Piano Lessons- Music Theory Lessons

Player systems have become incredibly advanced – many can be programmed using a tablet or phone. They can play historic performances of some of the greatest pianists of all time preserved digitally from the original expressive player piano rolls from over 100 years ago! They can download new music over your home wireless network. Some have speakers that can play music to accompany the piano, and some will even record your performance for playback. It is a very exciting technology.

If you’ve considered getting one of these units for your piano you might wonder whether or not it will do any damage to the piano or if it will it play differently? These are good questions which require something more than a simple yes or no answers. The truth is, it can hurt the piano, but it doesn’t have to.

Many people are initially surprised when they find out how much it costs to install a player system on their piano. Typically it will cost thousands of dollars. The process to install a player system is quite complex and you will want to make sure you work with a technician who is experienced in installing them.

In order to install the system, the technician must cut into the key bed where the player system actuators come through to operate the keys from the bottom. Under the hands of a skilled technician, there is virtually no risk involved with installing a player system.

With the right technician, you will not be able to tell a difference in the action if a player system is installed. My technician has been installing player systems for over 30 years and I’ve played many pianos he has installed them on and can’t tell any difference in the feel or response of the pianos in any way.

Now, there is another side to player system installation that you should be aware of. If a technician is not skilled in installing player systems, there is some risk of damage to your piano. Incidentally, a large piano moving company started training its truck drivers to install player systems in pianos in response to a decline in piano sales and deliveries after the crash of the housing market. Many dealers are taking advantage of the low labor costs. So, when you consider having a player system installed in your piano, be sure to inquire who is doing the work.

Nelson asks if piano actions get easier to play as the piano ages. He noticed that over time his Yamaha piano became easier and easier to play. Do piano actions actually get lighter as you continue to play them? There is no absolute yes or no answer to this question, but there are certain fundamentals that are important to understand.

The first thing to be aware of is that when you buy a brand new piano, the felt bushing will eventually loosen up over time – and fairly quickly if you play a lot. Each key sets in motion nearly 100 parts. Wherever there is friction, there are felt bushings. Over time they will loosen up.

On the other hand, if you don’t play your piano much, the parts can actually get stiff and harden up over time. A humid environment can make the felt bushings swell slowing things down as well. A piano technician will typically lubricate parts of the piano action. If the piano isn’t played, dust can accumulate inside the piano and make the action gum up making it harder to play.

If you practice a lot or play your piano every day it will actually get easier to play the instrument over time. Why is this? Every time you hit a key on a piano there is a felt hammer that impacts the strings. As time goes by, the hammers will get grooves in the felt as they continue to strike the strings. This becomes compacted felt which is hard and produces a bright, brittle tone with little effort. So, even if the piano is physically no easier to play, you will get much more sound out of the instrument with the same effort making it seem easier to play. The way to deal with this phenomenon is to have a qualified piano technician reshape the hammers by filing them to create the original egg shape which produces a warm, projecting tone. Over time when the hammers have been filed a number of times, they will have less mass making the action lighter.

The only reason a piano action would get heavier is if you don’t play it a lot. Otherwise, with regular play and maintenance, your piano will generally become easier to play.

On some older Steinway pianos, they were using a paraffin solution that can cause a condition called verdigris where the action may become very sluggish and the piano might feel considerably heavier. However, this is generally not a problem to worry about except on certain vintages of Steinway pianos. The only real way to remedy this issue is to have a technician perform skilled work on it (which might only relieve your issue temporarily) or replace some action parts.

A dream for many music conservatory students is to become an orchestral musician. The industry has changed dramatically over the past few decades but there are still plenty of orchestras and possible job openings. But what is it like? What are the hours, the demands, and even the general lifestyle?

The sad thing is that there are very few jobs in North America that pay a living wage for an orchestral musician. The competition for these jobs is extremely fierce and you will often audition with hundreds of other possible candidates for a single position. Despite the dozens of orchestras around the country, most of them have become part-time jobs. In order to support themselves; a lot of orchestral musicians turn to teach or freelance performance to supplement their income.

As for the full-time positions in orchestras, you must be ready to compete against hundreds of other musicians at every single audition. It might sound discouraging but for a lot of musicians since just making it to the quarterfinals of an audition is a monumental achievement. A lot of success really relies on knowing how to audition. Just because you’re a great musician doesn’t make you great at taking auditions.

By and large, the people who end up getting jobs with orchestras have made a career out of auditioning. All of these musicians must be willing to travel to any available auditions and spend the majority of their time learning and being instructed by coaches on specific repertoire. This can be incredibly expensive and time-consuming; all of these musicians must have a system of support in order to work for their goals. Whether it’s teaching or performing freelance, these musicians must find a way to support their passion beyond just auditioning and practicing.

So what is the life of an orchestral musician like? Well even though it can be very glamorous and incredibly fulfilling, it’s a very demanding job. You have to remember that there are literally hundreds of other people that would jump at the opportunity to have your job; this means you have to keep yourself in top-notch condition. Even if you have time off from the orchestra you will have to practice every single day to stay in shape and learn your parts.

While it’s incredibly challenging to find and keep a job in an orchestra it can be richly rewarding. Many people spend their whole lives in pursuit of this and never actually achieve full-time success. Sometimes the freelance and part-time work are all they will achieve but it’s nothing to scoff at. Getting paid to play music is a complicated endeavor and it can truly take a lifetime to achieve success. But for a musician, it is the path to take.

You may or may not have heard of the term pitch raise before but it is something that is very important when it comes to the condition of a piano. It’s nothing to be scared of but it is something you should be aware of, especially if you are looking into buying a used piano or haven’t tuned your piano in a long time. Maybe you have a piano that you haven’t tuned in years or maybe you just bought a used piano and assume that you’ll just get it tuned up and it will be ready to go. Then when your tuner arrives he tells you that you’re going to need a pitch raise; what does that mean?

Hundreds of years ago there were no established pitches. For example, an A on one piano would not sound the same as an A on another piano – pitches would vary quite a bit. Over time pitches stabilized and a standard pitch was established. Today the standard reference of pitch is A 440. That is the note that a symphony orchestra tunes to. But what does 440 mean? The number stands for vibrations per second of the strings and it’s the measurement of how many times the string is moving back and forth each second. If you double the vibrations of the string to 880 cycles per second, you also have an A, just one octave higher! It is the same principal for all musical tones.

So why is it a concern if your piano is not up to pitch? There are actually several reasons this:

One of the most common examples is if your piano is under pitch and you are playing with other musicians you will be playing in two different keys and it won’t work. Or at the very least you will be drastically out of tune with one another.

Another fundamental reason to have your piano tuned to concert pitch is that a piano is designed and manufactured to sound best tuned to a certain pitch. So if your piano has dropped in pitch, it will produce a very dull, lifeless sound.

So is it really that complicated to get a pitch raise? Actually, it is! There are a number of reasons why it’s a complicated and expensive procedure.There are about twenty tons of string tension collectively throughout the piano. Getting a pitch raise means that you will be adding potentially thousands of pounds more pressure onto the plate and the delicate wood parts of the piano; particularly the bridges and soundboard which could possibly cause problems. Worse than that, unless a tuner really knows what they are doing, they could end up breaking strings. So if you’re getting a pitch raise you definitely want someone who is experienced in this. Piano technicians must lubricate the points of friction on the strings if there is any corrosion.When you consider that there are over 220 strings on a piano and multiple points of friction, this is a job in itself! If the piano hasn’t been tuned in years the strings could have become tarnished or rusted melding into the pins and other parts of the piano. If you just tune it up you could end up snapping strings if you don’t take precautions.

Even in a best case scenario, if you tune a piano that needs a pitch raise without any major problems, you can’t expect the piano to hold its tuning. In fact, your tuner will have to do a rough tuning first then then do a fine, second tuning. But even the refined tuning won’t hold very long and you will most likely need to get the piano tuned again multiple times over the course of the next year or two just to get it to stabilize and hold its tuning. So how can you know if a piano needs a pitch raise? Luckily it is something that is fairly easy to tell if you have the proper tools. You just need a source of pitch: a tuning fork, a tuner that produces tones, or any instrument that you know is in tune. You can even use a tuning application on your phone! A lot of times the piano will not produce completely different notes – it will most likely be between two notes which still entails getting a pitch raise.

So make sure you keep your piano tuned up to pitch. You will enhance the tone and prolong the life of your piano.

This is a very common question and something that is extremely important when it comes to music lessons. Whether it’s for budgeting or attention issues, the idea of a shorter lesson can be intriguing to many parents.

If you find yourself thinking, “I’m not sure my child can even pay attention for thirty minutes”, then it’s probably best you don’t have them take music lessons until they are older. If they can’t be attentive with someone guiding their work for thirty minutes, then how can you expect them to practice on their own? It’s probably best to hold off on lessons for the near future and come back to it when they are ready. There isn’t some magic age at which children are ready for music lessons but if they are old enough to go to school and do homework on their own, they could be ready for music lessons with a private teacher.

There are always some exceptions to the rule. If you have a young child starting lessons then maybe thirty minutes is the best option – or better yet having two thirty minute lessons each week. It’s also important to have personal involvement with them outside the lesson and help them through their practice sessions. Once they are of school age and can handle homework, you probably won’t need to sit in with them on a regular basis. It’s also important to be encouraging to them; don’t fret over simple mistakes as learning and practicing music should be an enriching experience and you want to avoid harsh discipline.

Another concern for some parents is that longer than thirty minutes could be too intense for some children. The truth is, it’s exactly the opposite! Let’s say you have a student who has issues with something like rhythm or hand position and it’s going to take some time to resolve. As a teacher, having a shorter timeframe to fix something like this will produce a much more hectic and frantic environment in which you are racing against the clock.

When it comes to thirty-minute lessons, there is not much time to achieve anything other than correcting wrong notes and assigning new material. It’s not until you get into 45-60 minute lessons where you can actually begin to analyze and explore the finer points of technique and study music theory. The longer lesson also allows for the teacher and student to build a better rapport with one-another which enhances the learning environment. After all, the most important part of a music lesson is the time you are not with the student – the independent practice time at home.

Your job as a teacher is to show the student what to do on a daily basis that will improve their playing – how to practice. You can’t be there every day so the little time you have must be spent teaching them how to work on their own. In this sense, the most important part of a student’s week is the time they spend away from their teacher. If a student can learn to work on their own and improve through self-correction and productive practice techniques, this is the mark of a very effective teacher.

So why are thirty-minute lessons so popular? It’s simple economics. Most music teachers will advertise cheap lessons as a way to get people interested. After all, a $25 lesson sounds a lot better on your wallet than a $50 lesson each week. The truth is, thirty-minute lessons are most often a compromise.

Many top teachers will offer lessons longer than thirty minutes. Some of them might even insist on longer lessons. Remember that the quality of the teacher is paramount in providing a better learning experience. You might pay a little more but the results could be well worth the extra time and money.

Chickering & Sons pianos are one of the oldest, American piano companies going back to 1823. In 1850, Henry Steinway attended a concert featuring performance on a Chickering grand piano. He was entranced by the experience and it provided inspiration to start Steinway & Sons pianos.

In the mid-1800’s Chickering was the largest piano manufacturer in the United States. There have been Chickering pianos in the White House. Abraham Lincoln owned a Chickering piano.

Technically, Chickering was responsible for developing the one-piece, cast iron plate which became a standard for all pianos up until this day. Unlike the vast majority of American piano companies, Chickering survived the advent of radio and the phonograph, the Great Depression, and WWII. However, the influx of cheap Asian pianos finally dealt a death blow to the esteemed, American company in the early 1980’s.

Let’s say a piano is brand new in a store and needs to be prepped. A technician might spend an entire day doing full regulation, voicing and tuning as well as other refinements. After a full day of work, guess what? It’s halfway there. It’s halfway to being the perfect piano, and then the tuner comes back another day. Maybe there’s a customer who plays on a high level who’s not entirely satisfied with the performance. The tuner might spend even another day prepping and fine-tuning. By this time, we have gotten halfway yet again.

This is a process that could be repeated over and over. The piano gets into the person’s home, and they get the best technician they can find because they want this piano to be as exquisite as possible. They bring their technician on a regular basis, and each time they come in, they get just a little bit closer to perfection. Let’s contrast this with someone else who buys a piano who doesn’t play very much, and they don’t tune it for five years. Well, guess what? There is going to be more backward steps then forward steps. The piano can degrade over time!

There is a saying among piano tuners who say you can’t tune an out of tune piano. As crazy as this sounds, there is some truth to this. Think about it. If a piano drops in pitch when a tuner comes to tune the piano, as they tune one section of the piano, the previously tuned section is knocked out of tune because of the additional force on the bridge. That makes the soundboard flex which throws out the part that they just tuned. If the piano has not been tuned in a very long time, it takes multiple tunings to get the piano in the zone. Even that tuning will not hold for very long, and then the tuner has to go back and tune again!