Tips & Tools for Learning New Pieces
When learning a new piece from scratch, there are a number of tools we can use to get the maximum benefit from our practice time and to lay the foundations for a secure and successful performance.
Piano Conversations with William Westney
William Westney and Graham Fitch discuss their experience with Dalcroze, desire to empower students, and the various ways they have found to achieve this.
The Hanon Debate (Part 2)
This blog post features the views of pianist Peter Donohoe on the use of Hanon’s Virtuoso Pianist as part of our debate on the subject.
The Hanon Debate (Part 1)
As we saw from responses to last week's post, the exercises of Hanon are a hotly debated topic. It seems there is nothing more provocative than uttering the name of…
Learning Khachaturian’s Toccata
Aram Khachaturian’s Toccata is one of the most effective showpieces for the advancing pianist. Although it looks and sounds very difficult, it is actually much more approachable than you might…
Applying the Practice Tools
If you would like to lay foundations for much more productive and effective practising in the year ahead, you might want to join my upcoming interactive practising workshop. The workshop…
Happy Holidays!
This is my final blog post for 2020, so let me take this opportunity to wish you all a very happy and peaceful holiday season. It has been a year…
The New ABRSM Syllabus – Initial Grade
The final instalment in my exploration of the pieces from the new ABRSM piano syllabus is now available on the Online Academy. This features video walk-throughs for each of the…
The New ABRSM Syllabus Workshop & Grade 1
The next instalment in my exploration of the new ABRSM piano syllabus features video walk-throughs of all of the main pieces from the Grade 1 syllabus. The following video provides…
“Everything You Know Is Wrong!”
When I first witnessed international piano guru, Peter Feuchtwanger, demonstrate his exercises in a class I was so shocked by them that I had to leave the room for a…