Find the right Teacher for the Piano or your Instrument
How do I know if I found the right teacher for my kids or for myself in learning a musical instrument?
In my previous article, I've already pointed out why it's essential to find a qualified music professional to teach your kids at the beginning, when your kids first start learning a musical instrument, but how do I know if the teacher I found is suitable and can bring my kids to a higher level although this teacher has graduated from a music school.
Let me have a brief introduction about what is actually going on when people are studying music at a university/ music conservatory. When you are studying music at the music school of the university or at a music conservatory, you will have a choice of what area are you going to study specifically. We have performance major, compositional major, majoring in music education (which prepares you to teach music at primary or secondary school.) and majoring in conducting.
Usually, if you want to major in performance with your major instrument, you need to go through some further auditions and the jury board of the music school will make a decision by saying that you are better than the normal music students when playing your instrument and also having the potential to be a performer. It's always very competitive to be majoring in performance at the music schools.
Every music student who has studied music at the music school in the university or conservatories with a particular instrument, is what we call their major instrument. It can also be said that when someone enters the music school, they should show and prove to the school that they have a certain ability in playing a particular instrument at the audition when applying the school, for example the piano, or violin or french horn. But studying and focusing on a particular instrument by taking this instrument as a major study in performance is a total different story.
Taking an example of someone who plays the piano, this person enters the music school by showing the school that this person has the ability to play the piano. However, that's just the minimum requirement for applying the music schools around the world.
They can choose to study specifically in music composition by showing during the audition the compositions that
they composed previously . What am I talking about? For these students who study composition, they will receive formal training at the music school emphasizing on how to compose music, more theoretical in nature. The focus is not on having individual instrumental lessons. If you are looking for teacher for learning a higher level in theory, or you want to learn how to compose music in a more complicated style, these musicians are the best choice.
On the other hand, if you want to improve your piano playing or a particular instrument playing, you should choose those who did their major in piano performance (or majoring in performance with that particular instrument you are learning). These musicians have received intensive training specifically in performing with their major instrument. They have more than enough knowledge on how to solve the problems that you will encounter when playing the piano.
A professionally trained musician can show you what the hidden messages are, that the composer wants to bring out and how to bring those ideas out in a musical way when you play that piece. in addition, they can show you the proper posture and technique that you should have when playing the piano, how you communicate with your audience, tone color of the music, etc. So you may say this is more practical instead of theoretical.
I hope this information will give you a further idea on how to get a instrumental teacher for your kids or for yourself and achieve the best result though learning with these professional teachers.
