Our Toronto Piano lessons provide the perfect platform to train in creative expression and concentration. It’s no secret that we all want to improve our playing piano faster, and get the most out of our piano lessons. At times, learning something new can feel arduous and frustrating, and it can be difficult to have the tenacity to stick it out. While there are no real shortcuts for becoming a fluent pianist, there are methods that can make your piano practice time more effective and get you to where you want to be at a much quicker rate!
- Practice piano slowly and use specific problem solving:
Identify the parts of your piano piece that are giving you trouble and slow them down. While slowly playing through these sections pay attention to what it is that is causing you to make mistakes. Is it a fingering issue? An unclarity in which notes are to be played? A matter of coordination between the hands?
If you’re unclear, ask your piano teacher in your piano lesson what you should focus on. Our piano lessons in Toronto provide an exceptional facility with qualified and fun teachers to make your learning experience more enjoyable.
Just as there is no need for you to practice the alphabet anymore, there is not as much benefit to continually going over things you have already perfected! Instead, focus on the hard parts and use your deductive thinking to get to the root of the issues.
2. Start a piece from different points and stay consistent:
It is extremely common for piano students to be confident and fluid at the beginning of a song, only to fumble three-quarters of the way through it. Is this because the song gets significantly harder in skill level as it goes on? Most often, no. So why does this happen with such frequent recurrence?
The answer to this is quite simple; music students tend to have practiced the beginning many times more than any other part of the music. Most tend to go from the start every single time they practice, thus this section is engraved on the mind in deeper and deeper tracks.
Instead of doing this, try starting your piano piece from different points. Go from the middle, from 12 bars in, from the last page, mix it up! In doing this you will truly learn the music from all angles and have a much higher level of familiarity and confidence.
3. Be creative with your piano lessons and practice to keep yourself engaged:
Let’s face it, piano scales can be boring. They are the vegetables of piano. Yet, just like actual vegetables, they are good for you and necessary for a healthy development.
It is easy to zone out while going through piano scales and arpeggios, our minds wandering off about lunch or school or what our plans are for the weekend.
A way to regain our focus is by making these scales more musical and interesting, like puzzles for us to warm up with.
For example, start your major scales in your piano lessons from the 3rd note, from the 4th note, start you left hand on the 3rd and you right hand on the 5th, play Db major with your left in reverse and F minor with your right forwards!
They can sound super funky but doing this is an incredibly fun and fruitful brain workout.
4. Learn songs by ear:
Doing this is one of the best things you can do, not only for your piano chops but for you musicality as a whole. Learning by listening allows you to hear all the elements and how they fit together, and it forces you to go slowly and truly get a part down before moving on to the next.
It tests your knowledge of scales, key, chords, and rhythm, and it will deeply improve your feel.
5. Use your non-dominant hand!
While you can’t always be at your piano lessons in Toronto, just being going day to day in life can be busy work! Using your non-dominant hand in your everyday life is a great way to always be taking baby steps forward, even when you don’t have a chance to sit down at the keyboard.
Use that weaker hand to brush your teeth, hold your spoon, carry your coffee, zip up your jacket, whatever it is!
Slowly, very slowly I may add, you will start to feel more and more comfortable with doing this, and thus become more adept at playing with your less favoured hand on the piano.
Sounds crazy, but what have you got to lose!
Also, when using any of these tips, stay consistent! It is better to do 10 minutes a day than an hour twice a week. Our brains and hands need time to adapt, and consistent is necessary for this to happen.
Want to learn more? Check out this great post to learn more Toronto’s great lineage of piano teaching.
Good luck and keep going!
