Free stuff! We love it! I’m something of a serial bargain hunter myself, but some things are just not a good idea to get for free: tattoos, candy from strangers and… learning piano.
YouTube is a world of information, all free and all there for the taking.
It’s great for things like learning how to fold a fitted sheet, how to cook a lasagne or how to do a fab makeup contour. For a skill or anything that takes the time to learn, however, it gets tricky. You end up spending more time trying to find out which path to go down, or which topic you should learn next, than learning. It’s free, it’s abundant, but most of what you can piece together lacks direction and structure.
There are a lot of different paths, but you need what’s right for you.
If you find a teacher that understands your direction, they can put you on that path so that you don’t waste time with irrelevant information. A good teacher will provide the right resources at the right time to guide you toward what it is you want to achieve. A clear learning path is sadly lacking from the vast majority of free online material because it is either designed poorly or designed to be incomplete–leading you into a subscription plan for self-serve, randomised content.
If you spend the money, your will follows soon after.
When you get something for free you don’t value it. More often than not, if you find yourself a completely free method of learning piano or spend the time finding free videos on YT, will you take it to the end? Of course not. If you get halfway through and decide to give up because it’s more challenging than you thought, you haven’t spent any money so what’s the harm in quitting? When you pay for something you are more likely to follow through, no one likes to throw away money!
A tutor who charges for their services is saying “Hey, my experience and advice is worth something”.
This is why I work on my piano course full-time. All my time and effort goes into putting Piano Picnic together and making it completely effective and a worthwhile investment of your time. A free tattoo is not a great idea, like free surgery or free bungee jumping… you just don’t go there! The fact that it is free leads you to question the legitimacy of the service. The same principle applies to spending your precious time on a piano learning method, you get what you pay for.
Don’t get me wrong, I am a complete YouTube addict.
I use it for all sorts of things – scouring for new pianists to listen to, seeing which new metal song the pianist VK Goes Wild has decided to cover (love her!), I even have my own Piano Picnic channel. But I’m very careful to only put advice or discussion-led videos up and not actual piano lessons because the noise of 82 million other videos vying for your attention isn't a conducive learning environment.
Don’t become a statistic. Too many new pianists give up before they’ve really seen any reward for their efforts. It’s difficult to pick up any new skill! Much time and effort must be invested before you start to make real progress.
The three main reasons that students give up learning piano are a lack of motivation, lack of support and lack of structure. If you really want to learn the piano you shouldn’t risk learning from a source that isn’t tailored to these needs – you need support, encouragement and a clear learning path so there's no need to despair when you face a challenge.
Learning something new isn’t easy and even with an enthusiastic and encouraging teacher like myself, you still need to foster a decent amount of inner-motivation in order to put in the effort required to achieve your piano goals.
The ability to effortlessly flow across the piano keys without stopping is a technique that requires practise, patience and a couple secrets.
If you've experienced any strain or pain as a result of playing piano – or maybe as a result of something else in your life but certainly exacerbated by playing piano, please know that it is normal! But just because it’s normal, that doesn’t mean you have to put up with it. Stretching into those forgotten corners of the body can do wonders for your energy, motivation and creativity too!
When you first decided to learn piano you probably didn't imagine you'd need to learn rhythmic skills, but once you get into creative playing that's exactly what you need to develop! So why is it so difficult to get our hands playing different things?
Feeling lost in the jungle of piano learning? This one is for you. In this free training I answer that I get asked all the time from beginner, intermediate & advanced pianists.
Discover the correct technique for playing scales with minimum strain and maximum warmup & exercise value!
Learn how to play the main riff from the classic 80s rock song ‘Africa’ by Toto on the piano in just a few minutes!
If you're in the market for a digital piano, these terms will definitely come up - what's the difference between weighted keys, semi-weighted keys, hammer action & graded hammer action? And which one is more desirable?
There comes a point in any creative pianists life where they want to go BEYOND the basic triads and explore the satisfying texture of a CRUNCHY CHORD! But where do you start? Here.
Learn how to play the main riff from the Mandalorian theme tune on piano! Carefully arranged for solo piano (from the original orchestral work) by Ruth Power of Piano Picnic. This casual tutorial will get you showing-off for all your Star-Wars obsessed friends!
Learn what makes the Piano Picnic style of learning different to the rest. If you haven’t done a course with me yet, this is the perfect introduction to what to expect, who’s suited to my courses, and the ethos behind my unique teaching style!
Today I’m going to show you my favourite finger exercise - it’s starts very simply and gets progressively more difficult each time you go up a level.
Free stuff! We love it! I’m something of a serial bargain hunter myself, but some things are just not a good idea to get for free: tattoos, candy from strangers and… learning piano.
I'm reflecting on 4 years of being a piano coach online, how I NEVER wanted to be a piano teacher and what I’ve learned about today's piano students (that shocked me!).
Learning piano is fun! It’s also challenging and rewarding, a form of expression and at times a source of frustration. But what we gain from learning piano goes far beyond the direct results we notice in the moment…
If you've been disappointed with traditional piano methods you're not alone. Here's why I believe the traditional methods of the past no longer fit today's amateur pianists.
Playing one thing and singing another, whether melodically or rhythmically different was such a challenge while I was learning piano! My only approach was to learn the piano piece so well that I didn’t have to spare it a thought, allowing me to focus all my attention on trying to sing properly. But there are other ways to improve at accompanying yourself singing…
Everyone knows they need to practice in order to improve their piano-playing ability, but a vast majority of piano students don’t quite know what to do, for how long they need to do it, and exactly what good it does!
In this post you’ll discover the science behind practice: how our brain responds to ‘quality repetition’ and how you can get the most out of your time.
Especially for the digital pianists, we start by looking at what the digital piano is made of, it’s many functions and what the buttons mean. Then you’ll discover exactly what you need to plug in and where.
Getting an acoustic piano from one place to another is something better left to the professionals. But for the brave ones determined to DIY this blog will show you what to expect.
The easy decision to make is the one to get yourself a piano. It’s kind of hard to learn without it, right? The difficult decision is which type of piano to get and after that, which brand? Then after that, which model? It can seem like a complicated test you have to pass to enter the piano world, but you need not feel confused any longer. This guide will make it crystal clear.
A lot of people teach posture as a strict way to sit and do this and that ‘correctly’. The result is that it sounds more like a military exercise than playing music but the whole point of these guidelines is to help you play comfortably.
As you progress in your piano playing you will notice your fingers and wrists can become strained after a long practice. Prevention is better than a cure which is why you need to start doing finger and wrist exercises.
Learning how to practice well enables you to get the most out of the time you have: to make maximum progress and firmly establish new information. I’ve compiled 10 practice tips here that are easy to implement in your practising regime.
Taking care of your piano is vital to not just getting a good sound - you are investing in the longevity of your instrument and the respect you give it suggests to your psyche that playing the piano is important to you.
Let's get one thing straight:
Learning the piano doesn't need to be an endurance test!
When buying a used piano it’s important to keep in mind that one man’s “perfect working order” can be another man’s piano-shaped table...
Acoustic pianos can be expensive, particularly the shiny variety. But if you’re not in the market to throw several thousand at a glossy black beauty then you’re looking at the used category of pianos.
With so many pianists starting their journey in childhood, it can feel like as adult beginners that we’ve missed the boat already. Is learning something new best left to the young? I talk to one of my students, Mike Clarke–a retired engineer in Australia–about his experience.