SUMMER 2023: Using Summer Break to Explore Piano Skills
Summer 2023; Vol. 15, No. 2
Pamela D. Pike Editor-in-Chief and Chief Content Director Many musicians use the summer break from teaching and performing to learn new music and prepare for the upcoming academic year at a leisurely pace. Our students, who look forward to a vacation from typical learning and...
Spring 2023: Editor’s Letter: Why Piano? Why Now? Rekindling the Joy
Spring 2023; Vol. 15, No. 1
By Pamela D. Pike Editor-in-Chief and Chief Content Director I spend much of my time thinking about what my students need. For my pre-college students, those essentials vary as they grow and progress, but I aim to help them develop technical and musical skills that...
Winter 2023: Editor’s Letter: Embracing Our Musical Identities and Nurturing Future Generations of Musicians
Winter 2023; Vol. 14, No. 4
By Pamela D. Pike Editor-in-Chief and Chief Content Director Musicians who are comfortable with and can easily describe their musical identities experience professional satisfaction.How do you identify as a musician? Are you a professional or amateur? Are you a teacher, performer, collaborative pianist, entrepreneur, studio...
Autumn 2019: Editor’s Letter
Autumn 2019; Vol. 11, No. 4
Indeed, one of my areas of formal research is understanding how musicians maintain careers across an entire lifespan. It is no surprise that professional musicians engage in a variety of activities each week, including solo and collaborative performances (in secular and sacred settings), teaching (in...
Autumn 2022: Editor’s Letter
Autumn 2022; Vol. 14. No. 3
This past summer, I had the privilege of attending the Oberammergau Passion Play. As the Plague raged throughout Europe in the early seventeenth century, the townspeople of the remote mountain village of Oberammergau, Germany, vowed to remember the Passion through performance once each decade if...
Winter 2021: Editor’s Letter: Embracing the Positive as We Emerge from Our Pandemic Cocoons
Winter 2021; Vol. 12, No. 5
After the long, dark winter, springtime represents a time for rebirth and renewal. Yet, as we head into the second year of our new “pandemic” normal, many musicians have grown weary of what they had assumed would be temporary inconveniences—teaching online, physically distant performances, and...
Cultivate the Community: Impressions from the 2022 Gilmore Piano Festival
Summer 2022; Vol. 14, No. 2
The Gilmore 2022: A Pianist’s Perspective Twenty years ago, one of my retired adult piano students took two weeks off from lessons to attend the Gilmore Piano Festival in Michigan. He returned, raving about the exceptional quality of the performing artists and insisting that I...
Summer 2022: Editor’s Letter: The Restorative Power of Rest and Professional Development
Summer 2022; Vol. 14, No. 2
For many, during the summer months we dispense with the daily rituals of teaching, practicing, and performing and, instead, make room for activities for which we do not have time during the academic year. As summer begins, the possibilities for learning new things and restoring...
Winter 2022: Editor’s Letter: Intermediate Students: Mind the Gap
Winter 2022; Vol. 13, No. 4
Arguably, facilitating student learning and performance during the intermediate-level years is where many teachers spend most of their teaching hours. Intermediate piano music takes years to work through and as the music becomes more demanding, these years coincide with activities that compete for students’ attention....
Teaching Piano in the Time of COVID-19
COVID-19 Special Issue; Vol. 12, No. 2
Excellent piano teachers negotiate the delicate balance between preparing and planning for each lesson, and responding to unanticipated student needs during the lesson. These two skills, careful preparation for upcoming lessons and thoughtful flexibility during actual lessons, are essential during the COVID-19 global pandemic. So,...
Teaching Music Online: Past, Present, and Future Opportunities
COVID-19 Special Issue; Vol. 12, No. 2
LEARNING BEFORE 2020 While teaching online is a new adventure for many professional musicians, it is an extension of distance education that began in the United States in the nineteenth century and was subsequently developed in Europe, Canada, and Australia.1 Often, these were courses offered...
Spring 2022: Editor’s Letter: Music Making For All
Spring 2022; Vol. 14, No. 1
Fifty years ago, in her “Questions and Answers” column from March 1971, Frances Clark wrote: “If [your students] continue not only to play the music they studied with you but to explore other music; if they are part of the life of their musical communities; if...
The Gilmore International Piano Festival: An Engine for Creative Activity
Spring 2022; Vol. 14, No. 1
Every two years, Kalamazoo, Michigan, and the surrounding region is overtaken by piano enthusiasts participating in the Gilmore International Piano Festival. This year, on April 8 and from April 24 through May 15, the Festival will feature classical and jazz performances, master classes, lectures, film screenings,...
How do you help an adult student who has ingrained poor technical habits?
Keyboard Companion Spring 2008; Vol. 19, No. 1
from the series: It’s Never Too Late: Adult Piano Study Michelle Conda, Editor by The Adult Learning Committee of the National Conference on Keyboard Pedagogy Okay, let’s face it – I’m not talking about the good habits your adult students have, but the bad habits that form...
Spring 2020: Editor’s Letter: Transforming Pianists Through Foundational Pedagogy
Spring 2020; Vol. 12, No. 1
In this issue of the Piano Magazine, we explore the impact of inspirational pedagogy on pianists of all ages and abilities. Teaching and learning piano requires dedication to developing skills, such as technique, voicing, balance, sight reading, and improvising, to name just a few. But,...