People come to music lessons for many different reasons.It's fun to teach children because they learn fast and most of them are easy to teach. Kids come to music lesson mostly for two reasons.
1. Their parents wants them to learn
a. because they learnt themselves too and they want their kids the same experience.
b. because they did not have a chance and these parents don't want their kids to miss out!
2. The kids had some kind of an experience, they saw someone playing, at school they saw a performance, one of their friends is playing or in some families there is an instrument at home or in the family and the kids started to experiment on the instrument and the parents think their child has some music ability and should be exposed to music lessons.
Unfortunately, in Australia I can't list the third reason that is the most common in the country where I come from. That is that in primary school instrumental learning comes as an all inclusive subject with a choice of an instrument of the child and his/her family with weekly two lessons outside school ours.
However, I have always loved teaching all ages and all levels. Even when I was working with professionals, I still continued to have a small private practice and taught mixed ages. Because I enjoyed it.
When it comes to adults it is a totally different ball game. When a matured aged student turns up at my door fom lessons that is a conscious decision. Similarly to kids, for two reasons. Because they never had a chance to learn or because they did and want to get back to playing.
A few weeks ago a 74 year-old or the way I like to put it, especially in Sue's case, a 74 year-young lady called me to enquire about piano lessons. A few days later she turned up for her first lesson. Sue wanted to take up piano again because as a child she learnt and enjoyed it and now she has the time to learn again.
Sue is a lively, tall and very attractive lady with a great personality. Her commitment to learning manifested right away. She had the adult beginner book in her hand that I recommended to get.
Long fingers, manicured nails and quick reading of notes. Although she was a little hesitant at the beginning, I could see that in no time she will be back reading music and playing with two hands. What surprised me was that her right hand was shaking very much. The left was steady. Witnessing a tremor like this is quite interesting. It is almost infectious and you get a little agitated if you don't breath and control this feeling. During lessons I become one with my students so much in the learning process that even this tremor I experience through Sue.
I have never seen a shake like this before, although I have seen a lot of different things. I had kids and adults with weak hands, weak fingers or just an old injury that left the little finger on one hand really weak. The worst conditions that I saw an adolescent boy whose fingers in general were extremely weak to press the keys and they were a little shaky. Just like when you go to the gym after a long period of break and your legs are shaking for awhile! Then the legs get stronger and the tremors stop.
However, it only takes a few weeks or sometimes a few months to strengthen these muscles by playing the piano and practicing at home and all is back to normal. This is when you realise how important it is to play an instrument and to develop not only the coordination but the physical strength of the hands, arms and the whole body.
Sitting at the piano requires quite a core strength. Holding your upper body with good posture and using your arms to play is quite a tummy work out! Not to mention adding the pedals and operating them in a sophisticated manner add extra difficulty and more challenges to your core muscles. Good players breath with the musical phrases like in singing and that again improves strength, circulation, removes toxins and improves emotional, mental and physical well-being.
The skills that go into piano playing with two hands and into reading musical notes fluently has no rival in any other subject. Once you play the piano picking up any other instrument is no problem.
Sue made a very conscious decision to come back to piano. Music learning will keep her young, mentally and physically active and after the first lesson seeing her shaking right hand, I was hoping that even these tremors would improve with time as she gains more control of her nerves.
Just the other night I was reading about a new exercise method that is extremely successful at the Gold Coast. Even paraplegic people, who have been in wheelchair for decades are gaining back their movements. A lot of injured professional athletes turn to this method because it is so successful. I have great interest in it because in music I have been always taught to practice slow, master it, then increase speed. Many times, it is extremely difficult to slow people down, especially fast racing boys and men and to convince them to practice at first slowly so the nervous system can gain total control of the problematic passages and the fingers can learn then memorise the sequence of movements that are involved in that section.
Here is a section from what I have been reading on ultra slow exercising:
"Movements performed at the ultra-slow rate take more physical and mental effort (effort generates more signals) and the more relaxed the state in which they are performed (open to receiving and processing signals), the more they result in more system-wide information processed for every fractional inch of movement than otherwise. Only when new information is flowing does any system change its behavior." from the article Hypothesizing the body's genius to trigger and self-organize its healing: 25 years using a standardized neurophysics therapy by Sarah N Ross and Ken Ware in the Frontiers of Physiology. "By contrast, information coming into the system at high rates in any domain of activity can be difficult to process and can stress the system, triggering extremes in excitatory or inhibitory dynamics depending on system-perceived significance."
So for anyone who really wants to play well or do any physical or mental activity well, visualising and slowing down things for awhile are absolutely crucial. Giving enough time for the brain and the body to process things help to reduce stress and gain control. Then, gradually increasing speed without increasing the number of mistakes is another, very important part of the process.
With Sue, this methodology is even more important to let her gain control of her nerves and her fingers to find their way on the piano and enjoy playing. She has already mentioned that would like to get a keyboard to practice at home which would increase her progress. Having fun at home by playing the piano every day and practice between lessons is just a great way to live at 74!
Sue just had her third lesson. I regretted that I did not video her on the first lesson so I could show her and you where we started from! However, this is how steady her hands have become in three lessons! Rock Along has been recorded on the third lesson and this was the second time Sue has played this particular new piece.
Working with Sue made me very curious about how much we will be able to improve her tremors. Seeing the progress in there lessons makes me extremely positive that we might be able to reduce it, maybe even alleviate it! Will keep you posted on Sue's progress!
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