Inspiration for piano practice

Picking Up a Beethoven Sonata After 50 Years

Picking Up a Beethoven Sonata After 50 Years

Like so many adults, I thought about lots of different things I would do when I “retired,” among them not setting an alarm, traveling, learning Spanish, spending more time with the grandkids—and, oh yes, returning to the piano.

Grandpa’s Gift

Grandpa’s Gift

As a shy 12-year-old girl, I never imagined that I’d one day thank my grandfather, Franklyn Mcafee, concert pianist, organist, and music teacher, for my hurting my feelings.

Your Brain on Adult Music Lessons

Your Brain on Adult Music Lessons

Good for your brain—Susan’s words resonated with me. Like so many middle-aged people, I worry about my brain; particularly because my father died of dementia a few years ago.

Bringing Joni Mitchell into a Chopin Nocturne

Bringing Joni Mitchell into a Chopin Nocturne

On a whim, I slipped a Joni Mitchell songbook into my tote bag along with my classical piano scores, before scrambling for my keys and rushing out the door for my session at the new music studio where I’ve been practicing once a week, since I don’t have a piano at home.

A Contemporary Romantic

A Contemporary Romantic

The painter Annika Connor is a Contemporary Romantic, a term that is at once wholly new and yet wonderfully old-fashioned, reminiscent of Chopin, Liszt, and Schumann, members of the Romantic music movement in 19th century Europe.

Piano Gone Missing

Piano Gone Missing

Almost a quarter century after August Wilson wrote his play The Piano Lesson, CBC News in Ottawa buzzed on May 29 that “Police seek grand piano missing from Kingston-area home”.

When An Adult Saw a Piano for the First Time

When An Adult Saw a Piano for the First Time

Indusekhar Menon hails from Pune, India, a city known as the Oxford of the East. In his early 30s, after looking upon a grand piano for the first time, he joined the global community of people with a passion for classical piano music.

Lent’s Thirds in Clair de Lune

Lent’s Thirds in Clair de Lune

Three weeks into Lent, I saw her slumped on a side staircase at Penn Station, her face set with weariness although she was fast asleep.

A Piano Teacher Takes Adult Piano Lessons

A Piano Teacher Takes Adult Piano Lessons

In his early 30s, Matthew Harre felt disenchanted with his piano technique. So this graduate of composition from American University and a teacher of adult pianists enrolled himself in adult piano lessons.

Pianists Show Up in the Most Unexpected Places

Pianists Show Up in the Most Unexpected Places

The neon sign in the dark, second-floor window at the corner of 61st and Lexington simply read “Eyebrows.” Getting my eyebrows done had never failed to lift my spirits, and on that particular rainy Tuesday evening my spirits needed lifting.

My Debut of Chopin’s C-sharp Minor Nocturne

My Debut of Chopin’s C-sharp Minor Nocturne

When I awoke this past Sunday morning, I could feel a familiar clipped breathing and tight chest from performance anxiety.  I was scheduled to play the Chopin Nocturne in C-sharp minor in public for the first time, at a mid-morning service at my church.

Red Light in Adult Piano Lessons

Chopin’s Nocturne in C-sharp Minor is a signature piece of my piano teacher, Stephen Wu. At his wedding reception at the Montclair Art Museum earlier this year, the lights dimmed as Stephen sat down at the mahogany Steinway, where he played a piece of his own composition he had written for his new wife, Meredith.