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.