Month: January 2013
A Love Story Woven on a Chopin Canvas
A few years ago, I received a telling message through my Authors Den website. John Bidwell, a spirited short story writer and poet, shared more than a literary connection with me. He waxed poetic about his late mother and father, Eleanor and David, who were pianists and 1950's classmates at Oberlin. (my alma mater) A… Continue reading A Love Story Woven on a Chopin Canvas
Piano Instruction: Suggested ways to practice Mozart Rondo: Allegretto, K. 545 in C Major
Having been through years of practicing and teaching this Mozart Alegretto, I have a few epiphanies that might benefit others. In the attached video, I assert that the opening Rondo motif with its lively thirds should not spill into an emphasized downbeat but rather a lifted one. This applies to the overlapping Left Hand as… Continue reading Piano Instruction: Suggested ways to practice Mozart Rondo: Allegretto, K. 545 in C Major
If I let my imagination run wild, I would frame this writing around Robin Hood.
The backdrop was the Merrywood Music Camp, nestled in the Berkshires in a dense forest where a friendly outlaw could easily rob from the rich in Lenox, and retreat into the pines, practically unnoticed.
Merrywood was a stone’s throw from Tanglewood, home of the well-established music festival. The camp owner, Ruth Hurwitz, who resided for most of the year in upscale West Hartford, Connecticut brought a contingent of Hartt School of Music students and teachers to her rustic summer sanctuary where she housed two dozen or so campers in a three-story abode with a charming attic space. The place resembled a college co-op like the one I’d remembered at Oberlin. May Cottage, my Frosh digs had the same look with an added roomy basement that gave refuge during tornado warnings.
Merrywood’s space accommodated rows of…
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Respect for Piano Teachers and Business Practices
Piano teachers often deal with nagging, extra-musical issues in managing their studios as independent contractors.
Adult Piano Student Themes and Issues
Thoughts about the adults I so dearly teach...
A Skype piano lesson-in-progress bundled with technique and Romantic era phrasing
Despite the imperfection of the media environment, there's intrinsic musical and pedagogical value in web-cam-driven piano lessons.
Here are riveting quotes from two adult students:
The Italics are my emphasis.
1) “I feel like I’m in the adult student ghetto, where much latitude is given and few results are expected. We’re all supposed to be doing it ‘for fun.’ In a way, of course, that’s right. But in another way, if we wanted pure fun we’d spend our free time riding roller coasters.” http://www.mymusiclifeblog.blogspot.com/
2) “Here’s what I believe teachers often find among adult students:
“Wanting to be able to play favorite music without taking much time and without getting into depth that would create musicianship. That is the experience, and therefore the expectation with adult students.
“Result: Either adult students are rejected by good teachers (leaving us with those who have to take anyone), or the teaching is geared to that mindset. This is the general picture out there.”
“…. Supposing that the adult has…
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My Favorite J.S. Bach Little Preludes
I've been practicing a slew of them at the instigation of a go-getter Skype student who sends these in droves. It means I have to set everything aside and dive in, to keep up with the turnover. I had one other adult student who rivaled the importer of Baroque beauties. She loved Chopin so much,… Continue reading My Favorite J.S. Bach Little Preludes
I would have been leg pressing at the gym but for my detour to Nancy Williams’s Facebook Page.
Here’s what I found:
“Those bloody sharps and flats–those endless calamities of the personal past. Bah! I disown them from the rest of my life, in which I mean to rest.” From “Grass” by Mary Oliver.
My inserted comment
Shirley Smith Kirsten: “I wish it were not that way. If our teachers had made us friends with black notes from the very beginning, there wouldn’t be such avoidance.”
“For example, my little 5-year old student whom I mentor, loves her new FLAT as much as the whites.”
***
Nancy strongly interjected when a prior poster had voiced surprise that the blacks were stigmatized:
Nancy Williams: “Adult students sometimes” have a “bias” about “black notes” and perhaps they’re not white notes “gone wrong.”
To me, this attitude hearkened back to 1960’s…
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Arioso7's Blog (Shirley Kirsten) 