Hi Ron, Sad but true. Vinny ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ron Nossaman" <rnossaman@cox.net> To: "Pianotech" <pianotech@ptg.org> Sent: Saturday, December 25, 2004 8:31 AM Subject: Re: Bad Student Piano Insight > > > I seems to me piano > >teachers are more divorced from the instrument of the trade than these other > >instructors. I wonder why. I think that is what I might have been asking. > >Why is that? > > > >Terry Farrell > > > As always, no guarantee on the validity of my thoughts, but I still have a > few. The tennis and marksmanship instructors have likely been professional > performers for some years before becoming professional instructors. As > such, they spent a whole lot of time with their "instruments", maintaining, > tuning, and repairing them. The vast majority of the piano teachers I've > known aren't full time professional teachers, never made a nickel > performing on the instrument, and took up teaching because they could make > some money with virtually no personal cost in training, and very little in > materials (stickers and such). The tennis and marksmanship instructors use > instruments that are vastly simpler than those of the piano teacher, and > the knowledge required to minimally maintain these instruments is > considerably less. Yes, these instruments can be buried in a fog of > subjective mysticism just like pianos, but as basic tools, they are > relatively simple compared to pianos. The requirements of the instrument > are an important consideration here too. Both tennis and target shooting > are ballistics. Both require a rather high level of precision performance > as a minimal requirement. We are taught that we should clean, protect, and > pamper our firearms, and purchase new tennis rackets and balls > periodically, or possibly re-string our rackets if we are serious about our > performance. If a piano makes a noise when the key is depressed ("It's in > great shape - all the keys work"), it's just fine. We learn this in > childhood, and it is reinforced through "education" right up until the time > some suspect technician tells us that our piano is sub-standard. Pianos are > immortal, and never need service as long as all the keys work. Ask anyone. > The marksmen and tennis players that aren't serious, don't know their > instruments nearly as well as those that are. Pianists tend to be the same. > Dependance on an instrument for high performance levels demands greater > understanding of the instrument unless you wish your performance (and > livelihood) to be at the mercy of random circumstance. In teaching > (beginning) piano, performance is of little to no consequence. It's so much > a half hour to pound in the basics. Tennis and shooting can be taken up > with about fifteen minutes of quick briefing to tell you everything you > need to know to participate in the sport. Playing the piano badly is > somewhat more difficult to learn than pointing a firearm and pulling the > trigger, or smacking a tennis ball over the net, so many people never > progress far enough to get beyond the basics and into the desirability of > learning something about the instrument. But they can still teach. > > > Ron N > > _______________________________________________ > pianotech list info: https://www.moypiano.com/resources/#archives
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