same services back from many other posters here.

I think if you lived in my neighborhood, instead of coming for one on one lessons, you would still prefer the anonymity of not having to appear before the teacher.

Life is give and take - give comes before take in the alphabet.

If I sound annoyed - yes, I am somewhat.

Betty Patnude

First, you will need some kind of keyboard
instrument (grand piano, upright piano,
digital, synth, portable keyboard, clavichord,
etc.). The exact type is not that important
because all keyboard instruments are of
the same instrumental species and are
played fundamentally the same way. However,
I would strongly recommend a digital piano
because of the many fundamental advantages it
offers over an acoustic piano for learning.

Next, you could play entirely by ear without
resorting to notation, but it would probably
be better to learn music reading. In
theory, all you would need is one of those
keyboard charts that shows which note
on the staff corresponds to which key on
the keyboard, and some basic information
about counting time and musical notation--
all available free online--and you could
then play anything, even a concerto, by
picking out the notes one by one, slowly
at first and then gradually faster, as you
learn as you go, so to speak.

When playing with sht. music, you should
try not to look at your hands as much
as possible, which improves reading, since
you can then play with your eyes glued
to the score. The black keys on the piano,
a pianist's best friend actually, aid
in this because they occur in a repetitive
pattern of two's and three's all along
the keyboard and give tactile reference
and support to the fingers--which is
why a passage on all white keys is the
most difficult thing to play on the piano,
since there is not a single black key
for tactile reference.

I would recommend doing some playing with
a quarter on the back of each hand. This
is the way students were taught to play
in the 17th to 19th centuries. What this
does is to get you playing mainly from the
fingers and hands with limited wrist
and arm movement, which is the simplest
and most efficient way to play. Employing
the wrist, arm, body, etc. to aid the fingers
in playing makes playing easier, but
if you add the wrist to your playing,
for example, the weight and muscle
of the wrist will aid the fingers and
make playing seem easier. But by doing
this you make the playing motion twice
as complex: now in addition to learning
the finger movements you've also go to
learn the accompanying wrist movements
that you've now made an inherent part
of your playing motion. Adding the forearm
to playing makes playing even easier, but
now you've tripled the complexity of
the playing motion. And so forth. In easier
pieces the physical assist you get from adding
more body parts to your playing seems to
outweigh any added complexity of motion,
but as the pieces get longer and more
difficult the added complexity will begin
to tell and you'll have trouble even
playing at all with the cumbersome motion
you've adopted.

When playing with the score, you should
resist the temptation to memorize so that
you don't have to be bothered with reading.
If you start to fall into the memorizing
trap, this will gradually decrease your
reading skill to the point where you
can no longer read music. You should
always stay with the score until a piece
is fluent, before you start to try to
play from memory.

May I try to act as an intermediary. Latefingers, teaching is work. A teacher must plan a lesson, take the time to write it out, give you feedback, and this is *work* performed by an expert in a field. It is no different from getting advice from a lawyer. Moreover, the very act of giving you further guidance, planning one lesson after th next, is continual interactive work becuase teaching is a process.

Teachers have studied for a long time to be able to do what they are doing. They live in the real world and need to earn a living, and they do so by teaching, and being paid for their work. You are asking a skilled professional to work for you for free on an ongoing basis. The act of planning a lesson and giving that lesson is the bulk of the work. Feedback is necessary: "grading papers" doesn't happen in teaching music.

Betty, it is not fear of facing a techer first hand. We have the same in the translation field, because when someone works from their hom an is available in a forum it does not seem "real" like an office. We are frequently asked to translate a lover's letter, a poem on a t-shirt, an advertisement, with the asker not aware that translators earn their living doing that. We have to do do an "educate the public" campaign. We hvae figured out that since the majority of people earn wages from an employer and must move to an official "business building", the self-employed person's work does not seem real. That goes for payment policies (the grocer always gets paid,and so does hydro, but a teacher or a freelancer who works at home may find herself waiting). People honestly don't figure it out unless you spell out what is a foreign world for them.

Latefingers, you have discovered that teaching is an important service, otherwise you would not be seeking it. If you cannot afford or find a teacher at this time, why don't you have a look at the wealth of information in this forum to get you started, and then decide how you are going to approach learning to play the piano. There are self-teachers here, fully taught people, and some who seem to be in an in-between land or in transition.

online live lessons are not free. it's like regular lessons which are charged by time, and the teacher can watch you playing through your webcam, and you see his/her demo through his/her webcam too. such live lesson is the 2-way street, with both you and your teacher's video screens on the web lesson page.

i've seen how it's done myself (a demo), which is why i know it's possible and the technology is pretty advanced already to make online interactive lesson available now. it's sort of like web conferencing technology.

I strongly assume Latefinger is ready to pay for his internet lessons, as no one in his right mind would go to, say, a cook and say "could you cook for me for free: I don't ask you to judge how I eat, just to cook"..., he also speaks of "lessons", which are generally not for free....

The payment could be done in many ways, for example in advance via paypal.

Still, I do not see how it could be good value for money, though it might bring some results.
A camera will never give the closeness and completeness of observation that the actual presence can give.
My old teacher put whenever necessary her hands over mine and led my hands over the keyboard, try to do that online..

Innominato, you're quite right, and that online lessons are not quite the same as in person lessons. but, it's still a good way to do certain things for certain leveled students. as Laterfinger indicated, he needs a teacher to check out his rhythms or something, which of course can be done online, since it only requires a teacher to listen to his playing and point out whether he's done right or wrong. a good teacher would have keen ears for that, and some online classroom audio perception is very good actually that you wouldn't miss hearing any single note played. also, for some advanced student who's seeking coaching lessons for certain technique/performing issues or interpretations, it would be very suitable and convinient, especially from a highly qualified teacher who could only be reached from distance such as this. the classroom sort of technology not only enables visual and audio exchange, but also has the capacity to upload score for both parties to view and the way for drawing/pointing over it too. it's a fantastic tool actually for any types of online live teaching, as i saw it myself.

it's definitely not for kids at very beginning stage though.

I have heard of remote teaching in a classroom setting which is quite sophisticated. Thre is a camera that can be controlled halfways across the world which swivels as well as zooms, and sound capability, of course. When there is a group of students playing in an ensemble kind of setting, some hapless student suddenly sees the camera swivel in his direction and he knows he is being "watched". (eek!) I have heard of it in the sense of masterclasses, where a master instrumentalist teaches a class or select students via this method. There was also a remote village in the Arctic where the students only had access to the remote teacher in a city to the south.

Closer to non-classroom settings, live lessons via videocam are possible though this tends to be clumsy. You pretty well have to plan ahead what the camera angles will be for particular views. You can see the teacher, and you can see yourself in a tiny window if you choose.

Sending in clips of yourself for commentary is another version I saw somewhere involving Tai Chi, I think, or perhaps it was posture and body alignment.

That's all fine and dandy, but what could one of us do that a teacher in Latefingers' area couldn't do? He'd be better off going to a teacher locally and asking for lessons there. Plus, he'd have to pay that teacher.

This makes it highly unlikely any teacher here will want to work for you, Latefingers. Don't grade your performance? What exactly is it you want us to do then? No. You go fetch my ball, and when you bring it back, please also have $40 in your hand. Thank you.

"as Laterfinger indicated, he needs a teacher to check out his rhythms or something, which of course can be done online, since it only requires a teacher to listen to his playing and point out whether he's done right or wrong"

Agree, that's why I said that an internet lesson "could bring some results": some things you would be able to correct in any way.

But I do believe that the teacher would want his full fee for just a partial benefit, and that's again why I said that it would be "not good value for money".

It's like paying for the entire cake because you want to eat the strawberries on top.

I think you're assuming he/she is willing to pay for the strawberries. So far, I've not seen that offer, so I assume Latefingers is expecting this service for free.

Latefingers, I must be honest with you. The "go fetch the ball" comment comes off as being very offensive, as if you equate a teacher with being a dog who will follow your commands. I think the two teachers who did respond, will agree. Frankly, after that comment, I'd be surprised if you'll get any teacher to help you, even if you are offering a nice compensation.

Try being polite, if you want something.

Actually it was hard to tell whether Latefingers thought he was the dog or the ball thrower. The statement's placement is ambiguous. Nonetheless, that's not the relationship.

I am sorry. I was not referring the teachers as dogs. I was using the analogical action from the statement.

For the world of me I cannot understand how anyone would benefit from internet piano instruction.
I can understand where such instruction would work for other things--like operating your digital camera, learning certain computer operations, etc. but the piano?????
Also, I would imagine that it would take an inordinate amount of time for a teacher to prepare such lessons, and under your proposal would have no feedback as to what is working and what is not.

You indicate that you would be the one who would be reviewing your own work and comparing it to other students. Well, this would assume that you already know how to make such judgements and evaluations, in which case why would you need a teacher?
My suggestion is that you get a live teacher. You will be amazed at how fast you will progress.
Unfortunately I am without a teacher right now as I am having a problem with my back which makes regular practice difficult, so have had to curtail regular lessons for the present. I am working on my own, but believe me, I am aware of the difference between self-teaching, and having the guidance of a real teacher. Gaby Tu

Maybe you ought to try some English lessons first?

Latefingers - Who throws the ball in your analogy, the teacher or the student? Who fetches it? This is not rhetorical, I actualy want to know because there may be confusion coming from there.

For the record I have taught composition online. Through MSN typing only (in order to keep the logs), exchange of e-mails, files, scores, Finale files, and pdf files and discussion on thelephone. It was passionate!

But then again it is composition and I recognise that it took 3 hours for an 1 hour lesson, to which I did agree to do (after all I was getting $70 per lesson). At the same time, since it's the Internet I could also drink my... beer, or maybe check my e-mails, or post over here and elsewhere...

Thing is that, however there was something missing and it was impossible to keep this. Especially since I can't singlehandly provide any kind of degree or certificate, even if I can teach composition.

That said, the worst thing was the lack of demostration (which would take a lot of time to create a score in Finale and send it over). This is what eventually killed the lessons, because otherwise we both were thrilled.

Demonstration is the core of teaching (otherwise it's called studying, not being taught) and online this is usually missing. It would take great technical support (for example real moving cameras in both places, to move from face to hands, to different positions, etc), as well as patience and a really charismatic teacher, as well as a student, in order for this to work.

Especially in piano, cause composition is much more... hands down and write, hear, etc, which can be done online pretty much.

and the "hey fetch the ball" is irrelavent at best, insulting at worst...

the teacher throws the ball and the student fetches the ball. in another sense, obeying the instructions

Why? are you offering?

I would be offering, but....

would you be paying?

I believe that the teachers thought that you wanted them to obey your request (instructions) to teach them on your terms, hence that they were to dog fetching the ball. Teachers, does that part, at least, sit better?

Originally posted by keystring:
I believe that the teachers thought that you wanted them to obey your request (instructions) to teach them on your terms, hence that they were to be the dog fetching the ball. Teachers, does that part, at least, sit better? [/b]

Onya, keystring! That has helped. "Blessed are the clarifiers..."

Well, with the dog and ball stuff out of the way, there are still a few issues:

[1] "teachers, teach me" did still come across like a demand.
[2] We still don't know whether you had payment in mind. Most of us earn our living - such as it is - by teaching, and though we might give advice from time to time, or post videos like keyboardklutz, I don't think anyone would be prepared to set up a regular "lesson" type situation for free.
[3] the big issue raised by Nikolas, of demonstration. To keep sending videos backwards and forwards is a bit cumbersome, don't you think? How much easier to just go and find yourself a teacher!
But most here are generous with their tips and advice on a particular point from time to time.