Piano Night 2013

I try to make this announcement every year, and it's hard to believe that another year has gone by. Swooosh.

Of interest to music lovers the world over is what is arguably the most ambitious music festival of all, the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. Although their music offerings tend to skew toward the fertile sounds that have been bred in the Crescent City, the festival puts on display a wide variety of music from the world over.

As a New Orleans style piano player, my favorite part is the annual Piano Night, which this year will be on this coming Monday, April 29, live from New Orleans' French Quarter.

It's been awhile since I've attended one of these in person, but the beautiful thing is you can listen to all of Piano Night from the comfort of your living room, or anywhere you can bring your computer or smart phone and a WiFi connection. Catch the entire event streamed live on radio station WWOZ-FM.

Things get under way about 7 pm Central time, so add or subtract the appropriate number of hours for your time zone and check it out.

If you like what you hear, let me know. This style of piano playing is kind of a specialty of mine, and if I get enough requests, I may include a workshop of this style at the upcoming Piano Retreat in September.

Here is the question I received from a subscriber who was considering enrolling in the fall Piano Retreat:

I would like to participate in this retreat. I
wonder if there is a way I can bring my spouse and
child, who would entertain themselves doing other
things while I play piano. Is this something that
others have done in the past?

I see this as a two part question.

1. Is it possible for members of my family to pay only for room and board at the Piano Retreat, and not pay for the actual tuition?

2. Will my spouse and child have something to keep them occupied while I'm gaining my piano skills at the retreat?

The answers are (in order) yes and yes.

Whatever accommodation level you chose for your self, your spouse and child can have the same level of accommodations and all meals (except the optional Sunday lunch) for $200 off the posted full price. Full prices range from $427 to $497, so the room and board only rate for them would be between $227 and $297 apiece. Your family would also be welcome to attend the evening "piano bar" party on Saturday night.

Bear in mind the semi private rooms have two twin beds, and would not accommodate three people. The economy cabins would work. We could put you in a co-ed (couples) cabin where you could be all together.

Another option is for all of you to stay off premises. There are hotels/motels in Petaluma (30 minutes), and probably on the coast some 12 miles away in the other direction. That way you would pay the Day Use rate for yourself (currently $377), and the rest of the family would be on their own.

We have had several people take advantage of both options.

If you opt for the $200 discount option, let me know, and I'll set things up where you can make a convenient payment on line. Just drop me an e-mail.

As for what your spouse and child might be able to do while you are immersed in your piano studies.

First and foremost we do have a track at the Retreat for the total beginner. We've been very successful over the course of 30 years in introducing total beginners to the art of playing piano. We will have you playing your favorite songs with two hands by the end of the camp. That's a guarantee.

If you choose to pass on the piano lessons, there is plenty to do right on the property. Walker Creek Ranch is over 1500 acres of pristine rolling hills, and abundant wild life. They have almost 50 miles of hiking trails, a swimming hole, and great opportunities for bird watching or stalking the deer, fox, raccoon, and other life forms. On the property there is also a small natural history museum.

And it's only a few miles to the coast where you will have access to Tomales Bay and the Point Reyes National Seashore and numerous beaches. It's just a short hop to the towns of Sausalito and Tiburon and the Golden Gate Bridge. And on the other side of the GG Bridge...San Francisco.

So there will be plenty to do both day and night, if you choose not to be part of the Retreat itself.

Easy Piano Accompaniment for Christmas

The piano is a very easy instrument to learn how to play. Except for one thing.

Unlike those who play flute, cello, violin, sax, trumpet, etc. etc., a piano player virtually plays two instruments simultaneously. Let's look at these dynamics.

A violinist, for example, uses his left hand, his right hand, his concentration, most of his fingers to produce one tone on the violin. This tone is usually part of a melody.

It's very demanding to learn to play this tone on a violin. Violinists spend a lifetime getting this tone exactly right.

By comparison piano players can produce any one of 88 tones just by (metaphorically) pressing a button. It's really simple. I have no guilt in calling my basic piano workshop "Instant Piano," because one can create great sounds on a piano from day one, thanks in part to the "push button" nature of the piano.

There is no such thing as instant guitar, instant violin, instant cello, instant clarinet because those instruments and most others are so demanding. But piano can be learned very quickly. That's what makes piano so relaxing, fun, and enjoyable compared to most other instruments.

But........the piano player is usually called upon to do two or more things at once when playing the piano. And that's the hard part for them. Typically a piano player plays accompaniment (chords) with the left hand and melody with the right hand. Yes, he has to do both things at once.

It seems like you might call this a challenge of coordination. It's not. It's a challenge of uncoordination. The challenge to a piano player is to UN coordinate the two hands, so that they play two different things simultaneously. But the UN coordination must be coordinated precisely.

Which brings us to playing Christmas carols. One of the beautiful things about Christmas carols is that people sing them. When that happens it takes all the pressure off the piano player for playing the melody at the same time he tackles the chords. Then he needs to concentrate on only one thing at a time: playing the chord accompaniment.

So now it's a matter of pushing buttons again. When you can focus on one task (chords) you can succeed faster. And have more fun sooner.

Don't get me wrong. We still want to achieve right hand/left hand independence eventually. So we work on the basics. But we can achieve some desired results sooner by letting someone else (singers) take over some of our responsibilities.

This idea applies to all forms of vocal accompaniment, not just for Christmas carols. But we do have our Christmas carol program on sale right now until Saturday. And if you want to pick up on some of these basics and be able to play some fun music THIS YEAR, now is your chance to do so for a 50% discount. We don't have sales very often. And this on ends in a couple of days.

Click here to view order page and for more information.

Just thinking out loud.

http://www.pianofun.com/temporary/season2012/season_2012.html

Feb. 3, 2012

On this day in 1959, we lost Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and the Big Bopper in a tragic plane crash. If you're old enough, you might remember exactly where you were when you heard the news. I do. I was in fifth grade, and I heard the news at recess. Even then I sensed significance.

Now here's some interesting math (again for you older readers). It was in 1972 that Don Mc Lean recorded his immortal hit "American Pie" which alluded to the tragic plane crash. He referred to it as "The Day the Music Died."

Here's the weird part (to me). The time elapsed between the event and the song was just 13 years. Yet the time elapsed between the song and the present...40 years. Can't be. But it is.

To this day whenever I hear a Buddy Holly song on the radio, I think about what might have happened if he lived. One of the top songs on the record charts at the time Holly died: That'll Be the Day That I Die.



Reminder: 2012 Piano Retreat is now taking enrollments. www.pianofun.com/wordpress

Tip 10: Identify your weaknesses. (And address them.)

For years I was an undisciplined musician. Or more accurately, I would hover between discipline and otherwise. I'll exclude my days taking piano lessons as a child, because back then everything was orchestrated by adults. The grown ups determined who I'd take lessons from (and when), when and for how long I would do my practicing, what pieces I would learn to play, what I would do for my recitals, etc.

I was just a kid, and my passion for learning music hadn't kicked in yet. Discipline was not an option.

When the music bug finally did kick in, it hit me hard; and it wasn't the piano that kick started it, it was guitar. I started learning guitar about the time the folk music craze hit the culture, circa 1961. So here I was between 14 and 16 years of age, when Peter, Paul and Mary stormed in. Pete Seeger was a big influence. Bluegrass. Old Timey. Irish. I just soaked it all up. Then Bob Dylan came along, and I was mesmorized.

I played guitar constantly. I'd rush home from school, get the homework out of the way as soon as possible, and spend the rest of the evening in my room with my old Silvertone acoustic. Nirvana.

That alone doesn't mean I was disciplined. Obsessed, yes. But not always disciplined. But sometimes I was. I recall about a three month period where I was determined to learn three-finger picking. I was painfully learning it out of Pete Seeger's Folksinger's Guitar Guide. It was days of obsessive pain. The days turned to weeks, the weeks to months. I wasn't really getting it, but I was determined to stick it out.

Then one day, all of a sudden it came to me. I could three finger pick. I was a three month overnight sensation.

That was an example of discipline. But here's the kicker. Unfortunately I did NOT progress much further on guitar for a long time, and here's why. Once I hit the three-finger picking plateau, I kind of coasted. I was happy with my achievement and became complacent. I had attained a certain level of achievement with my guitar playing. And that's what I played. I reinforced my strengths, through continual playing in my new comfort zone. And that's a good thing.

But had I been really interested in improving my guitar playing, I would have addressed myself to my weaknesses (of which I had plenty). I didn't acknowledge my weaknesses. I was in total denial. Although I had plenty of role models to listen to, I did not make much of a conscious effort to play like them. I just kept with my three finger picking.

If you are a piano player (or any kind of musician), it's up to you to decide if you want to get better. Human nature is such that almost all musicians I've ever met, and I've met quite a few, wish to become better musicians. Insane? Maybe. But that's the nature of learning music.

Others might worship you as a musician, based upon your current skills. But you know you can do better. And it kills you, because we all know what it takes to become a better musician, right? Practice, practice, practice.

Actually, there's more to it than that. It's not just practice. It's knowing WHAT to practice. I tell my beginning students that there is no reason ever to practice the piano. Of course they are astonished to hear those words coming from a music teacher. But then comes the punchline. "Just play," is my frivolous follow up. Okay, that's kind of a joke with a little truth thrown in.

The real truth, however, is that making music is a combination of practicing and playing. We PRACTICE so that we can PLAY better. When we PLAY, we have a natural tendency to play to our STRENGTHS. When we PRACTICE, however, we need to practice to our WEAKNESSES. We need to address the areas of our playing where we are weak, and devise a prescription for making ourselves stronger.

So how do we go about that? A good music teacher (make that a VERY good music teacher) can assess your weaknesses AND find ways of addressing them. My hunch is this works better in the field of classical music than in pop, owing to the relative dearth of pop piano teachers and their almost non-existent formal training, especially in the field of pedagogy. In absence of such a teacher, you're going to have to find and correct your weaknesses yourself. Here we go.

It's not easy to distill the essence of musicianship into a finite number of categories. There are just too many subtlties. But for the sake of illustrating the point, let's look at just five:

technique
repertoire
rhythm
improvisation
theory

Chances are if you're like me, you could use some work in all five areas. In that case, you need to prioritize. So take a careful look at your piano playing. Record it. Analyze it. See if some of these symptoms apply to you.

Symptom	Problem Type
hit a lot of wrong notes	technique
don't feel comfortable in certain keys	technique
don't feel in control	technique
not able to predict chords	repertoire/theory
get lost in songs	repertoire
can't take requests	repertoire
just have trouble memorizing	repertoire
tempo slows down	rhythm
tempo speeds up	rhythm
stop and go	rhythm
tied to the sheet music	improvisation
sounding dull/boring	improvisation
lack of intuition	theory
trouble with keys	theory

So once you have listed a few symptoms, you can refer to the chart above to try to pinpoint the problem. And then you can go about working on the solutions by using the chart below. Here are just a few ideas.

Problem Type	Solution
technique	Hanon exercises
	scales
	exercise books
	your own exercises
repertoire	learn x songs per week
	different composers
	different styles/rhythms
	different keys
rhythm	work with metronome
	work with recordings
	rhythm instruction CD's
improvisation	work with recordings
	play along instructional media
	record yourself and play along
theory	study theory books
	learn more songs
	analyze music

The point is, don't just do what's fun to do unless it doesn't bother you not to make progress. We get weak in certain areas, because we neglect to work in those areas. And the reason we neglect to work in such areas, quite possibly, is that it's not very fun to do so. So we end up trapped within a vicious circle of stagnation.

These suggestions are just examples. There are many other areas of music in which we can work and improve. Recording yourself can help a lot. So can getting the opinions of others.

I mentioned that there are resources out there to help you learn. We have a lot of good stuff for sale too. But remember that it's just information. It's there for you when you want it. But first it will be of real benefit to do the prep work and discover what's wrong with your playing, find the right information to help you solve what's wrong, and then do the work that it takes to make the corrections.

Of course when you do discover your weaknesses, it will be very helpful to write everything down in a log. Indicate your weakness, write down the name of the source of information you plan to use to fix it, write a specific game plan for working on the weakness (specify that you will spend exactly x minutes a day on this problem), and finally set a target date for when you will evaluate your success.

Then take the plunge. There is even a chance you'll discover that the sessions spent at the piano addressing your weaknesses will become fun after all. That's called success.

This is the 10th installment in our series of articles on hidden or obscure strategies for improving musicianship. These strategies are not intended to be a substitute for (I dislike this word) "practicing." To the contrary. Spending time playing your instrument is mightily important.

But think of these 22 ideas as strategies you can use in addition to your time in the woodshed. How does one find a label for these strategies? Subconscious? Metaphysical? Whatever word you want to use, go ahead. It's just that these ideas are not often presented to you as part of a musical instrument learning regimen. For earlier articles, check our blog archive.

Tip Nine: Play the best you can afford.

This is the ninth installment in our series of articles on hidden or obscure strategies for improving musicianship. These strategies are not intended to be a substitute for (I dislike this word) "practicing." To the contrary. Spending time playing your instrument is mightily important.

But think of these 22 ideas as strategies you can use in addition to your time in the woodshed. How does one find a label for these strategies? Subconscious? Metaphysical? Whatever word you want to use, go ahead. It's just that these ideas are not often presented to you as part of a musical instrument learning regimen. For earlier articles, check our blog archive.

It stands to reason you want to select a high quality instrument, both as a beginner and an advanced musician. This is more critical for some instruments than it is for others.

Take the guitar. You don't want to start a student on a bad guitar. Some guitars, due to warped necks and a host of other problems, are simply unplayable. They physically cause pain to the finger tips. They don't sound good.

And the worst thing is, a beginning student doesn't know the difference. We teachers understand that music students need to be motivated or they won't advance. The musical challenges are great enough as it is, we don't need extra roadblocks like a subpar instrument to derail a student's progress.

A quality instrument doesn't guarantee a student will become successful, but a bad instrument can adversely affect even the most gifted and motivated of students.

The guitar may be an extreme example, but the same principal applies to piano students. A bad piano may not directly cause blisters and carpal tunnel syndrome, but it could have some serious negative effects.

So do you need to run out and buy your six year old a nine foot Steinway? The Steinway salesman may disagree, but the answer to that is no. Then how do you tell a good piano from a bad one?

Everything else being equal, a grand piano is usually better than a vertical piano. Start with that. What, you can't afford a grand piano (or you don't have the room)? Okay, a vertical will do. Now the rule is, the longer the strings, the better. Thus, (again, all other things being equal) an upright piano would be better than a spinet. In fact a spinet should be your last choice (but don't completely count it out).

There are actually a couple of sizes in between spinet and upright. Just above spinet is console. A lot of the smaller Japanese pianos are in this category. Above console is studio (these are institutional pianos, made mostly for schools, churches, libraries, and the like).

The next consideration: how well has the piano been maintained over its life? Was it tuned once a year like it should or once every three presidential administrations? Is it in tune now (reasonably)? Do all the keys work? Any obvious flaws with the frame or the sounding board?

Then there are the subjective evaluations. How does it sound? How does it play? If you are not a piano player yourself, you'll probably need to get an outside opinion if you're shopping around.

I myself started on a crappy spinet. It was all my parents could afford. I still have it. Then as an adult I got an old used upright. Later when I turned pro I got a really nice (for a spinet) spinet. I got that so I could move it around, and take it to gigs. I still have that one too. Then I finally got a nice medium sized grand piano which I really love.

But the grand piano spoiled me. I go back and play the two spinets, and I wonder how I ever survived playing them. People know me as being really cheap in a lot of areas. But I never cheap out on a musical instrument. They are just too important.

So if it's for your child, get the best instrument you can afford. They won't appreciate it early on, but they'll be statistically more inclined to stay with music with something of quality to play on. And they'll thank you later.

As for yourself. You're going to want the best if nothing else than for pride of ownership. Psychology 101 tells us the bigger the investment, the more you'll play. The more you play, the better you get. The better you get plus the better the quality of the instrument, the better you sound overall.

A more expensive instrument may even be more economical in the long run. If you compute the cost in terms of dollars per hour spent playing, a more expensive instrument may actually be cheaper than a cheaper one. Of course there's things like resale value and trade in value to consider too, but we don't even need to count that.

Buy the best. You and your children deserve it.

Piano Camp Frequently Asked Questions

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Q. What is Piano Camp?

A. It's a two day experience of classes, workshops, guided practice, and personal coaching in the art pop piano playing.

Q. Is it for beginners?

A. There will be two tracks, one for beginners and one for those beyond the beginning stage. Absolute beginners are encouraged. The second track (Beyond) is designed for those students who have taken the Instant Piano Workshop designed by Robert Laughlin or those who already have a little background in pop/chord piano playing.

Q. Who is behind it?

A. The workshop is presented by the New School of American Music. They were founded in 1982 and have directly or indirectly been responsible for teaching hundreds of thousands of students nationwide in their One Day Workshops. These workshops are given primarily in college non-credit programs, in almost all 50 states and in Canada.

Q. Who is teaching it?

A. Over 300 piano teachers have been trained to give these workshops. However the bulk of the sessions at Piano Camp will be taught personally either by the designer of the course, Robert Laughlin or by his wife Pam.

Q. What do I need to know already?

A. Nothing really. However, if you wish a head start you can download a pamphlet to study at www.pianofun.com/newsletters.html

Q. Will there be pianos for everyone?

A. We will have four or five keyboards available for campers. And there will be ample time for practice. But I can't guarantee that there will be a keyboard available for everyone all the time. Therefore, I encourage you to bring a portable keyboard with you, if you have one. If enough people do that, there won't be a shortage. But it's the only way I can guarantee you will have an instrument to play 100% of the time. If you cannot bring your own instrument, I will guarantee you'll have access to one of our instruments at least SOME of the time.

Q. How effective is the curriculum and staff?

A. Robert Laughlin, the designer of this program and lead teacher at Piano Camp, has personally given the basic Instant Piano workshop to almost 25,000 students over a span of almost 30 years. The course has been consistently rated as one of the best courses offered by the dozens of college non-credit programs in which it has been taught. This is not just an idle boast. We have thousands of evaluations in our files, and we get unsolicited praises about the course on a regular basis.

Q. Will classical music be covered too?

A. No. Just pop.

Q. What's the difference in teaching or learning classical vs. pop?

A. Classical music revolves around reading music notation, which is a long process with a steep learning curve. Pop music revolves around chords, a much easier system.

Q. Will there be private instruction?

A. The instructors plan on helping everyone out with their individual needs during the guided practice sessions. There you will have one-on-one contact with the instructors.

Q. What is the deadline for the tuition discount?

A. June 22 at midnight.

Q. What about sleeping arrangements for Saturday night?

A. Sleeping is bunkhouse style. The bunk houses have about a dozen single cots with mattresses. You bring your own sleeping bag or bedding. The bunkhouses are segregated by sex. If you wish, you can opt for a private room upgrade for yourself or your family. Those come with a semi-private bathroom. Again, bring your own bedding. More info on facilities and what to bring are at the Walker Creek Ranch web site. Be sure to read the list of essentials before leaving for camp.

Q. Where is Walker Creek Ranch located?

A. Less than an hour north of San Francisco and less than an hour from the famous Napa Valley wine country, the ranch is located on several acres of pristine natural foothill topography. It's currently used as a nature camp for the Marin County school system. Aside from the wildlife, you won't see any neighbors. It's really beautiful and ideal for short hikes and explorations during your free time.

Q. What about meals?

A. You will get lunch and dinner on Saturday and breakfast and lunch on Sunday. It's all served cafeteria style and is actually pretty good. Vegetarian meals are available and they can accommodate special needs. Be sure to inquire ahead of time.

Q. Where can I get more information?

A. These links.

Walker Creek Ranch: http://www.walkercreekranch.org/newpdfs/confguestinfo.pdf

Registration: http://www.pianofun.com/camp/orderform_pc.html