Legato pedaling can be a real challenge to teach! Teachers, have you found yourself sitting on the floor and manipulating your student’s foot up and down at the correct time? I used to do that until I hit on an idea for an exercise to do ahead of time that would set them up for […]
Arrange Success For Legato Pedaling Read More »
A foot rest provides students with stability at the keys and promotes good technique. I always use something to support students’ feet. The Strongtek Foot Rest is a very sturdy option with 5 different levels for the shelf. The highest shelf is high enough for a really young student like a 4 or 5 year
Review: Strongtek Piano Foot Rest Read More »
My next ‘splainer video is up! This one shows all of my tricks for having a good hand position at the piano, and includes clips of me demonstrating them with students. These videos are intended to be resources for my students and yours between their lessons. You can assign them to your students to
New Video: How To Have A Great Hand Position At The Piano Read More »
UPDATE: I have a video about adjustable benches on my youtube channel. Check it out! Here’s a photo of one of my 3rd grade students. In the right side photo, she’s sitting at standard bench height with no foot stool, and in the left photo, she’s at the proper height with a stool for her
You Can Afford An Adjustable Piano Bench! Read More »
My students have short feet! Of course, this is because most of them are 10 years old or younger! When your foot is short and your teacher insists that you keep your heel on the floor, you have to lift your toes higher than an adult does to clear the pedal fully. Add to the
Short Feet, Piano Casters, and Pedaling Difficulties Read More »
(Click here to see all of my posts on the 2009 MTNA National Convention.) Sorry for the blurry picture! That’s Catherine Rollin and the big screen which displayed her hands close up as she played. She presented a seminar today called Technique and Artistry: You Can’t Have One Without The Other. If you are familiar
MTNA Nat’l Conference – Catherine Rollin on Technique Read More »
Once I’m 100% sure that a student can reliably find whole steps and half steps from any key on the keyboard, we proceed to step two of the “learning major pentascales” process. On their assignment page, I write this formula: S-W-W-H-W1 -2 -3 -4 -5 The letters stand for Start-Whole-Whole-Half-Whole. Of course, when I’m doing
Teaching Pentascales: My Process Read More »
I start off by explaining half steps and whole steps. Several years ago, I took a twin bedsheet and drew a keyboard on it with permanent marker, making the keys big enough to step on. It only covers the range of a 10th, but it’s enough for what I need. We start off by walking
Teaching Half and Whole Steps Read More »
