Starting 11th January 2012, I will be giving a 3-hour evening piano class once a week. There are three course codes for this college-level class, each corresponding to a different level of playing. I will find out on the first day of class when I get to know the students just what their playing, reading, and hearing abilities are.
The 20 students will have to procure headphones to plug into their electric pianos, and I will teach them individually. This will be very different from the individual private piano lessons I have been giving at home in the Netherlands and elsewhere.
I can’t rule out those that are starting completely from scratch. They simply want to learn how to play the piano without having any previous music education or experience. For them, I found a blog post containing tunes one can play on one hand.
As the students are adults, I will also look for sites with tools and resources for adult piano learners.
My first step is to get them comfortable at the keyboard and recognise the 2-3 cluster patterns of black keys. Next I will get them to look for a note and find similar notes several octaves apart.
Ultimately they will want to play tunes they like. Here is where playing by ear is important.
As it is a group class, I look forward to having my students play together at some point. The more advanced players will play more advanced parts. I will get them to improvise. There are so many possibilities!!
