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Truly excellent post!

I thought about this a lot last night. I actually had a hard time sleeping. First, when I say "100%" what I really mean is "as well as I can play it at this point in time". Second, the point has made several times that an experienced teacher knows the difference between some performance nerves and not truly getting all of the points to be learned for a piece. My teacher is experienced so I have to trust her on this.

As I said in my previous post last night, I must have some inner fear of failure, and I'm worried that too many mistakes will send me back to a lower level of study. Well intrinsically that is probably dumb, as I have already passed several pieces at this level, and I doubt that my teacher would have let me move into this new level if I was truly not ready.

P.S. I'm sure I'm not the only person in this forum where piano study means so much to them personally, given the fact that I will never be a professional? The only question that I still cannot answer: Is it a good thing or bad thing that this means so much to me?

Exactly! I don't think I've ever had 100% anything. Even when I play pieces much lower than my level. And I appreciate what earlofmar said (I think this is what you said), that it's now just about accuracy. That just gets you to the door, but open that up and see the world of music making that lies beyond it, and you see how much more there is. When you are first learning, however, at lot of emphasis is on playing accurately, then you gradually add more and more expression. It takes time.

Obviously you are not the only one
Is it a good thing that it is so important? In a way it is, because it's hard at my age and if it wasn't so important then it would be too hard. Then again, if it didn't mean so much I wouldn't have to do it...

Music has always been important to me, it keeps me sane, but studying the piano myself is fulfilling in a different way. Can't explain, I love and hate the work at the same time...

Not at all...I think many people on this forum are just like you. Simply because it's not your profession does not mean it's any less important to you than to a pro. Being a professional musician requires cetain personality traits as well as the talent and training and providence, and even then, it's really hard to feed yourself and keep a roof over your head from it. But caring, that happens at all levels.

I think it's a good thing to care - always. Those that care will work hard to do their best. They will also be more expressive players and want to communicate with their audiences, not show off. However, that caring is something you have to learn to harness and take advantage of its positives while minimizing the negatives that caring can give. It's a process.

Thank you!

Thank you (+1)!

I hope your students realize what a great teacher they have!

+1 :-)

I think it is essential to have a passion in life, and it is different for every person. Adults that rediscover/discover their love for piano, can go as far as their determination takes them. The more I learn, the more I want to learn. The payoff is being able to just sit down at the piano and play your heart out. Even if it is a simple song, there is joy in making music and sharing with others.

But sometimes it *is* performing for the teacher, and that's not all bad.

From my experience: if I say to my teacher, "these two measures are giving me trouble" and I play them and then get her feedback, that's playing for my teacher. When she says, "Okay, let's get to the music. Which piece would you like to play first?" and I play through the entire piece, *that* feels more like a performance to me. But it is a performance in front of an audience of one who will provide me with supportive feedback and instruction.

Nervousness at my lesson was a real problem for me when I started at the beginning of the year. It's still a problem, but is slowly getting better. Like all skills in piano, it takes time. Probably I'll never be free of nerves at my lesson--but c'est la vie--that's life.

I do my best to perform for the teacher each time. To that end, I generally do not correct mistakes, unless it's really bad. I try my best to get through to the end. My reason for this is that as an adult, I have fewer opportunity to *perform* at all, so I use the lesson as another opportunity to perform, so I would have more practice performing.

There are a few problems of course. When the music isn't ready, it is difficult to perform. Perhaps I would play at a much slower tempo. Generally when the music is ready, I always-always play the repeats. Perhaps because my music is so easy and short there is time in my lessons for the repeats. Also the repeat serves as another chance to get it right, and it is an opportunity to express differently from the initial exposition, which is important. However, before something is ready, I would not repeat. I don't want to torture my teacher by doubling the pain.

One thing I struggle with a lot, which my teacher encourages is to take the time to sit, focus, be quiet, before starting. This feels very pretentious to me, she assures me it is necessary. The problem is always starting a piece, then stopping after the first measure and re-starting. This is a really a bad habit I am trying to get rid of.

Ultimately, the goal is to be able to sit down, start a recording, mediate for a few moments, then play without stopping to the end, then submit it to the recital thread. This process requires practice, which I'm working toward consciously each time I'm at my lesson; not always possible. My recent lesson, I accidentally transposed everything a third lower than the score and got all confused. It would be nice if I could untangle myself and play to the end, but I'm definitely not able to at his point of development.

Brian, the caring and passion is absolute must (otherwise who would be crazy enough to put all the time, effort, and money into learning to play), but we piano students shouldn't worry so much about what level we're at. None of the pieces or levels are carved in stone, and progress is rarely linear. Take the long view--save your concern for acquiring all the basic skills you need now, rather than having to patch things up at some later date.

Stubbie: I DO agree that there are times when it is a performance - when we feel that the piece is truly ready (we may not be right, but it's time to try!)...but what I meant to underline is that most of the time we are not (and perhaps should not) be performing for our teachers. We place undue burdens on ourselves, expecting to "perform" when that's not really the objective.

Like you, I don't know when (or if) I'll ever stop being nervous in front of my teacher.

I do this as well. If I make more than a few mistakes at the beginning I stop, make a frowny face, and start again.

In fact, I almost never "work" on a piece during my lesson. If a piece is not ready for "prime time" I skip it until the following week. The only problem with that, is sometimes I'm making mistakes that can't be corrected until I finally play it during a lesson, and by that time it's harder to re-learn those sections.

Now, there is a lot of give and take and learnin' going on, as we critique the pieces I've played. In addition, my teacher spends quite a bit of time going over details of anything new I'm going to learn the following week.

Finally, about 25% of the Faber pieces have a teacher duet part, and nothing pleases me more than playing WITH my teacher and really nailing it.

The best lessons I've ever had as a student have been the ones where I come with specific problems for my teacher to help me solve. These have been the most fun and productive. It truly feels like we are collaborating, and I love it as a teacher when students have a problem to tell me at the beginning of a lesson. It's great, because that is where I get to do my job and problem-solve.

Any good teacher is like this I think, so you shouldn't feel so much like you need to come to lessons and play something perfect for a teacher. Sure, we love those moments where we get to see how the students worked through things and can just sit back and enjoy the fruits of their efforts. But give us a problem any day, and we'd rather have a lesson full of finding solutions than a recital.

A comment about the collaborative playing - that is fun for us teachers, too. Piano can sometimes be a lonely instrument because it does so well as a soloist. We often neglect playing with others. This is a reminder to me to do more duets withe my students

Your best quote yet, and you've made a bunch of great comments since I've been a member of this forum!

I think I'll discuss this exact point at next week's lesson.

I've been given three new pieces to learn, and for me they are all not so easy to master, so unless I come prepared to discuss "unfinished" pieces next week and try to improve upon them, the lesson might last 2 minutes.

Maybe I misunderstand what you mean, but I think you are missing a lot in the lessons if you don't. The best times I have with my teacher is when we are discussing how to do something or trying to solve problems in the pieces, even if they are still in early stages of learning. Of course I do the actual practicing at home, but trying out and discussing things with the teacher is essential for that.

What I need to do first is to get at least somewhat familiar with the score of the piece/section before the lesson. That I need to do at home with full concentration because of my difficulties with reading. But after that I get new suggestions every time I play the piece to my teacher. I don't always play the whole piece but just the part that is under work.

I have noticed that the amount of details I can handle simultaneously is limited, so I don't see it as a bad thing to add corrections gradually as I advance in the piece. At some point I tried a different way, to try to learn small sections "perfectly" from the start, but it didn't work for me. I didn't get anyway with the piece. What I do now is first learn a "sketch" of the piece, trying to get the major musical lines into my head first and then gradually work the smaller details with the help of my teacher. This may not work as well for someone who is a more "sequental" learner, but it's the best way for me. And I am glad my teacher goes along with this. Only sometimes she does give too many things for me to work out in a week and I feel like I am not ready for the next lesson...

Another issue that can best be solved by us working on the pieces together is that due to my NLD I am very bad in understanding the mechanics of my body. I get totally confused and very tense if my teacher asks me to move my wrists up or move my hand a little to the left etc. So writing down such instructions are of little use. Instead I have a good ear (or that what she says anyway) so when she plays something in a way it should be played, I can use the tonal image to find the right movements and then I just need to reinforce that while practicing at home.

When I think something needs more practice before it's "ready" to bring to my teacher, usually what it really needs is his help in figuring out how to do it better. Then I can go back and practice it much more effectively. My lessons are full of problem solving.

I think I haven't done a good job of explaining what I mean by "working" on a piece.

In my structured world there are several phases of learning and mastering a piece. They are basically:

1) The Introduction. This is usually done at the end of each lesson when a new piece is to be assigned. We study the music, see what is going on, she may point out tricky spots, points of interest, etc. Usually she will demonstrate the piece for me.
2) Learning the notes and fingering. I always do this at home. Normally I will learn the melody hand first (usually the right hand) then the left hand.
3) Putting everything together. Just as it sounds. Left and right hands together.
4) Fine-tuning. This is where I have the basic fingering down, and it time to turn my attention to dynamics, accents, shaping, etc.
5) Bring it to the lesson. Normally my teacher will listen, take notes, and then we work on what needs to be improved.
6) Bring it back home. I work on what has been taught.
7) Bring it back the lesson. And hopefully pass it!

Looking at my process, I don't do steps 2-4 while at my lesson, as it could consume most of the time that I have, and normally I have 4 or more pieces and exercises to play as well. These steps are what I referred to as "working" in my post.

I think most folks would define "working" as step 5.

One other thing to consider: At 12+ months, I'm not playing anything so difficult that I can't get past steps 2-4 and must bring it to the lesson to noodle around.

But, if you read my "OK now what do I do" thread, there was one case where I had to do this; I couldn't get the fingering right in a certain section.

OK, now I have given everyone a glimpse into my IT-oriented mind. Scary place, eh!

Not scary at all, it makes a lot of sense

I also have a process, it's a bit different at some points though. Many of my pieces take months to mature, because I need to work on music that speaks to me and then I do want to keep working on them. Before when working more on short pieces and exercises my teacher and I had to work a lot on physical issues and tone quality, so I got a lot of feedback that I needed to work on before leaving the piece. So even then we usually spent some time on them together... the idea of "passing" a piece is a bit foreign for me, seems there's always something to do better but at some point we just decide to move on. Some pieces I will keep polishing on my own and some are left to be forgotten, sadly...

I go to each lesson expecting to play each piece I'm working on. If I haven't made progress on even stage 2, then maybe I've got too much on my plate. Occasionally a piece gets missed because something else has grabbed the lion's share of time.

Myself, I regard (3) and (4) as stages where the teacher should be having input each week, if those stages take longer than a week. For example, putting hands together: maybe I need more legato in the left hand and more something else in the right hand, or maybe softer in LH and louder in the RH melody. Fine tuning: lots of places here where earlier rather than later input by the teacher saves me time in the long run.