Hi

I am 44 years old and have finally decided to make good use of those piano lessons i had over 20 years ago. Basically like a lot of people i started learning the piano at the age of 6 until 15. I managed to get to grade 7 and then school exams took started.Work, marriage and bringing up a family then took priority and the piano playing just happen every now and again. I always wanted to play but got put off because i was not as good as i was when i was 15 !!!
I would like to start having lessons again but does anyone know how long it would take to get me up to the same standard as before? I have been adviced 3 to 6 months but this does seem rather quick?
Never practiced as a child and did ok. Now i know what i need to do. Even thought about taking things further to maybe teach one day so assume i would need grade 8 and then diploma? But have heard you can teach without this too?
Any advice gratefully received and its so good to know people are out there. Playing the piano can be a very lonely.
Thank you.

Well... If you achieved grade 7, I imagine it will come back very quickly. I didn't have music lessons as a child (of any kind) and it took me 7 years of lessons to prepare for a grade 6 exam! I think a teacher will best assess you but from all I've read, I expect 6 months to a year would be reasonable to get back to close to where you were. In Canada I think you can teach with a grade 8. Personally, I'd want a teacher to be a performer or accompanist with much higher qualifications but for a young child or beginner, I think this would be ok.

Hi Mabelchops. I have much the same background as you, lessons from around 6 until I was 17. I had very indifferent teachers and didn't do grades. I was playing what I now know were grade 7 pieces when I left for college and pretty much gave up the piano for the next 35 years. It wasn't intentional. Life just happened without a piano. I started back about 5 years ago when my mother decided to relinquish my childhood piano for my daughter. My daughter wasn't interested. My husband decided he was, had the piano tuned and promptly lost interest. The piano just sat there. And sat there until one day I sat down and started picking out Christmas carols. That was all it took. I was hooked again. Within a month I was practicing about three hours a day and have been ever since. I think it took me about 4 months to get back to where I was as a teenager.

It's very much like riding a bike, isn't it?

Mabelchops, you'll do great, having reached Grade 7. That's awesome!

3-6 months sounds about right to me! Like Cebukid said, it's like a bit like riding a bike. A certain amount of basic skill just sticks, even if you're a bit rusty.

I am also in a similar situation: I started taking lessons when I was 6 or 7 and stopped when I went to college, but my foundation was not very strong. I used to quit frequently, so I didn't have a stable teacher until I was 12.

After a twenty-year hiatus, I began taking lessons again just 15 months ago. I have a pretty busy work schedule, and I also travel a lot. So although I want to devote more time to piano, I can only manage at most an hour a day. The first three months were pretty frustrating. The next three were markedly much better. After a year, I was playing better than I ever did (granted, since I was no musical prodigy, that's not saying much).

Some thoughts:
* It's important to find a teacher whose teaching style matches how you learn. I enjoy the interaction with my teacher more now than I did as a kid because the lessons are conversations between adults. I didn't like the teachers of my youth, who were all from the do-it-because-I-said-so school.
* I liked keeping a record of my progress. On days when I feel discouraged, I can play it back to see how much I improved.
* I also enjoyed reading up on what folks say here on the forum. A lot seems to have changed (for the better) in terms of piano pedagogy. I'm trying out different ways of learning from what I did as a kid. It's been educational and fun.

I hope you will enjoy the return to piano as much as I am!

You may now be an adult thinking about lessons but compared to an adult who has never taken any lessons before you are already light years ahead.
I too took some amount of lessons when I was younger but stopped to go onto other things.
However I always remembered how to read music (although I had gotten quite rusty) and I had memorized a few Scott Joplin pieces from my teen years.
However it wasn't until I bought a junker of an old piano when I was in my late 30's that I started to get into it again.
On the advice of a good piano-playing friend he suggested that I just get a bunch of classical books and start working on that.
Without starting lessons again I was eventually able to tackle advanced pieces (for me anyways ie. Beethoven's Sonata Pathetique) by just spending a lot of time working it out.
After a while I became much better at sight reading than I had been before.
Now I have really caught the bug and have just recently begun jazz piano lessons.
I am not a jazz fan really but I felt I needed to learn theory because I had absolutely zero improvisational skills.
It is a completely different way of learning but I am enjoying it immensely.
If I hadn't had those early lessons when I was very young I'd never be able to enjoy what is my new main hobby.
However I realize that I am only a beginner now.

Simply realize that you are already significantly advanced compared to complete newbies.
It is amazing how fast it comes back, and as CebuKid mentioned, it's much like "riding a bike".

Welcome back.
(You and me both).

Exactly my experience, 10 years of childhood lessons with very strict classical teaching. I am on my second attempt in the last six years of taking lessons. The first time, I tried to "pick" up where I left off as a college student and the advanced material was too difficult. I'd lost the fingers of youth so to speak and it became very clear about six months into the lessons, that there was a lot of technique and theory that I never truly mastered.

I had a lot of frustration with myself and the material and it brought back all the angst that I associated with playing. After a three year break (with a hysterectomy in between), I started back with the same instructor as a low intermediate. My focus now is to learn the technique and theory. So much better. I'm still not back to where I was in terms of being able to play the pieces that I could thirty years ago but I think that I'm a better pianist. My playing has a lot more precision, expression and a pureness in tonality, if that makes sense. I'm beginning to feel the music. So much so that I'm buying my first acoustic piano (used Yamaha W-102). I've been taking weekly lessons for a year now and I'm more excited about Wednesdays than ever. My advice is take your time and enjoy the journey.

Susan

Hi Frycek,

It was so good to read your reply and i am pretty amazed as to how much practing you do per day. Well done you.

It was great to hear how quickly you got back up to your own previous standard. One of the main things i will take on board is your signature Slow down and do it right. I do tend to take the bull by the horns so to speak and thats probably why i am jumping ahead and planning piano lessons before i have started to practice again.

You will be glad to know that i have just completed my first hour practice today and gone right back to basics.

You never know if you can do 3 hrs per day maybe i could to?

Do you do this all in one go or break it up during the day?

Many thanks for your help.
Mabelchops.

Thanks Pete M.

Have checked out your blog. Looks good.

Great to know that there are so many people out there simular to me and giving me help and support.

Mabelchops.

MegumiNoda,

Your advice has been amazing and thats ever so much!!!

Hearing how you felt during that first year was really useful to know. Just in case i start to feel the same.

Good pointer re teachers. Yes my 2 previous teachers where very simular with victorian like teaching methods and i felt as a child no interaction. So sounds like it loads better as an adult.

Reading this forum as helped so much already to will continue to do so on this new journey of mine.

Im sure loads has changed over the years and glad to hear you have enjoyed the return which i hope to do so too.

Thanks.
Mabelchops

Hello Sparky and thanks for your useful advice.

I never realised that i would be light years ahead of adults learning to play from scratch but i suppose you are right.

Good to hear about the sight reading to. I can remember never being very good at that bit in the exams. So will follow your advice and spend more time trying to work pieces out rather than just giving up cos i could do it.

Significantly advanced eh. Well if you say so but i suppose i am but dont tend to believe in myself like that. May be with the practice and support from you guys out there then i will believe this.

Decided that i will practice on my own without lessons to start with so that i can brush up on my own techniques. Then take lessons and see what happens next!!!

Poor piano, which was past down from my grandmother to my father and now me, has been sat un played really for the past few years. Better start to make good use of it.

Thanks.
Mabelchops.

Susan,

Loved your advice. Yes will take my time and no one is rushing me, apart from me, so i will try and remember to tell myself to slow down !!!

I was trying to work out which type of teach to go for. One with the better qualifications for exam work or one just for popular fun music to get me back into playing the piano.

Your advice has made me realise that when i do pick a teacher i will pick one with qualfications to get the best instruction as i can get, so that i can play better.

I understand what you mean about being able to feel the music. I'm sure as a child i just did what i was told but got no real satisafaction from playing a piece well. As a adult and with more self worth to practice, this will develop into more feeling etc for the music.

Enjoy your new piano.

How nice.
Mabelchops.

Mabel,

My teacher does both fun stuff and classical. I teach at our local community college, so during the school year when I'm harried and busy, I work on fun stuff -- right now I'm working through the Joy of Boogie and Blues II (never saw I). Then in the summer when I have time to practice, we'll go back to scales, arpeggios, Bach and Chopin. It's been a nice mix.

Also, since I'm actually one of her more advanced adult students, I get to learn accompaniments for her winter recitals, which was a new experience for me. I think that most piano teachers really appreciate the adult student just because they have as you wrote, "the self worth to practice." A lot of times they see their students to their teens and then lessons start. I realize that my teacher loves the fact that I'll be with her for a long time and she can really "shape" my technique. You sound like you're well on your way!!

Susan

P.S. If you haven't poked around the teachers' thread, you should. I love reading about their pedagogies.