Autumn 2019: Editor’s Letter
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
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...
Cultivate the Community: Impressions from the 2022 Gilmore Piano Festival
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...
The Restorative Power of Rest and Professional Development
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
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
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
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
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
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,...
Editor’s Letter: Transforming Pianists Through Foundational Pedagogy
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,...
September 2018: Editor’s Page
New Beginnings September, this moment of new beginnings for both teachers and students, always seems to me like a time when anything might be possible. After several decades of teaching, I still look forward to the first day of classes and the first week of lessons as much as I did when...
November 2018: Editor’s Page
Celebrating American Music In this issue, we celebrate American music by taking a closer look at two composers. One whose name and music is familiar throughout the world; the other remains largely unknown even to professional musicians in her home country. In Celebrating Leonard Bernstein at 100, you’ll have an opportunity to explore Bernstein’s...
November 2018: Piano News
The 2018 Leeds International Piano Competition winners were announced on September 15, 2018. In April 2018, auditions were held in Singapore, Berlin, and New York. From the preliminary round, twenty-four pianists performed in the second round of competition at the University of Leeds, UK. Following the semi-final and final rounds, twenty-year-old Eric Lu, from the...
Editor’s Letter
One of the hallmarks of being human and living in a knowledge-based society is the ability to learn and adapt throughout our lives.1 Once thought to be a purview of youth, adults now recognize the necessity of continuing to increase knowledge and develop skills. Although...
Editor’s Letter: Summer: A Time for Renewal of Musical Passion
Typically, summer is a time of rest and renewal for piano teachers and performers. Even those who are lucky enough to perform and participate in summer festivals benefit from the change in pace and location. Finding time for purposeful renewal is crucial this year. Although...