Watching my students grow up …

One of my former students, Anna, studied with me from when she was in Kindergarten until I went on sabbatical when she was in high school. She continued her studies with a colleague of mine and is now about to graduate from college with a degree in Piano Performance.

As luck would have it, she was looking for an opportunity to practice-perform her recital program, and I wanted to offer a live performance to my group of 2nd graders.

Knowing the ability of my 2nd graders to sit and enjoy about 20-25 minutes of music, but not much more, I requested that Anna perform two of her three recital pieces: a Mozart Sonata and Schumann’s Papillons. I wanted to allow time to introduce the pieces, and time for questions after her performance.

My 2nd grade group had been studying Mozart’s Little Nightmusic, Haydn’s Surprise Symphony, and Beethoven’s Fifth, and were thus familiar with multi-movement works. I thought the Schumann would be a lovely contrast to the Mozart Sonata, both in form and character.

In addition to students and their parents, Mark and I also invited Dr. David Littrell with whom Anna had studied orchestra. And Jamey, another former student who occasionally comes back to play for me.

Here is Anna’s performance of the slow movement of the Mozart Sonata in A minor:

And here is Papillons by Schumann:

 

Spring Break

I love teaching.

It’s one of the relatively few things I am really good at. After having temporarily moved to a new city, several years ago, I was unable to find enough students to have a “studio” and it was the combination of not being able to find students and not being able to teach (much) that depressed me.

I would love to teach all the time. I never say no when the opportunity to work with a student arises. Which becomes a problem when I forget that even with the best job in the world, I need time off. Time to renew, rejuvenate, time to be away from it all.

Years ago, I learned to guard breaks such as winter and spring break, or the week after Memorial Day when I don’t teach, jealously. I learned that I do need this very definite unstructured time of no lessons. Not because I am sick and tired of teaching or because I feel I need a break, but because I need the distance. I need, and cherish, the “nothingness” on the calendar. Breathing space.

There were times when I gave in and taught “just a few make-up lessons” during a break and I always regretted it. I don’t know if it’s a case of “absence makes the heart grow fonder” or simply the need to step back from it all, remove myself for a week or two, look at things and teaching issues and students from a distance and then return to teaching with renewed energy.

Whatever the reason, I have learned to say No.

Well, kind of. A few days before this year’s spring break, a former student contacted me to see if I had some time to go over some music and theory with him. How can I say no to the opportunity to work with Jamey? Wednesday afternoon we spent a delightful, intensive, productive two hours taking parts of Liszt’s Liebestraum apart, working on technical issues, interpretation, and discussing theory, jazz, improvisation, and more.

Over the course of this spring break week, in addition to working with Jamey, I had medical appointments and an appointment with our accountant; we had to be home to meet with the irrigation guy to go over how to set up the spring irrigation schedule; we were expecting a call from the insulation people about working on our attic – none of it big, but all of it things on the calendar. Something nearly every day. It had seemed like a good idea to use spring break when my afternoons are free to do some of the things that might be more difficult to fit into my schedule when I teach. But it made spring break less of a break.

I realize that I live a very privileged life. A very first-world life, with first-world problems and solutions: doctors, accountants, irrigation and insulation experts.

But I am an introvert. In order to be there for my students, I need time to myself. Unstructured alone-time. Lots of Nothingness on the calendar. Next break, I’ll do better.

Why Praising Your Kids Can Hurt Them

Not exactly new, but definitely worth repeating:

Psychology of Parenting: Why Praising Your Kids Can Hurt Them

Po Bronson Debunks Conventional Parenting Wisdom that All Praise Is Good for Kids
By CYNTHIA MCFADDEN and DEBORAH APTON
ABC News (online) Sept. 3, 2009—

For writer and father Po Bronson, yelling praise from the sidelines of a soccer game to his child has always been part of his parental territory. And what parent hasn’t done the same, showering gushing platitudes like “You played great” or “You’re so smart” at their children at every twist and turn?

But praising your kids, Bronson says now, is what can ruin them. In his latest book, “NurtureShock,” written with Ashley Merryman, the science journalist explores some misconceptions about raising children and how certain modern parenting strategies, such as excessively praising children, can do more harm than good.

[…]  “Kids become fixated on maintaining the image of being smart, of never getting anything wrong in front of people, of always looking like they’ve gotten everything right, of making it look effortless,” said Bronson. “Because if you show effort, it’s a sign you can’t cut it on your natural gifts. And so they make safe choices. They choose classes that won’t challenge them. They choose teachers and projects where they know they can get an A.”

Bronson said he’s trying to reform and all parents should too — for their the sake of their children.

[…]  “The difference is a child who is truly motivated and interested in learning, versus a child who wants to memorize so they can get a good grade so they can keep hearing how smart they are,” Bronson explained.

A decade of groundbreaking research suggests that constant praise can lead kids to lose self-confidence, not gain it, and make them actually perform worse, not better.

Bronson relies heavily on the research of Carol Dweck, a professor of psychology at Stanford University.  […] Over the past decade, Dweck has conducted a series of experiments on 400 fifth-graders from different socio-economic groups across the country. The research provided the basis for one chapter of Bronson’s new book and points to a stunning result: Not all praise is created equal. Telling children they’re smart can actually hurt them, and you get a far better result if you praise children for challenging themselves, and for effort.

“Nightline” asked Dweck and one of her graduate students to show us how it works.

Mary, 9, and Jameson, 10, were given a series of IQ puzzles and asked to work on them silently. At the end, the researcher gave each child a score. The research assistant praised Mary for being smart, while Jameson was praised for working hard.

After reviewing Mary’s answers, the research assistant lauded her: “Wow, you did really well at these problems. You got 8 — that’s a great score. You must be really smart at these problems.”  If Dweck’s theory holds, Mary will want to continue to look smart, and when given the choice, will opt for a test that shows it — not something more challenging where they she could learn more.

In the next phase, when Mary was asked by the research assistant what kind of problems she would like to work on next, “problems that are pretty easy so you’ll do well, problems that you’re pretty good at so you can show that you’re smart, or problems that you’ll learn a lot from even if you don’t look so smart,” Mary chose problems to show that she’s smart.

“Problems that I’m pretty good at — so I can show I’m smart,” Mary told the researcher. “I am smart.”

Consider the difference with Jameson, who was praised for how hard he’d worked — not for being smart.  “Well, you did really well on these problems. You got 8 — that’s a really high score! You must have worked really hard on these problems,” the researcher said. Jameson agreed.

Dweck’s research suggests that Jameson — armed with praise for his hard work — will want to challenge himself — even though he got some problems wrong.  Following course, Jameson opted for “problems I’ll learn a lot from even if I don’t look so smart.”

Bingo. But Dweck took the experiment one step further. Both kids were immediately given another test — one that was much more difficult than the first and way beyond their grade.

While Mary actually performed extremely well, the researcher was discouraging, and asked her why she seemed to have more trouble with the second set of problems. A deflated Mary said that she wasn’t smart enough.  “There are other people in my class that are smarter than me. … I’m not really that smart because of that, because I’m not used to them [the problems],” she said. “I worked hard as I can, so I think I’m not smart enough. But I do think I’m really, really smart but not ready for the other problems. But I want to do them when I get home.”

Jameson, who got only three answers right to Mary’s six on the very difficult second test, remained undaunted, moving onto a third test and nailing it — getting nine problems right.

But Mary seemed to crumble, getting only three right on the third test. And remember, she’d actually done twice as well as Jameson on the difficult second test. The point, Dweck said, is that praising children’s intelligence makes them less resilient when they hit a bump in the road and less willing to challenge themselves.

“After they’re praised for their effort, they enjoy being challenged,” Dweck explained. “What we value here is the practice, the effort, the trying of many strategies, and then they can feel satisfied as long as they’ve been engaged in that way. But if you say we value how smart you are, how enjoyable can it be if you’re not shining?”

Bronson said the sense of failure, induced by Dwek’s experiment, made Mary perform worse than she could have. In turn, Jameson, who was praised for effort, learned strategies for concentrating and facing challenges.  “At the end of the day, on the medium test, he ends up doing a better job than Mary, who had actually performed at a higher level up until then,” Dweck said.

[…] While Dweck’s research suggests parents need to stop praising their kids in a generalized way, with catch phrases like “You’re so smart” “You’re great,” praise given correctly — for effort or for specific accomplishments — “I really liked how you passed the ball to Johnny” or “You worked really hard on the field today” can be helpful, as opposed to “You’re the best soccer player ever!”

[…]Psychologist Florrie Ng was interested in studying cross-cultural parenting. She conducted research while she was at the University of Illinois, with children and their mothers in Illinois and Hong Kong. She tested kids with a similar pattern-matching test used by Dweck.

During a five-minute break, American mothers were given their child’s score. They were then told that their child did not perform well, regardless of their child’s actual score, and were then instructed to talk to their child about the test. During the sit-down with their kids, the American mothers did not mention their child’s “poor” score, but instead offered their child praise and presents, regardless.

“We saw them ignoring — completely ignoring — their child’s failure. And not willing to help them, and if anything, praising them for their intelligence, or saying, ‘Don’t worry, ‘You’re going to do great,'” Bronson said.

By contrast, when mothers in Hong Kong were told their child hadn’t performed well on the same test, they addressed the issue with their children, Bronson explained, working through the problems with their children and encouraged them to stay focused.

When the American and Chinese children were tested again, following the one-on-one sit-down with their mothers, the Chinese performed 33 percent better than in earlier tests. Ng plants to continue her research at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

“You might think that these Chinese mothers were cold and inconsiderate and cruel and harsh to their children. But when you watch the videotapes, these mothers are touching their child. They’re loving, they have their arm around their child, they are stroking them, they are just as affectionate as the American mothers were,” Bronson said.

“As American parents, we can be loving and affectionate and supportive at the same time as we are directing our child’s attention to better strategies to improve and to learn,” Bronson said.  “The child wants to do well on the test; help the child do well on the test. Don’t do things that are just going to make the child underperform on the next test.”

[…] “I became a social praiser,” Bronson said. “And I started to feel like — that it wasn’t my child. My child was doing great at the new praise regimen. It was I who was suffering. The praise junkie wasn’t my child; it was me.”

But Bronson confirmed that there’s no limit on one kind of support. Unconditional love is something parents can repeat and repeat.  “Telling your child you love them is something else,” Bronson said. “You can tell your child you love them all you want.”

Please read the complete article at http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/nurtureshock-parenting-tips-praising-kids-hurt/Story?id=8475074&page=1

What good are piano lessons?

I believe they are called “blanket statements”.

“Taking piano lessons is good for you / your child / your IQ / etc.”

You’ve heard it, perhaps tried to heed that advice.  Maybe it worked, maybe it didn’t.

While there is some research on the topic, the problem is that “Piano lessons are good for you” is as accurate as “Eating food will make you fat”. Everyone knows that, yes indeed, some food will make you fat, but it also depends on how much of which food we are talking about. People don’t seem to be that descerning when it comes to piano lessons. Piano lessons are good for you, right?

Wrong.

Remember the adage, “Practice doesn’t make perfect; practice makes permanent”? I’d like to add, “Perfect practice makes perfect.”

Good piano lessons are good for you.

Some 40 years ago, after my first piano teacher with whom I had studied for only a year or two got married and moved away, we were faced with the challenge of finding a new teacher. Our piano tuner, a gentle and quiet man, recommended his mother. I don’t know what her qualifications were, and it doesn’t really matter. What matters is that this woman taught piano lessons on a tall and dark upright piano in a dark corner of her dark living room; piano lessons that for a while destroyed my love for the piano.

While my first teacher, a young and enthusiastic woman, was good (which I didn’t realize until much much later when I read through some of the assignments she had written), I didn’t really learn how to practice. I was kind of lucky – or perhaps not, depending on how you look at it -, because I had some talent, and excellent ears, and faked my way through the note-reading exercises. My new teacher would get upset about my lack of sight-reading skills, urging me during our dreaded four-hand sight-reading sessions sternly, “Keep going!!!” – which is exactly what someone with no sight-reading skills can not do.

Sight-reading was not the only thing I wasn’t good at. I had no clue what it meant to practice. If I did sit down at the piano between lessons, I’d play through a couple of songs, usually not the ones I was assigned because those were “hard” and I didn’t know them, I didn’t know what they were supposed to sound like, and I didn’t know how to practice and I didn’t like them anyway. I had no sense of rhythm, I couldn’t count. My teacher managed to identify my weaknesses but that’s where she stopped; she was unable to help me overcome them. All in a tense, rigid, dark atmosphere. What I learned from her was that I wasn’t good enough. I hated lessons, and I still hadn’t learned how to practice, nor how to read, nor count.

After a while, I don’t remember how long I took lessons, my mother who by nature and nurture does not quit (“You started it, now you stick with it!”) said, “You know, if you want to stop lessons with her, that would be ok.”  She also made sure that, after a break (one year?), I auditioned with a new teacher who then became not only my new piano teacher, but also mentor, guide, coach, and solid rock in my tumultuous teenage years. I was lucky.

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Perhaps because I love music and the piano in particular, and I love learning and studying and teaching, I think that we do not need any outside reason to study music. If studying the piano does help with math, languages, etc., then all the better, but that shouldn’t be the main reason to take piano lessons.

Another aspect:

Neurologist Oliver Sacks (author of case-history collections such as Awakenings and The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat), during an interview about his book, Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain, had the following answer to one of the interviewer’s questions:

From the perspective of neurological development, is it important to give music lessons to your kids?

Sacks: One can become a creative and good human being without music lessons. But it does look as if fairly intensive musical training can promote the development of various parts of the brain, which may facilitate other non-musical cognitive powers.

Please note the first part of his answer. Also note the fact that he specifically says “fairly intensive musical training” (not just any old piano lesson) and says, “can promote” and “may facilitate”. A much more realistic answer, and therefore more honest, than the blanket “piano lessons are good for you.”

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Sad update, just two days later: Oliver Sacks has terminal cancer. He talks about it here.

Piano Concerto Competition 2015

2015-02-07 concerto bouquet from Marlena

2015-02-07 gorgeous concerto bouquet from Marlena

While many of my students studied a concerto over the last couple months, several of the older students were not able to compete yesterday due to sports events, ACT, etc.

I had five students in the 1st – 3rd grade category, and one in the 4th-6th grade category. They all played well and were able to convey the character of their pieces in an appropriate manner. Ethan was awarded First Place, Heather and Marlena got Honorable Mention. Why Angie and Evelyn were not recognized for their performances is baffling as their performances were just as good: Angie did a marvelous job taking her time to play slowly with expression and maturity. And Evelyn tackled a very long Minuet; playing with beautiful and very clear dynamics and a steady but not rigid tempo, mastering the tricky ornaments.

Jay played the second movement of Martha Mier’s Concerto in Classical Style with beautiful expression. Unfortunately, on the bottom of the second page of her three-page piece, she hit a wrong note, took a wrong turn, and was thrown for a  loop so completely that for a moment she just sat there, stunned. But – and I think this is what counts – when I asked if she could continue on the third page, she was not only able to do that, but she finished her piece beautifully, as if nothing had happened. (Bitter tears into her mom’s shoulder after her performance were proof that something devastating had happened.)

There were other students in the same category who played in a less accomplished manner – sloppy technique, not much expression – who were awarded Honorable Mention.

Why the judge decided not to recognize Jay’s performance with an Honorable Mention I do not understand, especially since at least one other student, in a different category, had memory lapses as well, not just one but several of them, and so profound that he had to resort to looking at his teacher’s score to refresh his memory. It was obvious though that without the memory lapses his playing was very accomplished, and the judge recognized this and awarded a second place. It makes me sad that the judge did not show the same kind of understanding to Jay.

This is not the first competition, of course, where I don’t agree with the judge’s decisions – and it has nothing to do with my students not making all first place. As a matter of fact, I once disagreed with the judge on one of my students making First Place: I didn’t think his performance was good enough. And there are always times where I don’t understand the judge’s rationale regarding other (teachers’) students’ placement.

Which raises an awkward question then: why, if I tend to disagree with the judges’ decisions, do we enter competitions at all?

I could say, and have said, that the journey is more important than the destination.

In preparation for the competition we had had weekly rehearsals which fostered not only an aspect of community among the students and parents, but also made performing their concertos – at least for their peers – something they did comfortably, with ease and confidence.

We discussed and practiced aspects of performing: how to walk up to the piano, how to bow (not too fast!), how to sit, how to wait (hands in your lap), how to start the piece, how to finish, etc and so on. And it showed: several people commented that my students performed with poise and confidence. Which is a life skill I hope they take into other aspects of performing: giving a speech, a presentation; how they carry themselves.

It was also a good experience to take a difficult piece and bring it to a high level of mastery, higher than we normally aspire to with our regular pieces. It was a good experience to learn to deal with getting tired of working on the same thing, again, on detail work, again …, on performing without letting the fatigue show. Again, a life skill I hope.

But that’s like sour grapes.

While it is nice for a teacher to be able to say, “My students took home such and so many prizes” it’s not really something I base my worth or reputation on. But it would have been nice for my students to have this outside, official proof that they did well.

I suppose the real life lesson here is – and this is of course nothing new at all -, the real life lesson is that competitions are subjective, and sometimes you get lucky and there is appropriate recognition for your work, and sometimes you don’t and there isn’t.

I try to be very specific in my teaching, helping my students figure out what exactly is not good enough, and then how to improve it. So I am always looking forward to the judge’s comments, the critique sheets, as I expect they tell us what he/she felt was good and what could be better. This year, I was hoping to find something in the comments that would explain why one student got Honorable Mention but another didn’t when I felt they had played equally well. Here are two critique sheets, with identifying details left out, so we can focus on just the comments:

2015-02-07 concerto critique Marlena

2015-02-07 concerto critique AngieOne of the above got Honorable Mention, the other didn’t.  From the comments, I can’t tell. How am I supposed to explain to my students what the criteria were if they are not obvious from the critique sheet?

Making Music a Life Profession

The following article was published in the American Music Teacher, Aug-Sept, 1995. It is as relevant today as it was then.

Dr. Virginia Houser, Kansas State University

A friend of mine quit her profession last year. Janice was a bright, energetic young woman dedicated to her clients and excited about her field. After moving to town several years ago, she jumped into her work wholeheartedly, developing a clientele, joining local professional organizations, and making contacts within the community. Who would have thought she would leave the profession within three years?

Janice’s profession is my profession–piano teaching. I am saddened by her departure and the loss it represents–the students who reluctantly have had to find another teacher, the future students who will not know her, and those of us who will not be enriched by her ideas. Why did this fine teacher, seemingly well-trained, enthusiastic, and passionate about music, quit the profession?

DOES TRADITIONAL PIANO PEDAGOGY ADDRESS ALL THE RIGHT ISSUES?

As I have reflected on Janice’s departure from the music field, I have wondered about her pedagogical training. She often spoke about how enjoyable her college pedagogy courses had been. She still referred to the enormous resource notebook she had developed from those courses.

I would guess that most current pedagogy courses present the nuts-and-bolts information of running a private studio, i.e. learning styles and theories, aspects of studio management and business procedures, methods and materials, and use of technology. This is undoubtedly a necessary component of teacher training. But the question can be raised, as in Janice’s case: Is such information sufficient for insuring long-term vitality in a teacher’s lifework?

THE UNDERPINNING OF DYNAMIC PIANO TEACHING

The music profession has retained, probably to a greater degree than many other fields, a close tie to the original meaning of the word “professional”:

At root, a professional is one who makes a profession of faith–a faith in something larger and wiser than his or her own powers….the true professional is a person whose action points beyond his or her self to that underlying reality, that hidden wholeness, on which we all can rely…the true professional is one who…strips away all illusions to reveal a reliable truth in which the human heart can rest.(1)
This “reliable truth” is the heart of our profession–music itself and its power to inspire, express, illuminate, and transform thought and emotion.

Considering music’s close ties to matters of the heart, should not pedagogy programs pay attention to spiritual aspects as well as informational elements in their training? Marilla Svinicki in the book Teaching Tips writes:

A teacher, whether by accident or design is more to students than a content expert. The teacher is a model of all that it means to be a thinking person. We teach not only what we know but what we are. Part of the ethics of teaching is to realize this responsibility and to become the best models we can be, which requires some serious self-reflection on our personal standards of scholarship and living.(2)
Spiritual perspectives of the music teacher’s life are seldom overtly taught to pedagogy students. Perhaps it is assumed that students interested in piano teaching already possess the self-knowledge and ideals for life work in music. Perhaps it is assumed that such perspectives will be learned in the process of working with their own teachers in the classroom and studio. Perhaps these aspects seem too intangible to teach.

Whatever the reasons, inclusion of topics outside of the informational realm can go a long way in preventing Janice’s crisis of spirit. Teacher training programs which offer a more holistic curriculum promote longevity and effectiveness in teachers’ careers by bringing attention to a wide array of topics. In regard to spiritual considerations, what ideas and resources nourish the inner life of a teacher?

SUGGESTIONS FOR LONG-TERM, ZESTFUL LIVING AND TEACHING

Live with a vision.

While it is important to have goals and plans for one’s life, listing personal goals within time frames is not the starting point of purposeful living–commitment to a life purpose is. In his book, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey invites you to visualize being present at your own funeral. For what would you be remembered? How would that life have made a difference in the world? Covey stresses the value of taking stock of one’s life and creating a mission statement–“the solid expression of your vision and values….the criterion by which you measure everything else in your life.”(3)

Know your own daily, weekly, monthly, and annual rhythms.

Many of us in the teaching profession plan our schedules without considering our personal rhythms and cycles. Questions to ask oneself for optimum energy levels throughout the year might include: Am I a morning or evening person? When is the lowest slump in my day? What can I do to help myself through it? Does my teaching schedule reflect my varying energy levels during the week? What can I do for myself to insure high energy during the demanding times of the year? How can I best use the less demanding times of the year to recharge my batteries through interesting activities, rest, and reflection?

Integrate personal renewal into each day’s schedule.

How easy it is for independent music teachers to live frantic lives without private time. The message can be traced back to earlier student years: work long and hard and success will follow. Consequently teachers, especially those in the early years of building a studio, are prone to interpreting continuing tiredness as confirmation they are devoting sufficient time and energy to their work. This can lead to a lifestyle of constant unrelieved work activity that frustrates and squelches the inner creative voice.

Covey describes the hypothetical scenario of a man in the woods working like a maniac to saw down a tree. Although the work has become slow and difficult, he refuses to take a break to sharpen the saw. “I don’t have time to sharpen the saw,” the man explains emphatically. “I’m too busy sawing!”(4) Similarly, the teacher should take time to cultivate life-long habits which nourish and preserve the […] dimensions of human nature: physical, mental, social, emotional, and spiritual.

Design your life for development of “the things worth being”.

In their book, Type A Behavior and Your Heart, Drs. Meyer Friedman and Ray Roseman discuss the necessity of cultivating an interest in the broad satisfactions of human culture. Not only do they write this is crucial to maintaining good health, but also write that one “cannot continue to avoid all that man in the past has considered lovely and humane without becoming the sort of person whose death saddens no one.”(5)

How easy it is for teachers to abandon all interests and activities that are not directly related to their profession! And yet the rejuvenation and perspective from other activities enlivens teaching. The music professional does herself a favor by regularly visiting libraries, museums, galleries, concert halls, theaters, and parks. This also includes time with friends and reading of books that tell about the lives of inspiring people.

Cultivate a life approach that does not separate creativity from daily living.

In preparing for a life of satisfying personal and professional achievements, I believe the teacher should cultivate a sense of learning and curiosity that is not limited to certain activities and times of the day. Hugh Prather in his book, Notes on How to Live in the World …and Still Be Happy, recommends bringing the same attention and energy to both job and personal life for optimum happiness. If a teacher can inculcate a sense of creativity in all circumstances–from housework to planning the day’s schedule to grocery shopping to successfully teaching concepts to a young student–rejuvenation can be an integral component of daily life.

Cultivate the habit of writing.

Personal writing probably works best when not read by anyone else. It does not have to be polished writing. To be most effective, it should be honest and done regularly; and like playing the piano, it improves with practice. In her book, The Artist’s Way – A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity, Julia Cameron describes writing as her own form of meditation and a fundamental tool of creative recovery and maintenance. As a film and television writer, director, and producer, she speaks about creativity in the following way:

“In order to create, we draw from our inner well. This inner well, an artistic reservoir, is ideally like a well-stocked trout pond….As artists, we must realize that we have to maintain this artistic ecosystem. If we don’t give some attention to upkeep, our well is apt to become depleted, stagnant, or blocked….Any extended period or piece of work draws heavily on our artistic well….leaves us with diminished resources….we must learn to be self-nourishing.”(6)

Writing is a wonderful form of self-nourishment and can be encouraged by the habit of keeping a pencil and pad available for scribbling ideas throughout the day–in the car, bathroom, kitchen, night table. A personal diary can be valuable as a written record, feedback to oneself, uncritical friend, access to creativity, personal expression, a problem-solving tool, and therapy. A practice journal by the piano invites the pianist to record practice times, impressions, ideas, and musical goals.

Emphasize means over ends as the most important element in the ventures of life.

It is unfortunate that in our goal-oriented, competitive, result-driven culture, the mentality which glorifies ends over means influences every pursuit. So it often is with music study. Ends-oriented teaching stresses competitive performing to the exclusion of broader considerations. Means-oriented teaching promotes and develops a wide range of elements: comprehensive musicianship skills; awareness of the body in playing; nourishment of a deep emotional attachment to the music itself; personal knowledge of one’s own learning style; and responding, creating, and expressing in the sound and emotion of the present moment.

Remember that efficiency and function do not feed the soul.

We all absorb the message from the earliest age on into adult life–to live in a way that produces results in the quickest, most efficient way possible is the best way. Modern culture extols efficiency and function in objects and lives as well; but a deep, rich sense of living is not nourished by these elements. In his book, Care of the Soul, Thomas Moore writes about the soul and spirit being fed by myth, ritual, tradition, and, for those who embrace a higher faith, religious belief. It has been noted Drs. Friedman & Rosenman in Type A Behavior and Your Heart that “the repetition of any pleasant event eventually gives far, far more pleasure than the initial event possibly could have done”.(7)

Rituals to enhance the life of a music studio might include celebrating achievement with recitals, complete with individual certificates and sharing of refreshments; giving birthday remembrances; observance of holidays and seasons of the year through appropriate music and decorations; and regular study of the great composers’ lives.

Stay in touch with new ideas in the time management field.

Time management encompasses so much more than it used to. While the teacher can always gain inspiration from reading books about time use (e.g. How to Get Control of Your Time and Your Lifeby Alan Lakein, or How to Put More Time in Your Life by Dru Scott), there are holistic-approach books which adopt a broader life-management view. One such book, You Don’t Have to Go Home From Work Exhausted by Ann McGee-Cooper, promotes ideas to bring joy, energy, and balance to life. Topics include high energy engineering, the importance of passion and dreams, recapturing the vitality of childhood, balancing work and play, recognizing burnout traps, designing an energy environment, and daydreaming as a source of energy. A far cry from the old make-a-list-and-check-it-off system!

Cultivate active ties with fellow musicians through dynamic involvement in professional organizations.

No pianist leaves a pedagogy course without hearing about the value of membership in a music organization. Yet it is easy for a new teacher in a community to get so busy setting up a studio that seeking out fellow professionals gets put on the back burner. It cannot be stressed too much in pedagogy training; there is a synergy in numbers which translates into inspiration, practical ideas, increased knowledge, exchange of information, and increased political and financial resources for its members.

CONCLUSION

Independent teachers, by taking advantage of the freedom and choices available in their profession, can create a life that is creative and restorative. Problems and stress are handled within the context of a larger purpose. Flexibility, awareness, open-mindedness, love of learning, balance, and attention to self and others are tools of daily living. It is from this humanistic foundation that living and teaching are nourished.

NOTES:1. Parker J. Palmer, The Active Life–A Spirituality of Work, Creativity and Caring(San Francisco: Harper & Row Publishers, 1990), 44.2. Wilbert J. McKeachie, ed., Teaching Tips (Lexington, MA: D.C. Heath and Co., 1994), 273.3. Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People(New York: Simon & Schuster Inc., 1989), 129.4. Ibid., 2875. Meyer Friedman, M.D. and Ray H. Rosenman, M.D., Type A Behavior and Your Heart(New York: Ballantine Books, 1974), 255.6. Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way–A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity (New York: Putnam Publishing Group, 1992), 20-21.7. Friedman and Rosenman, 257.

The amusic brain

an abstract from an article by Isabelle Peretz, Elvira Brattico, Miika Jarvenpaa, and Mari Tervaniemi in Brain. A Journal of Neurology

Like language, music engagement is universal, complex and presentearly in life. However, ~4% of the general population experiencesa lifelong deficit in music perception that cannot be explainedby hearing loss, brain damage, intellectual deficiencies orlack of exposure. This musical disorder, commonly known as tone-deafnessand now termed congenital amusia, affects mostly the melodicpitch dimension. Congenital amusia is hereditary and is associatedwith abnormal grey and white matter in the auditory cortex andthe inferior frontal cortex. In order to relate these anatomicalanomalies to the behavioural expression of the disorder, wemeasured the electrical brain activity of amusic subjects andmatched controls while they monitored melodies for the presenceof pitch anomalies. Contrary to current reports, we show thatthe amusic brain can track quarter-tone pitch differences, exhibitingan early right-lateralized negative brain response. This suggestsnear-normal neural processing of musical pitch incongruitiesin congenital amusia. It is important because it reveals thatthe amusic brain is equipped with the essential neural circuitryto perceive fine-grained pitch differences. What distinguishesthe amusic from the normal brain is the limited awareness ofthis ability and the lack of responsiveness to the semitonechanges that violate musical keys. These findings suggest that,in the amusic brain, the neural pitch representation cannotmake contact with musical pitch knowledge along the auditory-frontalneural pathway.

So, in essence, and pushing this issue a bit further:  this is like autism with regard to music?  Just like an individual with autism who can perfectly well see and hear – but then doesn’t know what to do with this sensory input (what does it mean when someone “smiles”??), an individual with an amusic brain can hear and distinguish musical details just as well as everyone else – but what is being heard has no meaning because there is no “contact with music pitch knowledge” due to a “lack of responsiveness”.

The question, as always, is:  what do we do – now that we know?

In Defense of Key Signatures, Accidentals, Double Sharps and Double Flats

In the February 2009 issue of American Music Teacher (AMT), published by the Music Teachers National Association (MTNA) of which I am a member, there is under “Impromptu” a short informational (infomercial?) entry for “Simplified Music Notation”.  As a teacher of all ages and all levels with a special interest in brain research and Special Education, I am naturally interested in anything that can make a student’s life (or mine) easier, less complicated.  The idea of a “Simplified Music Notation” seemed to fit that bill, so I looked at the website.

I have, in another post on this site, written about the issue of simplification, and the fact that there’s a right way and then there is a wrong way to simplify.  The right way maintains the spirit of the music but makes life easier for the performer – such as redistributing notes between the hands, or leaving out doubled notes in chords that are too large for a small hand.  When simplification is done right, you don’t hear a difference; as a matter of fact, it likely sounds better than the original because the performer is now technically able to play with expression whereas the original would either have been impossible to play or so strained that expression was a lost cause.

As someone who didn’t learn to sight-play until grad school, I had missed out on a lot of literature, growing up, because it was too time-consuming to learn to read the many notes – unless I knew how the piece sounded in which case I easily played by ear, using the score as a last resort to check on notes I wasn’t sure about.  Learning a piece I didn’t know was piece-meal work:  I’d laboriously figure out the notes in one measure, play it a couple of times until I had it memorized, then go on to the next measure, and from there string the measures together.  Amazingly, this worked for Chopin Ballades, Scherzi, Etudes, Schubert Sonatas and the like.   It did, however, not work for Hindemith.  I had somehow managed to never play Hindemith before, so my grad school professor assigned the Second Piano Sonata.  Progress was glacial at best.  Dr. Edwards grew frustrated and finally, suspecting that my reading skills (or, better, lack thereof) were to blame, put an easy Schumann piece (Melody? or something like that from the Album for the Young) in front of me, “Play!!”  It was a disaster.

As someone who suffered the consequences of not learning to sight-play until grad school, I now take great care to teach my students how to read and sight-play.  There is more to sight-playing than knowing your notes: sight-playing requires horizontal thinking and understanding, anticipation, and the development of  a secure knowledge of the keyboard topography – your fingers have to know where the keys are without looking down.   You also have to be able to “think” in different keys, so that there is an immediate knowledge of what to expect from, say, Beethoven’s Bagatelle in G minor – there will be B flats and E flats (from the key signature), and accidental F sharps, etc.  This is a skill I aim to develop in all of my students.

While my approach to teaching how to read works, I am always interested in learning more and perhaps finding a system which works even better.

According to their website,

Simplified Music Notation is a new notation designed to make sight-reading easier. It was originally created for musicians with dyslexia, memory impairments and other disabilities, but has gained interest from a broad range of professional and amateur musicians.

Sharps and flats are given by the shape of the notehead. This eliminates the necessity of relying on the key signature and dispenses with the need for accidentals.

The key signature is still there, along with all the information in the original score, but many of the unnecessary complexities of reading music have been removed.

“Simplified Music Notation”  promises

You no longer have to remember

— the key signature
— accidentals throughout the bar
— cancelling accidentals at the end of the bar
— transposing double flats and sharps

Wow.  What a relief!

Or is it?

Unfortunately, this system is based on a couple of incorrect assumptions.  According to this system, reading difficulties stem from key signatures, accidentals, and double flats and sharps.  (I don’t know what they mean by “transposing double flats and sharps”.)

If that were so, then my attempt at reading that easy Schumann piece should have been a piece of cake:  I distinctly remember that it was in the key of C (key signature: no sharps, no flats); there may have been one lonely F# toward the end of the first line.  If they were to take that piece and transcribe and convert it to Simplified Music Notation, it would not look any different, except for that F# which would alter the shape of the note head instead of having a # in front of it – hardly a simplification.

Next, it has been my experience that the difficulties that dyslexic students have with reading words/sentences, are different from the difficulties of note reading.  I have had dyslexic students who read music with relative ease, and I have had students who had no trouble at all with reading language but couldn’t read music to save their lives.

Then, they claim to eliminate “the necessity of relying on the key signature”.  While it is true that I tell my students that if a note sounds wrong, “check the key signature, then the clef (Right Hand is not always in the treble clef, etc.), then accidentals” – thereby acknowledging that remembering the key signature may take some effort – I also explain to them that the key signature is like their zip code:  it gives you a map, it tells you where to find what, it puts things into perspective, into a relationship.  If you are used to (skilled at) thinking in different keys, then playing a piece in A flat will pose no problems that could be traced to having to “rely” on the key signature.  On the contrary, having the key signature, thinking in the key, will help you read because you are familiar with the map, you know what to expect.  – If reading in A flat is a problem for you, then perhaps you are not ready to read a piece in A flat.  Simplifying the notation only covers up that problem. (This by the way does not mean that you shouldn’t play that piece in A flat – there are other ways to learn a piece than read it.)

I suppose, the worst here is the issue of double sharps and flats, as well as “white key” sharps and flats such as E#.  They “simplify” the notation and write the note of the white key.  While it is important for students to learn that E# is a white key, it is equally important that they learn that E# and F are not the same!  Yes, they are played on the same key, but they are not the same note.  Just like B flat and A sharp are not the same.  I like to do an experiment with a beginning student who has just figured out, by ear, an F major scale (black key – yay!) by asking what the notes were.  Many students will call that black key “A sharp” but it takes just a moment for me to explain that it has to be called B flat because we are replacing the B, not the A.  What is altered when you use enharmonic notes is the shape of the melody, and, importantly: the visual image (and cue).   Imagine an F# minor scale:  harmonic minor will have an E# in the scale.  Simplified Notation will write the scale as F#-G#-A-B-C#-D-F-F#.  That is not a scale!  It doesn’t look like a scale, it violates the visual image we have of a scale.

Or take a highly patterned piece such as Robert Vandall’s Prelude in G major:  The left hand pattern always starts with a half step down, then up again to the first note, then down an octave: G-F#-G-(low)G for instance.  Visually, it is instantly recognizable: one down, one up, octave down.  The pattern has implications for the fingering:  1-2-1-5, with the second finger always a half step below the first – meaning: very next key.  Learning, or sight-playing this piece, we put the visual cue and the fingering together.  In most measures, this pattern is followed by a repetition of the first three notes, creating:  G-F#-G-(low)G-G-F#-G, etc. (Did you notice the palindrome?)  Because we have looked at this and analyzed it,  we now know that we don’t need to “read” the last three notes – because we know that they are the same as the first three.  Actually, we don’t need to read any notes beyond the first because of the pattern!  So, there goes the issue of having to remember accidentals lasting through the end of the measure.   On the second page, there are two measures with (the same) double sharp: G#-Fx-G#.  Visually, we instantly recognize this as “the same” as before = same fingering, etc.  With Simplified Notation, this would look totally different:  G#-G-G# – we would have to think about it to recognize that it is actually the same pattern.  Destroyed is the consistency, the visual cue.  Yes, I am sure students can learn to play this piece with Simplified Notation, but they will have missed out on really understanding this piece.  And I don’t see how the Simplified Notation would have helped with memory.  Understanding patterns (visual, fingering, aural, and more) goes such a long way toward memorizing; I’ve been known to say to my (new) students, when they ask whether they “have to” memorize a piece, “If you really use your brain learning this piece, you cannot help but memorize along the way!”  (We know there’s more to memory than this, but it’s a fantastic and reliable start!)

The “unnecessary complexities of reading music” do not come from the key signature, accidentals, and double sharps and flats.  Music notation, the way it is, is a marvelous system that makes sense.  It has clear-cut rules that are mathematical in nature, they have to do with ratio, absolute distance,  etc. – unlike other musical signs, such as signs that indicate touch, tempo or dynamics:  there are (and should be!) infinite variations of staccato for instance.

Whenever I hear the cry for stricter rules here in town for – take your pick: non-smoking, vicious dogs, speed limits, I think: we do not need stricter rules, we need to enforce the rules we have!  The rules are there, but they need to be obeyed and enforced.

So, for music notation, what we need is not a new system with new rules, we simply need to adhere to the rules we have!  The rules say, for instance, that the barline cancels the accidental(s) of the previous measure.  But what do we have in the next measure?  A gratuitous, “friendly-reminder” natural/sharp/flat.  THAT is what clutters the score!  THAT is what makes reading unnecessarily difficult because it demands our attention, and then the decision that we can ignore the symbol – what a waste of brain power!  I can’t tell you how many times a confused student has asked, “Why is there a natural here in this measure?  I thought the barline cancels the accidental??”

When I shared with Mark who has a black belt in Karate my misgivings about this kind of simplification, he immediately had this story:

I told you about sparring with the Tae Kwon Do people.

I was paired with a woman who was perhaps 5 or 6 inches shorter than me. She had beautiful kicks and tremendous flexibility. Her spinning back kick was consistently higher than my head. Her form during the kick and after was atrocious.
During the kick she was not looking at the target. At best her line of sight was 90º to the side, and at worst she was looking 180º in the wrong direction. Imagine throwing a pitch with a baseball. You look at the catcher’s mitt, you look at the target. You don’t throw the ball with your eyes closed and hope that it heads in the right direction. Without looking at the target you have no control over the kick or pitch.
After throwing the kick she ended up facing away from me. Her back was completely exposed. In the karate-do world I came from the back was a legitimate target. Exposing your back to your opponent was called  mubobi or a defenseless posture. In point sparring you were giving your opponent a free point, on the street you were giving your attacker your life.
While her form was beautiful it was completely incorrect. She had no visual control over where the kick was going, she consistently missed the target, and she finished the kick facing the wrong way. I never had to duck or block her kicks, and I always had a free shot to her back or the back of her head after she completed her spin.
She was offended when I pointed this out, and indignant when I started tapping the back of her head with my fist each time. “That’s not a target!” she would say. Maybe in Tae Kwon Do it isn’t a target, but in the real world it is a target.
Her instructors had done her a huge disservice; they had allowed her to advance through their rank system with the belief that what she was doing was an effective martial arts technique when in fact it was anything but. Her form was beautiful, her style was flawless, but what she was doing wasn’t self defense or martial arts.

Using Simplified Music Notation violates the rational logic of music notation (the way it is) and gives our students a false sense of reading “skills”.

Update January 1, 2015:

Last year I bought a new book by Diane Hidy, “Attention Grabbers” (published in 2012). The pieces are attractive, immensely playable, and, best of all, easy to read. I so appreciate especially this “notational difference” she mentions on page 3: “Pick-up notes appear before each new phrase on a new system rather than at the end of the previous system.” While definitely a break with tradition, this is not really a simplification, just a more logical way of notating music because it allows the student to immediately recognize patterns – also because the number of measures in a system conforms to the pattern or phrase length – the wisest choice an editor can make. Which means that most of the time we get four measures in a system, but occasionally six or seven if the phrase length dictates it. Which also means that occasionally – when the music moves in half notes for instance – the notes seem a bit drawn out, and any other editor/publisher would have insisted on squishing more measures into the system.

Merry Christmas!

I’ve overheard teachers say, “Only a couple more students stand between me and my winter/summer/whatever break …”  How sad is that? It makes the students sound like an obstacle, something to endure. What kind of lesson can you expect with this attitude?

While I certainly look forward to my break, I hope I never feel like any of my students stand between me and something I am looking forward to.

This week Monday and Tuesday are official make-up lesson days: students who had to miss a lesson this semester and have not yet been able to make it up have their chance now. Only four and a half lessons over the course of two whole days: one at 11 this  morning, one in the afternoon, half of one as an extra lesson for a student who needed a bit of extra help with a piece, and then tomorrow a lesson at 1:30 and one at 2:30.

In a normal week, a spread-out schedule like this would feel terribly disjointed and wasteful. But somehow, this week, it feels luxurious. I get one more chance to be with a couple students before the break. The lessons are somehow nicely relaxed – maybe because the kids are out of school already? -, there is somehow less pressure (why??), and even though I would be prepared for the kids to resent having to have a lesson when it’s their break already, so far every one seems in a good and festive mood, smiling, laughing readily. Not only that, but they are willing to work, too, even doing the kind of detail work that so often has them rolling their eyes. I don’t want to jinx it but maybe we should have lessons routinely when the kids are out of school?

What a wonderful start to my Christmas break.

In defense of the parent who says “We just want to try lessons, and see if she likes it.”

Many children request piano lessons, because their best friend takes lessons and if their best friend takes lessons then lessons must be cool. Parents explain “you’ll have to practice!” and “every day!!” and “even when you don’t feel like it!!!” and the child says “yes, Mom” because their best friend takes lessons so they want to, too. The child has NO CLUE what it means to “take lessons” – and how could they? They have never experienced it, they have nothing to compare it to. Yet, parents make their children promise that they will practice – “yes, Mom” – every day! – “yes, Mom” – – they’d promise you the moon if it meant that they can start taking lessons.

Parents have no idea how utterly unfair and inappropriate it is to make their children promise something they have no way of knowing anything about. (And no, *telling* them how it’ll be doesn’t count.)

So, the child starts lessons and realizes, oh boy, this is not what I thought it’d be. Maybe they don’t like the sound of the piano. Maybe they don’t like how the keys feel under their fingers. It is hard work, rather lonely, and even with the best teacher and best materials, even if they have a wonderful instrument at home – there will always be children who realize, “I don’t like it. I changed my mind about taking lessons. I don’t want to do this anymore.” Ideally, the parents say, well, ‘twas a good experience, let’s move on to the next thing. More often however, both teacher and parents say, “You promised!” and force the child to continue something they don’t like.

There is so much in a child’s life they have to do without having much if any control over it: go to school, get up in the morning, eat what is being served, clean their room, and now we are adding piano lessons to the list just because the parents weren’t smart enough to realize that just because the child “promised” the child had no clue what they were promising.

Wouldn’t it make more sense to say, Let’s give this a try and our best effort, and in a couple weeks we are going to see how things are going.

Actually, better yet, let’s keep evaluating constantly, let’s keep an eye and ear open for signs that this – piano lessons -, despite wonderful teacher, materials, and instrument at home, may not be what we thought it’d be, and then have the courage to change things.