Many people wonder if there is anything they can do to improve their fundamental skills of playing the piano once they progress past the basic lessons to become a competent player. Are there any tips, tricks, or advanced exercises you can employ to progress your playing even further?

I’ve stressed in the past the importance of learning all major and minor scales and arpeggios. But beyond this, are there any hidden secrets that will make you a better pianist? There is a simple thing you can do that won’t take much time and can greatly improve your playing:

Practice at least 10 minutes a day

Seriously, that’s it! You may not be able to do this every single day, but if you sit down and practice even a little bit every day, it can dramatically change your piano playing. Like any endeavor, whether it’s music, writing, drawing, or physical fitness, the key to success is to work consistently over time.

By practicing every day for even a few minutes, you will be keep yourself in shape on the piano both mentally and physically. Whether it’s scales, arpeggios, or what I recommend above all else, repertoire, you will enjoy benefits to your playing. You will also build on what you have worked on the previous day instead of taking two steps forward and one step back forgetting what you had learned previously when you skip days.

You can revisit a piece you played in the past, play through something you are working on currently, or learn a brand new piece. Focusing your practice sessions on actual music is one of the best ways to improve as a pianist, and it can be an enriching experience.

Just sight-reading through music can help you grow musically by getting exposed to new music while improving your reading. Learning new music will help you expand your horizons as well. You’ll learn new techniques, get exposed to new sounds, and discover new ways to play your instrument. As pianists, we are extremely lucky because there is more solo music written for piano that any other instrument. You will never run out of new music to learn!

So instead of focusing on just scales, arpeggios and exercises, try focusing on music and work some at the piano every day. Not only will you be exposing yourself to something new that presents fresh challenges, you will be able to actually play something enjoyable for people once your master a particular piece.

I hope this is helpful and if you have any questions about this topic or any other, please email me Robert@LivingPianos.com for more information.

This is a great question and it’s something people don’t often consider. Most of the time people are used to the lesson plan of learning a new piece during the week – if you’re just starting it will probably only take you a week to learn – and then starting another piece the next week. The question is, what should you do with those older pieces and when you advance further in your playing, is it possible to work on two pieces at the same time?

When it comes to learning new pieces, it’s always a good idea to continue to practice the pieces you’ve already learned. It’s not worth forgetting about them. If you’ve taken the time to learn them, you should continue to reinforce them and expand your repertoire as much as possible. It’s much better to have a few pieces of music in your repertoire that you can play extremely well and as you continue to practice your older pieces you will be able to play them easier and more effectively. As you continue to learn new music and continue to practice all of your pieces you, will expand your repertoire very quickly.

Once you get to a certain point you might have too much music, which means that you might have to start dropping older repertoire to have the time to learn new pieces. This is a good place to be. It’s always great to have a solid repertoire you can refer to and once you begin to learn and master new pieces you can simply replace older ones you no longer like as much or you don’t think showcase your talents as well. Later you may revisit these pieces.

Instead of playing exercises, try playing your older music It can be more beneficial than simply practicing just exercises and it will allow you to refine your playing even more. I highly recommend playing older music as warm up exercises. You will become intimately familiar and comfortable with the music.

Once you advance to a certain level of music, it’s going to take you a long time to learn and master a new piece. If you’re entering competitions or playing recitals you will have to learn a lot of music all at the same time. It’s beneficial to practice each of your pieces at least thirty minutes to an hour a day – and many times you will have to practice much more than that. Learning one piece at a time simply isn’t feasible for a schedule like this and you will have to learn more than one piece at a time in order to keep yourself current with your music and the goals you’ve set for yourself.

So the short answer is yes, you should always practice more than one piece at a time, especially your review pieces in your repertoire because it only expands your personal music library and enables you to have many pieces on a high level at the same time. I know some people who simply learn a new piece each week and drop the older ones they were learning – they never have a piece that is on a high level they can simply play at a moment’s notice. The bottom line is that if you are to perform concerts, you must have a substantial repertoire under your fingers even though you can’t keep everything you’ve learned on a high level all the time.

While there are people who are supposedly tone deaf and have difficulty trying to match pitch, there are people who have an innate problem with even keeping a beat and clapping along with a song. So, is there any way to develop this? Or is it something you are born with?

There is a certain amount of talent that is simply “born” into some people and they are able to keep a beat well on their own, but it’s not a skill that can’t be learned. If you find yourself rhythmically challenged, here are a few exercises that can help you develop a sense of beat.

Traditional methods include clapping along with a beat or a metronome but sometimes these methods simply don’t work. You might encounter students that even with this type of practice still can’t keep a beat. Don’t give up on them, there is hope!

Simply listening to music will help develop a sense of beat a great deal. All sorts of music, rhythmic music, jazz, classical, rock, anything you can listen to will help develop a sense of beat. Beyond listening you should try moving with the music.