Do you have a piano teacher or a music teacher?

A "piano teacher" can teach you where to waggle your fingers to get a tune out of a keyboard.  A MUSIC teacher, however can teach you how to really UNDERSTAND music and get the best from your musical experience.

What's the difference? you may ask.  Well when I was a child I took piano lessons for maybe six years from a guy who was a pretty good pianist, from a 'classical music' perspective.  That is to say he could play music written in the music books.  If, however, he were asked to harmonise a melody on the spot, or to compose original music or to accompany a singer with only the benefit of the chord sequence and no written music notes then he would have been stuck.

Music jobs today require you to be an all round player, able to make the most of all music in front of you.  To read classical music from music books is fine if that is really all you want to do.  However if you want to play music of your own choosing then you really need to understand how harmony works and how to improvise accompanyments in many different styles at the keyboard.

Alas this skill is hardly taught, even at the highest level in our best music colleges.  There is, however, a solution if you do not have a skilled, all round music teacher on your doorstep.
That is to use the best of the home study music courses that you can find on the Internet.

There are many DVD and CD based piano courses available but, like live teachers, they vary in their effectiveness for your needs.  In my experience a big problem for the absolute beginner in music education is that courses tend to jump ahead in too large steps.  They assume that the student can understand new concepts that really need more explanation.

When you have had years of experience in teaching music, as I have, you learn not to assume anything.  Beginners can move ahead very quickly if helped to understand all the basic building blocks in music lessons step by step.  Or they can be put off easily if they think a concept is too difficult to grasp.

One of the finest courses for the complete beginner is 'Piano Fantastic'.  It's like having a brilliant and sympathetic music teacher living in your own house.  Right from the first lesson you are playing something that really sounds like music, rather than just an exercise.

Give yourself the best return on investment for your music lessons and make sure your are not just learning the piano but learning all about music.

Acoustic Piano