I have a new website and blog!

 

This blogspot has served me well for a number of years, but now I'm ready to move on to bigger and better things. My new website and blog is located at: 

dawntm-piano.com

dawntm-piano.com/blog

This website will no longer be updated in the future. I'm glad you visited and hope to see you soon at my new site.

Rainbow Figures for Piano Scales

I've been using Grimm's Rainbow figures for explaining scales to my piano students for years. I love that these figures come in the seven colors of the rainbow which typically matches the number of different scale tones in Western Music. I like that the figures don't have faces and can be configured to represent many different types of scales. For instance, I like to count half steps and whole steps using the figures to create both minor and major scales and sometimes even whole note and mixolydian scales. And because Newton chose the original seven rainbow colors, I also like to arrange the figures in light wavelength order (rainbow color order) with the longest light wavelength (red) being the tonic. That way it matches the longest light wavelength with the lowest and longest sound wavelength in a scale (because sound wavelengths get shorter with higher tones). It is kind of fun to inject a little science into the piano lessons!

However, these figures have a slightly larger diameter than I would like and they take up more than one white piano key width and they have trouble balancing on a black keys. So, I recently ordered a batch of plain wooden peg dolls from Amazon and colored them myself using paint pens. The new peg dolls have a smaller dimension and will fit on my piano keys much better (plus they are a lot cheaper than the Grimm's Rainbow figures). I'm pretty excited about this project.

Materials for making your own rainbow figures:

Plain wooden peg dolls

Paint Pens

The wooden peg dolls I ordered came in a box of 50 with various sizes, so I'm able to make multiple sets of rainbow figures at different sizes. I also looked to make sure that the paint pens I selected had the official 7 colors of the rainbow. I needed red, orange, yellow, green, blue (light blue), indigo (dark blue), and violet (purple). It didn't take me too long to make these figures once I had the supplies, but it did require a steady hand.

So, these are my new rainbow scale friends and they fit on my piano keys so much better. 

Here are some some suggestions for ways to use Rainbow Scale Friends:

1. Talk about the tonic or home of your scale with the red rainbow figure. Mention that the home of any scale can be any note on the piano and discuss what makes that note the "home" of a piece of music.

2. Arrange your rainbow scale friends in rainbow color order. I always have two red color figures so that we can talk about octaves (double the frequency - double the fun). I like to talk about how western scale tones have a lot of different names.

* 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, Octave

* Tonic, Supertonic, Mediant, Subdominant, Dominant, Submediant, Leading Tone, Tonic

* Do, Re, Mi, Fa, So, La, Ti, Do

* Major Scale - half steps and whole steps

3. Introduce the minor scales

* Minor Scales - half steps and whole steps

* Solfege the minor scale as appropriate: Do Di/Ra Re Ri/Me Mi Fa Fi/Se Sol Si/Le La Li/Te Ti Do

4. Create the different scale modes simply by keeping the steps and skips the same and moving the tonic around - Ionian, Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Mixolydian, Aeolian, Locrian

5. Whole note scales

6. Pentatonic and Blues Scales

It is also great to use your rainbow scale figures for intervals and chords:

1. Create a scale using intervals. 2nd, 3rd, etc.

2. Create a scale and then start to remove figures to create chords. I really like doing this because it helps students visualize how scales help you to create chords.

I adore my new smaller rainbow scale friends and use these figures with my all my students regardless of their age because they fit well into my multi-sensory learning approach. They are a different sort of scale visual, tactile if the students place the figures on the keys, and aural if you use solfege.

Maestro by Peter Goldsworthy

This easy to read fiction book is very well known in Australia. It has appeared regularly on school curriculums and is often described as a "coming of age" book. The basic plot is about a young boy (Paul) growing up in Darwin and his relationship with his mysterious piano teacher, known as The Maestro. Available study guides talk about Darwin's weather being hot and humid mirroring the young pianist's budding sexuality, the student's fruitless quest for musical artistry and achievment along with themes of escapism, guilt and regret.

When I originally read the book, I found the plot clever and creative, but what really interested me and has stayed with me long after reading the book were the little nuggets of piano pedagogy tucked into the story. It turns out that Peter Goldsworthy, a medical doctor as well as an author, is the father of Australian concert pianist Anna Goldsworthy (whom I saw play at a Western Australia Piano Teacher Conference). He seems to have picked up some wisdom from her or her illustrious piano teacher, Mrs. Sivan, and inserted it into the story.

THE HAND:

When the young boy starts taking piano lessons from the Maestro, he has quite a few lessons where he is not allowed to play the piano even though he already is a pretty competent musician. Instead, the Maestro only discusses the hand and has many individual lessons about each finger without allowing the boy to play any music. It is very striking because it seems quite cruel to have piano lessons without allowing a student to play. However, it made this part of the story get into my head and got me thinking about how does the hand relate to the piano.

In the story, the fingers are described as:

Thumb: "Thumb is...too strong. A rooster, a show-off. Sultan of the harem. He must be kept in place."

Forefinger: "This finger is selfish. Greedy. A....a delinquent. He will steal from his four friends, cheat, lie."

Middle finger: "Mr. goody-goody....Teacher's pet. Does what he is told. Our best student."

Ring finger: "Likes to follow his best friend.... Likes to....lean on him sometimes."

The fifth finger is not described because as part of the story, the Maestro has cut off his fifth finger and tells the boy that it is unnecessary because many great pianists from previous eras never really used their fifth finger. Although that is kinda true, it would have been fun to also have a colorful description of the fifth finger from the Maestro. Maestro then describes the fingers as the pupils, the elbow as the teacher, and finally the brain as the headmaster.

Later in the story when the boy is describing his lessons to his parents, he says that the only thing they talked about in his initial lessons were the lengths of the fingers and that not all fingers are the same length. It was also pointed out by the Maestro that all the keys on the piano are the same length and the student is asked what could be done to remedy the mismatching.

From my point of view, this one the most basic issues at the heart of all piano playing and it has caused me to think a lot about how pianists do deal with the issue of having fingers with different "personalities" and lengths. I've thought about how we move our hands at the keyboard to compensate for those differences. It seems a very useful way to describe the hand early on in piano lessons to my students because it makes you consider how to best use your mismatched hand from the very beginning.

POSTURE AND HAND POSITION: Early in the piano lessons, the boy wants to play Chopin for the Maestro and gets ready to play when the following exchange occurs: 

Paul: "I, too, would let my hands do the talking. I dropped them to the keyboard. But before a single note had been played he reached over and seized my wrists.

Maestro: "No," he said. "No more. I do not like your Chopin." 

Paul: "But I haven't started!" 

Maestro: "You have of course started. Your hands are in the wrong position. Also your fingertips. Your elbows. I do not have to listen. I know how your Chopin would sound."

I love this exchange and wish I could be so very knowledgeable as to definitely be able to tell how something will sound on the piano simply by looking at a student's hand position and posture. However, in real life sometimes people can sound amazingly good with poor hand position and/or posture. Nevertheless, I still always try to teach my students to have good posture and hand position because I believe it can help prevent injuries and also because most pianists do sound better if they have what is considered proper hand position and posture.

THE QUEST FOR MUSICAL ARTISTRY: One of the main plot points in the book is the student's quest to become a classical pianist and how he continually falls short of his goal. There are a number of great quotes in the book that describe that quest:

“We must know when to move on. To search too long for perfection can also paralyse.”

“Only the second-rate never make mistakes.”

"No advance in art is possible for the self-satisfied... A step back is often as useful as a step forward."

"What is the difference between good and great pianists?" ...."Not much"....."Just a little."

"Perhaps there can be no perfection. Only levels of imperfection. Only.....differences. Each time we move closer and closer - but can never be satisfied. A piece is never complete, only at some stage abandoned."

There is also a very telling exchange between the boy and the Maestro which illustrates Paul's fruitless quest for music artistry:
Paul: "I played Beethoven that night as well as I had ever played, and turned afterwards, smiling, ready for praise."
Maestro: "An excellent forgery .... Technically perfect".
Paul: "At such moments I always remember a forged painting I once saw. In a museum in Amsterdam: Van Gogh. A fascinating art work. Each violent brushstroke was reproduced with painstaking, non-violent care. The forgery must have taken many many times longer than the original to complete. It was technically better than the original."
Maestro: "And yet something was missing. Not much - but something.... And that small something may as well have been everything."

I love the allegory of the Van Gogh painting because it helps explain why some performances although technically perfect, don't move you as a listener. This book allows it's main character to not quite make it as a classical pianist, to fall just short of the quest. It speaks to all of us about the struggle for musical artistry and how appreciative we should be of the great classical pianists over the ages who have manage to achieve such elusive artistry even if only for a short time.

There are of course many more nuggets of musical wisdom in this story, like the importance of listening, how becoming a concert pianist is always a gamble, etc. For me, it is wonderful how all of these important musical concepts are woven throughout a compelling story rather than a more "dull" book on piano pedagogy. This is a book that music and especially piano students can read for the story, but through osmosis learn important aspects of piano study and start to appreciate the rigors of a pianist's search for musical artistry.

I actually only have one minor quibble with this book. How could the Maestro possibly have an authentic autograph of Czerny, all the photos of his past life, the two pianos, etc. in his Darwin apartment if the ending of the book really happened?

I want to blame Beethoven (for my injury)

I was working earlier this year on learning the awesome third movement of the Beethoven Moonlight Sonata Op 27, No. 2. There is a section where your hand is stretched an octave wide, its forte, and you have to jump around on the keyboard. I was having some trouble making the jumps accurately at speed and had intensified my practice on this section in preparation for performance and suddenly and unexpectedly felt something give on the top last knuckle (distal interphalangeal joint) of my pinky finger on the right hand. Unfortunately, I was then a bit reckless having never experienced an injury of this sort before and continued playing despite the small initial pain and feeling of the tendon tearing. I should have known better.

Injury Analyzation:
So, of course I thought a lot about my technique when analyzing why the tendon on my pinkie finger ripped. "Move with every note" and "be ahead of the sound" were some excellent axioms from my piano teachers which came to mind immediately after my injury. After a lot more thought, I realized I was doing three things wrong during my practice.

1. I didn't warm up properly prior to practicing. I had done some warmups prior to playing Beethoven, but I didn't start my warmups slowly and work up to speed gradually. I had tried to play my warmups as fast as possible to work on speed and to get on with practicing my music. So, my finger tendons were a bit strained before I even started my Beethoven practice.

2. I was setting my fingers to reach the chords and keeping my the ends of my fingers curled in a fixed position as I moved between one chord to the next.  So, I had constant tension at the end of my knuckle as I played the chords over and over for accuracy. As Thomas Mark says in his book, What Every Pianist Needs To Know About The Human Body, "You can allow your hand to fall on the chord or octave without setting it in advance, and you'll play with less tension........An image that helps many pianists open the hand by just the right amount is "let the piano open your hand". Be sure to think of the opening of your hand not as a spreading of the fingers but as an opening from the CMC (Carpometacarpal - inside the palm of your hand) joints, like an umbrella."

3. I didn't take enough breaks when practicing this particular passage. Some music passages are physically difficult to manage and a pianist risks injury when practicing them for too long a time in one session. Shorter, but still intense practice periods can be just as effective. I should have worked on this passage for a bit, realized my fingers were tired and then worked on a different section before come back.

Recovery:

My recovery was very uneven. I had never had an injury to my hand like this and in the beginning I felt the injury was perhaps just a strain. Consequently, I tried to treat it like other injuries I had experienced previously. At first, I just tried to rest my finger and stop playing piano for a while. Unfortunately, injuring your hand is definitely not like other injuries. It was virtually impossible for me to stop using my right hand. I still needed to prepare and cook food, do the dishes, clean the house... and eventually weed the garden. Weeding the garden several weeks after quite a bit of recovery caused me to re-injure myself badly. That's when I realized I needed to protect my finger somehow to help it heal. I tried some finger braces, but they were simply too big, uncomfortable and awkward. I tried some elastic ace bandages for fingers, but they quickly ripped at the seam and I didn't like it when they got wet. Then I tried just using some cheap 1 inch wide strapping tape and that worked great. I replaced the tape several times a day, but I had a lot of tape and it really prevented me quite well from bending my dip joint unnecessarily. I would wear a disposable latex glove over the tape when cooking and doing the dishes to keep it from getting wet. I could even play the piano with my finger taped which was a great relief to me. So, once I found the tape solution, I was finally able to heal my finger properly, but it did take a long time.

Now my finger is all healed up and I'm finally thinking about working on that Beethoven Sonata again, this time with better warmups, technique, and practice habits.

Piano Glasses

One of my new adult piano students is learning the piano for the first time in her life. This means she's starting of  slow process learning a new musical language. She's a great student, getting a lot of joy from her efforts, and working hard to learn her new language. However, learning to read music means that you need to identify the location of little dots on a bunch of lines quickly and accurately. The speed of note identification can be significantly impacted if those notes are just a little bit blurry, especially for a novice. Also, those blurry notes means your brain takes just a little bit longer for note identification (not to mention eyestrain and possible headaches). The note identification delay will impact how quickly you can read your music even if you know your notes well. We talked a little bit about this fact in our lesson and she then consulted her optometrist who said, "So, do you want some piano glasses?". 

What a concept! I had never heard of piano glasses. I knew about reading glasses (been using them a bit longer than I care to admit) and computer reading glasses, but piano glasses....interesting. The idea of having glasses especially made for the piano has stayed with me and I started to do some research into the idea. I found that the traditional distance for reading glasses is about 14-16 inches and the distance for computer glasses is about 18-20 inches. So, I sat down at my piano (using proper posture) with a tape measure and found my piano music reading distance to be 22-24 inches. That is significant focal length difference and will definitely impact an eye prescription. (Here's a pretty interesting article for optometrists on eyeglasses for musicians.) I imagine this difference can vary depending on the individual, so it is probably important to measure yourself at your own piano.

So, I have been noticing lately that my own eyes have been changing a bit with respect to my reading (and piano) focal length. It has been harder to practice my own music because the musical notes have become a bit more blurry. So, I'm going to have to schedule an appointment with my optometrist for a new glasses prescription and this poses a bit of a dilemma. Glasses are expensive, should I get a pair of reading glasses and a pair of piano glasses? Upon reflection, I think I'm probably going to get a new pair of blended bifocals and a separate pair of piano glasses, which means I'm buying an extra pair of glasses. However, I love my piano, I think it will be worth it. 

What is Piano Technique?

This blog post was originally going to be a glowing book review of my favorite reference book on piano technique - "What Every Pianist Needs To Know About The Body" by Thomas Mark. However, upon further investigation, I realized this book never describes itself as a book on technique, but rather as a book about how to move at the piano. When I reread the introduction, Mark actually says:
"This is not a book about piano technique. I say little about how to play arpeggios and nothing about fingering the B-flat major scale in thirds."
"The information in this book... brings about improved bodily awareness, a better quality of movement, and better piano playing."
So, what is piano technique? I thought that how you move at the piano was imperative for proper technique which makes Thomas Mark's book definitely a piano technique book for me. Reading that passage made me feel a little confused as to the definition of piano technique. I began to ponder the different definitions of piano technique (not for the first time) and subsequently felt need to create a definition that works best for me and my teaching.

Wikipedia's paraphrased definition of piano (musical) technique is: "Musical technique is the ability of pianists to exert optimal control of their instrument in order to produce the precise musical effects they desire." That's a very broad definition and it includes all the mechanical ideas like posture, breathing, hand position, and even scales, but it also includes exactly everything. Its kind of a wimpy definition because it is too general. For my teaching, I wanted a more workable definition of piano technique

Another favorite reference book of mine is Gerald Klickstein's book, "The Musician's Way" and he defines technique a little differently:
"The term “technique” refers to the means for executing musical ideas."........."When we acquire robust technical skills, barriers to musical expression drop away. We internally “hear” musical gestures, and then we make those gestures ring out with a natural quality that seems effortless. Yet despite the spiritual nature of technical mastery, I find that aspiring musicians often confuse “technique” with “mechanics.” As a result, many students don’t develop the technical command that they need."
So, if I interpret what Mr. Klickstein is saying, then he is admitting that having good technique means you have good mechanics, but that good mechanics is not enough. He wants to add an element of artistic vision to his definition of technique, because he thinks you can't develop mechanics in total isolation from musical ideas. For instance, if you can play an absolutely beautiful arpeggio isolated from any composition, does that mean that your arpeggio will sound beautiful when trying to play Chopin's Aeolean Harp Etude? I agree with Klickstein that this is an important concept. It means we have to keep in mind the reasons why we are working on particular aspects of our mechanical technique and realize that technique is always subservient to the artistic demands of the music.

One of the greatest books ever written on piano technique is "Famous Pianists & Their Technique" by Reginald R. Gerig. This book is a compliation of insights into piano technique over the centuries of piano playing and pedagogy by all the great masters of the piano. Even better is that Chapter One discusses "The Meaning of Technique" with many useful quotations. After perusing this chapter, I discovered my favorite quote of all time on technique from Josef Hofmann:
"Technique represents the material side of art, as money represents the material side of life. By all means achieve a fine technique, but do not dream that you will be artistically happy with this alone... Technique is a chest of tools from which the skilled artisan draws what he needs at the right time for the right purpose. The mere possession of the tools means nothing: it is the instinct - the artistic intuition as to when and how to use the tools - that counts. It is like opening the drawer and finding what one needs at the moment."
I love this definition and allegory because it acknowledges that you do need a "mechanics" tool chest of technique just like you need money to live and fulfill your life. It also helps my understanding of technique to think that you could imagine a beautiful artistic vision inside your head, but without having a good technique tool chest, you may well lack the ability (or tools) to execute your vision. It makes having a good technique tool chest very appealing, so when you open the drawer, there is a tool already available to help.

Along the line of creating tools to fit the vision, Leon Fleisher says:
"It's your musical ideas that form or decide for you what kind of technique you are going to use. In other words, if you are trying to get a certain sound, you just experiment around to find the movement that will get this sound. That is technique."
I like this definition as well because it makes you realize that on some level you have to discover your own technique and when to use it. Even when a teacher shows you an excellent example to follow, you still have to make any technique part of your own personal tool chest. I have found in my practice that even if a teacher shows you how to move in a good technical way at the piano, you still have to understand how to make those movements and sounds your very own through practice and self-discovery. In addition, this quote implies you will encounter musical problems for which you don't have a ready made tool in your tool chest. A musician should expect to constantly being figuring out new tools and/or new uses for old tools for the various musical challenges posed by music.

And then there is this from Arnold Schultz:
"The general hostility to the idea of method derives much of its vitality, I believe, from a half-conscious and almost universal suspicion that there is a fundamental incompatability between a mind interested in the mechanical phases of playing and a mind filled with what is loosely known as musical temperament. There is a fear, furthermore, that a persistent use of the reasoning mind in reference to the objective phenomena of technique results finally in the deterioration and atrophy of the subjective emotions upon which the interpreter's art depends. This is not, I believe firmly, too bald a statement of the case. It explains the widespread custom of camouflaging purely technical instruction with references to expression marks and with what are often entirely gratuitous rhetorical flights on the beauty of the music in hand." So, Schultz is highlighting for us suspicions that musicians who concentrate too much on the technical aspects of playing (left brain) and developing their tool box somehow forgo their ability to play with grand artistic vision (right brain).

Fortunately for us in the Gerig's book, he examines both the empirical and metaphysical musical approaches and believes them to be entirely compatible and I agree. I don't think concentrating on technical aspects of playing music will necessarily impair your artistic ability. However, I will admit that as someone who tends to be very analytical (left brained), I do need to practice being an artist and work on getting in touch with my emotional temperament (right brain). I freely admit to being jealous of my musician friends who just seem to have an effortless understanding of musical interpretations (right brained people), but I also think everyone brings something to the table and that helps to make every musical interpretation unique. Perhaps artists and teachers that don't analyze their music thoroughly and just try to feel and hear the music in their heads are also missing certain elements of interpretation that would be available to them otherwise.

"Mastering Piano Technique" by Seymour Fink is not a book I refer to a lot, but it has a wonderful description of technique in its introduction and how it applies not just to the mature artist, but also to the student of piano.
"Technique is like grammar; once it is a part of you, you speak without conscious attention to it. In the same way, technical matters function below the conscious level in mature pianists. Experimenting first one way then another, pianists mine their deepest, most intuitive feelings about the music, seeking out a particular mood, tone color, or expressive nuance. Ultimately their inner musical thinking triggers the requisite movement so they experience no separation between muscular exertions and musical goals.
The circumstances of the novice differ radically from those of the seasoned player; consistent technical training must be made an integral part of the learning experience. When first coming to grips with the relatively awkward conditions surrounding purposeful movement at the keyboard, students should be instructed in a healthy and efficient use of their bodies. Poor technical training slows their rate of progress and inevitably limits pianistic growth."

I love this description of technique because it applies to everyday pianists - the vast majority of us - piano mortals. I have discovered that many of my piano teacher colleagues were students of accomplished teachers and were well-trained technically from an early age. For those lucky few, they learned early how to move well at the piano. Unfortunately, when I was younger, I wasn't taught a usable piano technique and consequently thought I was not a "gifted" pianist. I never learned to play scales and arpeggios with ease at a young age. I thought my fingers were slow and didn't realize that I could do exercises to work on finger speed and efficient movement. I simply didn't know to listen for many of my thumb accents and even if I heard them, I didn't have a lot of previous practice or tools for dealing with this issue. It is only now after many years of persistent practice and effort along with sound pedagogical instruction that I have managed to correct a lot of my original poor piano technique. So, you can understand why I'm a great believer in good instruction and understanding of technique. While I agree with piano pedagogues that talk about understanding their artistic interpretation before thinking about technique. I also believe it can help a lot to fill your technique toolbox early in your piano study, so your tool box isn't empty when you finally start to think about your artistic visions. Not only that, but when you play with poor technique, its really hard to hear what you are playing without bias. You hear your thumb accents in your scales and believe it is normal. It is then difficult to develop an artistic vision of musical scales that really flow.

Getting back to "What Every Pianist Needs to know about the Human Body" by Thomas Mark,  I'm going to disagree whole-heartedly with his narrow definition of technique. I believe understanding how your body works should be considered to be part of a pianist's "technique" and a useful tool for the technique toolbox. For instance, if you understand that your body follows your head, it makes sense that when you are playing high notes at the piano, you would move your head to the top of the piano and your body will follow. I believe technique encompasses everything about how to move at the piano because having a basic understanding of your hand anatomy, how to sit, and how to move (as covered by Mark's book) means you have a solid foundation from which other aspects of your own personal piano technique can extend.

So, what is my new definition of piano technique?
Piano technique is the body positions and movements used to exert optimal control of the piano in order to produce desired musical ideas. Sound technique includes healthy and efficient use of the pianist's body and needs to be taught from the very beginning of a student's piano study. Pursuit of an excellent technique is a continual quest for an ever more complete chest of tools from which the skilled artisan draws what is needed in pursuit of an artistic vision.

Making a great practice space

The essence of learning to play music is practice. No one learns to play an instrument without a significant amount of time spent practicing and a typical student will spend many hours of time on their instrument in their practice space. It then follows that having a comfortable and organized practice space can help make practicing easier and more productive. You can think of it as the work office for a music student. It can be quite difficult to get the optimal practice space in a home crowded with other family members, but that doesn't mean you can't try to optimize a practice space to become a place where musical inspiration flows and lots of learning takes place.

A few years ago, I came upon this webpage of the key components of a great practice space from author Suzy S. I loved all the common sense advice and especially the opening comment, "If I had a dollar for every time a student told me, “I didn’t practice because my piano is stuffed away in a dark, cold basement,” I wouldn’t be rich, but I’d be able to buy something really nice." I've thought about this article a lot and have used the website drawing of an optimal practice space with my students many times, but I always have to notate it to include a few other items that I deem essential and finally, I wound up drawing my own image of a great practice space...

Here's an explanation of my 12 elements of  great practice space:

1. Piano - The practice instrument should be a full length with weighted keys and at least one pedal (the damper pedal). I generally recommend a good quality digital piano or a nice sounding acoustic piano.

2. Piano Bench - A chair is typically not a good idea because they aren't adjustable, so they will be at the wrong height and chair arms will impede arm movement at the piano. I recommend an adjustable piano bench so that you can be at the right height for playing the piano and prevent injury.

3. Music Stand - Almost all pianos will come with a music stand, but if for some strange reason there isn't one available, a band instrument music stand can be used by standing it behind the piano.

4. Pencils - When practicing, it is important to take notes. On Noa Kageyama's wonderful website, The Bulletproof Musician, he has a great blog post about "8 Things Top Practicers Do Different Differently". Item Number 3 in this wonderful blogpost is "Practice was thoughtful, as evidenced by silent pauses while looking at the music, singing/humming, making notes on the page, or expressing verbal “ah-ha”s." Give yourself a chance to have thoughtful practice by keeping writing implements handy.

5. Metronome or Cell Phone - One of the most important aspects of being a great musician is being able to keep a steady tempo. In fact, audiences will typically notice mistakes in rhythm and tempo more easily than wrong notes. So, having a metronome available to check your steady tempo is useful. Having a smart phone available during practice with a metronome app is even better as then you can also use the smart phone to make audio and video recordings of yourself and access any other useful apps.

6. Good Lighting - Effective lighting will allow you to read your sheet music easily and prevent eye strain.

7. Comfortable Temperature - Glenn Gould famously used to soak his hands in hot water to make sure they weren't too cold prior to his performances. Maintaining a comfortable temperature in your practice space will make sure that you aren't thinking about the temperature in the room instead of the music. It is also very important to have consistent temperatures for acoustic pianos, so they don't go out of tune too quickly.

8. Cozy and Inviting Space - Having your piano in an inviting location in the home (I personally like having a window), means that sitting at your piano is not a hardship. Being at your instrument in a lovely location in the home is continually tempting someone to sit down and play or practice. However, think carefully about where you place the piano. Does the piano need to be near the kitchen so a parent can hear a child practicing? Is your best practice space really in the living room near a noisy TV? Carefully consider the options available before making the best choice possible within your home.

9. Glass of Water - I always have a glass of water near me when I practice, but not on the piano in case of spills. Being hydrated while practicing can help with cognitive performance according to the NIH study of Water Balance and Cognitive Performance.

10. Speaker - Many piano method books come with mp3 music demonstrations and accompaniments. It can be very useful to be able to play these files near your practice instrument. It can also be useful to hear professional recordings of your pieces from YouTube or Spotify. I like to keep a bluetooth speaker near my practice instrument so I can hear any useful recordings or especially recordings of myself playing a piece where I can evaluate my own progress. If a digital piano is being used as a practice instrument, it can also be used as a speaker through an audio input.

11. Music Book Storage - It can be very helpful to have music and lesson books near your practice instrument. Piano students tend to acquire music and music notes as they progress with their studies and having close access to their music makes it easier for them to practice without having to move too far away from their instrument.

12. Clock - Even though I have a smart phone next to my practice instrument, I still like to have a separate clock nearby to note the time. I always record my practice time at my instrument, so I know how much time I am spending on my practice every week.

* One more thing....everyone is unique individual and what each person wants in a great practice space will accordingly differ. Use this list as a starting point, think deeply about what would make your own great practice space, and then make it happen!