Oclef Blog

June 04, 2024

The Paradox of Failure: Why Our Worst Moments Define Our Best

Consider the story of Beethoven, one of the greatest composers in history. Many people don't know that as a young man, Beethoven was a mediocre violinist. He was often overshadowed by other musicians, and his early compositions were met with criticism and rejection.

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November 02, 2018

Why are there levels for students learning piano?

First of all, for those wondering, these levels are all made up. Some group of people decided a while back to start categorizing pieces by difficulty and then organizing them into 10 levels. Level 1 is the easiest and 10 the hardest.

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October 03, 2016

Why do we teach?

At the end of every teaching day, I’m exhausted. Just like any other job you love, you’re depleted emotionally, physically and mentally. Teaching music is particularly rewarding since you see your students grow and develop over the years. But what I find incredibly rewarding is when I see students use the skills or mindset they have from piano, in their life outside piano. We often give presentations in theory class and it’s always the new students who feel most uncomfortable. Amy was a new s...

September 18, 2016

Avoiding errors vs. achieving excellence (Part II)

A teacher of mine from a long time ago once told me that mistakes in performance are like if someone walks in front of the TV while you’re watching a show. This always stuck in my mind. The person walking in front of the screen temporarily messes up the line of communication that you have with the TV, but it doesn’t effect your understanding and appreciation of the story, characters and setting. You still enjoy the show and by the end, you probably won’t even remember the person who walked by...

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September 15, 2016

Tough love

Every so often I need to reach for the tissue box in lessons. Tears happen. Does it mean we’re too tough as teachers? It depends. I often push students as hard as I think they can go. The result is a deeper student to teacher connection in the long term, but a frustrated student in the short term. I push them because they can do it. Because I believe it’s the right thing to do. It’s tough being a student. I know. I was there and went through every lesson, recital, competition, audition, tours...

September 12, 2016

Avoiding errors vs. achieving excellence – Part I

One of my first blogs on Oclef was a message that I sent to my students before a competition. You can read it here – The Perfection of Pursuit What I work to make clear to my students in every opportunity is that mistakes and errors are not the problem. The problem is almost always maintaining the correct focus or mindset. Do your students fear making mistakes? Or are they more focused on creating excellence in their music? Perspective is everything. I think this is the one big differences be...

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