Today’s article featured in Pianist Magazine’s most recent newsletter. It focuses on basic practice suggestions and ideas for when learning a new piece. This article is part 2 of the process and you can read the Part 1, here. In my last article, Preparing A New Piece – 5 Tips Part 1, I offered several…
Tag: Pianist Magazine
5 tips on preparing a new piano piece: Part 1
In the latest Pianist Magazine Newsletter, I focus on preparing a new piano piece. This is a three-part series. Part 1 looks at the periphery and early stages of preparing your piece. When learning a new piece, there are so many considerations. How will you start? Do you like to listen to several performances? Or…
New Piano Repertoire for the New Academic Year
It’s a new academic year and this means new piano repertoire. Today’s post focuses on educational piano repertoire which you may be interested in acquiring either for yourself or for your students. Earlier this month a new volume of Christmas music was released by US company Willis Music. I started working with Willis last year….
5 Tips For Breath Control
My latest article for Pianist Magazine’s newsletter focuses on breath control. I hope you find it of interest. Breath control. It might be a topic more closely associated with singing than piano playing, but developing secure breath control can by a most helpful asset, especially for those who regularly perform. Once this useful skill has…
Exploring the Key Bed: 5 Tips
My latest article for Pianist Magazine’s newsletter explores the tonal possibilities found in the ‘key bed’ or the area of the key beneath the double escapement action. I hope you find it of interest. The key-bed can remain a mystery for many, lurking, as it does, beneath the only part of the key that is…
5 Tips To Help Develop Finger Control
My most recent article for Pianist Magazine’s newsletter focuses on honing firmer fingers for clear and crisp articulation. Rapid passages. They require extra practice, don’t they? You sit down at the instrument, ready to start a practice session, and begin at the same quaver, semiquaver or demisemiquaver passage which caused some grief at the previous…
Perfect Alignment: 5 Tips
My latest article for Pianist Magazine’s newsletter focuses on hand alignment at the keyboard. One of the most noticeable aspects when learning to play the piano is wrist, hand and finger choreography. As soon as a student starts to play, it’s possible to determine any physical difficulties which they are experiencing, just from how they…
Attuning Our Listening Skills
My most recent post for Pianist Magazine’s newsletter focuses on our ability to ‘hear’ what we are playing. One of the most important piano playing skills that we need to assimilate is the ability to listen. I spent my college years struggling with aural tests, especially the atonal ones! But, years later, when I decided…
5 Tips for Perfecting That Silence
My latest Pianist Magazine newsletter article focuses on perfecting that silence! We sometimes forget the importance of observing rests, fermatas, or even creating dramatic pauses. Here are a few tips and reminders. Rests, as we know, indicate a place in the score where we literally stop playing. An actual rest is generally a specified length,…
Spot Finger Practice
Pianist Magazine is currently celebrating its twentieth year, and it has been a delight to write for the magazine since 2014. I write a ‘How-to-play’ article in every issue and a ‘5 Tips’ based article for the bi-monthly newsletter. The following piece first appeared in the magazine’s most recent newsletter. What do I mean by…
Exploring the Sostenuto Pedal
My bi-monthly article for Pianist Magazine’s newsletter is always a ‘5-tips’ affair. This month’s focuses on the oft-forgotten Sostenuto pedal, or the ‘middle’ pedal, on grand pianos. As a teacher, if you mention the Sostenuto pedal you tend to get a perplexed or puzzled look from a student. There are those who know what it…
The Una Corda: 5 Tips
If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you will know that I write an article for Pianist Magazine’s bimonthly newsletter. This post, known as ‘online content’, always appears in a ‘5 tips’ context, and this month’s tips focuses on the ‘una corda’ or left pedal. The Una corda, or the pedal to the far…