Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum New Year's resolution - piano lessons!

After a year of plinking around and teaching myself, it's time for lessons:

1. Correct my bad habits
2. Improve discipline to work on weaknesses

First lesson - Thursday night

Now off to practise so I can impress the teacher... lol...

:)me too. after spending time messing on my dgx220 which i have just sold so now have ydp161 on order, 1st lesson Tuesday 11th Jan.........Cant wait

Congratulations to both of you. Taking instruction in piano as an adult is a very humbling thing to do, and many people let the fear of someone seeing them struggle with a new task keep them from signing up for lessons. A good teacher really will make a big difference in motivation, rate of learning, and variety of pieces you are exposed to. Good luck, and let us know how it goes!

Nancy

HAPPY BIRTHDAY NANCY!!!

And yes, I applaud the decision of Mike and diypostie to start piano lessons. It's one of the best investments you can make!

Great idea ! Among many many other things, a good teacher will help you figure out problem areas in a fraction of the time you would take to do it yourself (if you even could!).

I have my first lesson (of the new year) tomorrow, ...can't wait!

Enjoy your first lesson! A good teacher will do wonders for you.

Wow, this is so true. I am going through this now. There are times when I feel so nervous about going to my lesson, that I start to think about excuses of why not to go. My teacher is very supportive and not very demanding, so I don't know why I feel this way. She always goes the extra mile to make me feel comfortable about learning new stuff. It is humbling, but more importantly, its worth it.

For me, its the price of a single lesson that keeps me from taking lessons and the fact that I play just for the fun of it and learn as I learn, no stress to learn in certain time.

I think for myself, without lessons at the beginning I wouldn't have kept on playing. My first teacher really emphasized that as an adult, I could learn a lot independently, but I think I still needed direction from her to help me find my way. She guided me through Alfred 1 & part of 2; then when I'd been learning for a year & a half, she moved away.

By that time I was hooked enough to keep playing during the 6 weeks or so that it took me to find a new teacher, but I can't say I progressed much during that time. My current teacher is much more focused on technique - which I'm sure I desperately need - & that's OK because at this stage I feel more that he's just one part of a process that is becoming more self-directed.

With both teachers, I've had lessons every 2 weeks, & I really look forward to them, because if anything is giving me difficulty, my teacher can usually sort it out pretty quickly. I leave each lesson feeling like I'm more skilled than I was when I went in.

If you've never had them, lessons are a great idea. They'll save you hours and hour of developing and then getting rid of bad habits!

Congrats! I take my first lesson on the 10th! I want to play such a wide variety of styles and genres that I finally decided a teacher was the best way to go about it.

Good stuff, you won't regrett it (so long as you get a decent teacher). I did the same about 6 months ago, and, although hubled at first, my playing his improved immeasurably since.

Nick

A few hardcore old cynics (who are confirmed self-teaching advocates) would tell you that there are no such thing as bad habits - except not being dedicated enough or working hard enough, which is basically your No. 2 point - and a teacher (no matter how skillful or well-intentioned) really can't help you much with that since it involves self-motivation and sometimes hard-to-come-by character traits.

But, that's just their opinion (some would say misinformed), and certainly not a "universal truth" - although it may be "food for much thought".

These same cynics sometimes wonder about the long-term success of piano student/teacher associations in general, and what percentage are beneficial in that long run, and what percentage end up being detremental.

IOW, you might be wise to hope for the best - but in a small part of you don't be too surprised or shocked if you get the worst.

Good luck & have fun!

JF

I'm one of those self-teachers like Artur and JF - I just think it's fun to glean stuff from here and there, and discover how some things work by paying attention to what works for me and what doesn't. And I think JF and I are living proof that one can progress that way - just listen to our recital pieces - well, maybe not mine

The one thing I think might have gone faster for me if I'd had some coaching is the relaxation/using-my-whole-body-and-not-just-my-fingers part. It's made a huge difference just in the last couple of months when I've been experimenting with it more, imitating the feel that I get when I watch pianists on youtube, or the premier dance pianist in this neck of the woods, who make it look easy. Some of the youtubers make me feel tense just to watch, so that's what I don't want to do, and some make me feel flowing, so I try to be aware of that. I don't think regular lessons would work for me - I just have too much fun ferreting it out on my own - but a coaching session, like going to a golf or tennis pro once in awhile, might be a good thing for me. I think having done a lot of physical things in the past so that I have some body awareness has helped me a lot in piano playing, but I might have come to some stuff earlier with a coach once in awhile.

So have fun Mike and diyposte! Let us know how it's going, and have a great year -

Cathy

Oh, and I *did* have a couple of years of lessons in my early teens, and played in band and sang in choirs, so I'm not totally without lessons. I just never played music, as opposed to just notes, until I started to play for dancers. I knew I wasn't playing music, but until I started playing for dancing I had no idea how to do so. It's been a treat.