There are factors working against you when it comes to your quest to play piano creatively - let’s look at what they are and how to overcome them!
Watch the video here or keep on reading for the text version.
We have both external factors and internal factors that stop us from getting the training we need in order to become a creative pianist.
If your dream is to play the piano naturally, freely or creatively then you’ll need to identify these things in your life and take action to remove or improve them!
“It’s not taught, it’s a gift!”
There is a damaging idea that playing the piano freely is something that only people who are born into a musical family, or have the genes, or have taken to it naturally from the beginning can play the piano freely. The rest of us simply can’t.
This is a myth. It can certainly be taught!
Even skills as seemingly mysterious as playing by ear or improvising seem like things that only specially talented people can do - but it only seems that way when you don’t have the right knowledge!
Once you have the necessary resources to steer you specifically down that path and teach you those skills, then it is very possible to play freely!
The trouble is that people will simply learn traditional piano, or learn a lot of songs and expect that by sheer volume of pieces learned–and the amount of time they’ve been learning– should result in the development of these creative skills - but it doesn’t work that way!
To play creatively, you must learn and practice playing creatively!
What’s the answer?
Find a teacher, coach or program that teaches you these skills specifically. You do not need to be gifted, but you do need to go after your goals directly!
It’s not an app or quick fix!
In these days of YouTube tutorials and game apps that can cleverly teach us snippets of information quickly, we can start to think that anything we need to learn, we can learn it from an app or quick YouTube tutorial.
This way of thinking will not help you.
Learning to play the piano freely requires a direct learning path to take you from Step 1 to Step 2, to Step 3 and so forth, all the way to developing your skill.
Short punchy tutorials on YouTube, though quick and fabulously to-the-point, are not designed to take you in sequence to a larger goal. They’re more about accomplishing very short goals– ‘quick wins’.
Any true skill requires prolonged effort on a direct path of development.
With short tutorials haphazardly selected on the internet, it’s too easy to either miss out on important parts of information and end up with a gap in your knowledge, or, gain too much information that isn’t relevant to your goal!
With Piano Picnic courses, I have lessons that are on average 2-minutes in length so that it’s quick and easy to fit a piano lesson into your day…
…but how they differ from YouTube tutorials is my lessons are carefully plotted to take you toward a specific goal in the long term and with just the right amount of information, no overload!
What’s the answer?
Don’t waste your time on piece-meal information if you want to develop a skill. You need specialised, specific resources that lead you to your goal of playing freely! YouTube tutorials can be helpful for many things that need a quick answer, but developing a skill is not that!
There’s no curriculum!
Many people don’t even realise that becoming a creative, freely playing pianist is actually a) an option! or b) something you need to pursue outside of traditional piano lessons.
But why do pianists have to pursue this separately to normal traditional lessons with a teacher?
This is because there is no standardised curriculum for playing piano creatively!
Most piano teachers learned the traditional way and so they teach the traditional way.
The few piano teachers who teach their students to play creatively and develop their skills of improv, composing, playing by ear and comping, are doing so because they have decided to go beyond the curriculum on their own journey.
This is why it is still rare to find a piano teacher who is confident and able to teach pianists these less common skills, it’s unfortunately still considered ‘alternative’ by the mainstream piano examination boards!
But people have been playing the piano freely and creatively for years! Why is it so difficult to find training for it?
You’ll find your answer in the first factor at the top of this article!
Because it hasn’t been taught, the only people to become creative pianists were those who were naturally talented, had grown up with a musical family, or ‘alternative’ piano teacher, or influence.
BUT NO MORE! With Piano Picnic, we are turning traditional pianists who have a desire for something more– into confident, free-playing, creative pianists!
What’s the answer?
Sign up with Piano Picnic today and start developing your skills, because absolutely anyone can become a creative pianist with the right training & support!
