Earlier this month, I hosted my 14th studio piano recital. There’s always so much that goes into planning and preparing for an event like this: Choosing repertoire Booking the venue Polishing memory Emailing parents Practicing “piano bows” Coordinating with the facilities manager and the piano tuner Borrowing percussion instruments from the music teacher Scheduling duet and ensemble rehearsals Finalizing and printing programs Planning a reception We spend months learning the music and practicing...
Jun 18, 2025•17 min•Ep. 84
It starts simply. Two blocked jazz chords with I-V in the bass. And then the vocalist comes in: “Twenty-four hours can go so fast. You look around, the day has passed…” This is Leonard Bernstein’s song “Some Other Time” with lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, written for the 1944 musical, On the Town. It’s about three sailors on 24-hour leave in New York City who meet three women before leaving for war. Four characters perform this song (in the stage version), hoping to catch up some other...
May 14, 2025•18 min•Ep. 83
Some of you may not know this about me, but I’m a musician and an artist. I always loved art as a kid—from finger painting in my blue smock at my Little Tikes easel to coloring and tracing to the pastel class I took one summer. For a while, my answer to the question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” was “An artist or illustrator.” Music was always there, too—singing and playing the piano, learning letter names as I learned the alphabet, and later, accompanying, teaching, performing, an...
Apr 16, 2025•19 min•Ep. 82
March is Women’s History Month and by extension, Women in Music Month—an opportunity to acknowledge and celebrate women’s contributions to our field. As a teacher, I love finding ways to honor and celebrate things like this with my students. A few years ago, we did a studio-wide blues composition project (see Ep. 045 ) during the month of February, Black History Month. Then, there was the year I created a 4-week study unit for one of my high school students focused on women composers. In Ep. 057...
Mar 12, 2025•16 min•Ep. 81
When you think about practicing, what do you picture? Maybe you think about your instrument in the living room or your favorite practice room at school. Maybe you picture your studio with morning light streaking across the floor or in the evening with a few lamps casting a cozy glow. Certainly, practicing happens in all of these spaces. But it can also happen at your desk, in the car, at the breakfast table, on a walk, in a carrel at the library, or in a classroom where no instrument is present....
Feb 12, 2025•18 min•Ep. 80
The Spring semester can be busy. With extra performances, we end up focusing more on performance skills—starting and finishing well, lifting hands back to our laps, how to practice performing at home, bowing, and memorization strategies. But as you know, there’s so much more that happens in a music lesson—so much more that we’re teaching and cultivating in our students. It’s not just about performance or mastery or checking things off. It’s about developing musicianship—developing musicians—and ...
Jan 15, 2025•16 min•Ep. 79
It’s the middle of December, which means you’re probably caught up in the rush of holiday performances, concerts, and recitals, studio classes, parties, and general busyness as we wrap up the year. Your to-do list is long, but the days are short, and you’re doing your best to stay on top of it all. But as busy as this time of year is, it can also be a time to pause and reflect. To embrace the quiet and stillness that comes with the first snowfall or sitting in the living room late at night or ea...
Dec 11, 2024•15 min•Ep. 78
I have a love/hate relationship with studio classes. I love the idea of them, and I love being able to offer them to my students. But I’ve never found a structure or approach that works. At the school where I teach, I’m limited to a classroom with a single piano, which means students have to take turns or do activities that don’t involve an instrument. In addition, having a group of 6-8 students in a room together for 45-60 minutes (again, with one instrument) was challenging. It’s difficult to ...
Oct 30, 2024•13 min•Ep. 77
It’s my second full week of teaching. I know some of you have been back to school and lessons for a month now, but I’m still getting my bearings, adjusting to a new schedule, organizing studio classes, and setting my intentions for the year. This is not a formal practice, but it’s something I sort of subconsciously do to mark the beginning of the new teaching year. I ask myself a few questions: - “What do I want this year to look like?” - “What do I want my students to experience?” - “What do I ...
Sep 18, 2024•15 min•Ep. 76
I don’t know about you, but this summer is going by very quickly. I know some of you may be going back to school this week or preparing to go back in a few weeks; here in New York, we still have a little summer left, as we don’t start back until after Labor Day. But regardless, it’s quick. At the beginning of the summer, I made a list of 5 things I wanted to work on outside of teaching. In this episode, I’ll share what was on that list, how it’s going so far, and what I’m spending time on this m...
Aug 07, 2024•12 min•Ep. 75
Last week, I taught a brand-new beginner her very first piano lesson. Cora is 5 1/2 and is quite mature for her age. She is the youngest of three—her two older brothers also study with me. In fact, the oldest started with me when he was 5, a few weeks after Cora was born, so it’s kind of a full-circle moment. I have a list of 12 things I like to get through in the first lesson. Twelve activities may sound like a lot for a 30-minute lesson, but at this age, we move pretty quickly. I’ve adjusted m...
Jul 17, 2024•14 min•Ep. 74
The interview process for finding a music teacher goes both ways: The teacher is interviewing the student and family to assess musical, physical, and emotional readiness; determine if the student (and parents) have the same goals for musical study; and evaluate whether or not they'd be a good fit in the studio. We talked about this in the last episode, Ep. 072 - The Case for Consultations in the Music Studio . So, go back and listen to that, if you missed it. At the same time, the student(and of...
Jun 12, 2024•12 min•Ep. 73
Years ago, I received an email from a piano teacher asking about initial consultations and interviews. “What do you do? What questions do you ask? How long should it be? What materials do you give them?” These are great questions! Here are some of the reasons I offer consultations to prospective families in my studio: 1. They give you an opportunity to meet prospective students (and their parents) face-to-face before either of you commit to lessons. 2. For students who are transferring from anot...
May 22, 2024•11 min•Ep. 72
Welcome to another episode of the Field Notes on Music Teaching & Learning podcast. Today’s episode is part 3 of a series I’ve been working on this spring all about how to plan and organize a musical informance. I first mentioned the idea of a musical informance in Ep. 068. An informance is basically an informal performance or an informational performance where you share insight into the music and the learning process with the audience. In Ep. 068, I shared a few examples of musicians who ex...
Apr 17, 2024•11 min•Ep. 71
The birds are chirping, the first Spring flowers are popping up in the front yard, and Rory, my dog, insists on laying in the middle of the daffodil bed whenever the sun is out. These are my seasonal cues that it's time to start planning for our annual end-of-year studio recital. As the title of this episode suggests, I usually spend 3-4 months planning all the details of this event, helping my students prepare, and communicating with parents and families so they know what to expect. Last year, ...
Mar 12, 2024•14 min•Ep. 70
I did a poll on Instagram recently to see if any of my music teacher friends had ever hosted a musical informance. A few said "yes," a few said "no," but a surprising number of respondents chose the third option: "What's an informance?" An informance is basically an informal performance or as Eastman professor Dave Headlam describes, "A performance for the information age." (source: Oxford Handbook of Public Music Theory ) There's a teaching component and a performing component, and depending on...
Feb 13, 2024•14 min•Ep. 69
This year, Rochester, NY is in the path of the total solar eclipse. There are lots of special events happening in town—the orchestra is performing a special concert, the science museum is hosting a festival, and the schools are giving everyone the day off to experience this historical event. As I looked ahead at this year, I thought it might be fun to plan a special event of our own to mark this occasion in the studio. Maybe special repertoire? An incentive program? Then I thought about the info...
Jan 17, 2024•14 min•Ep. 68
"It feels almost like if we don't document it, did it happen? And I need proof that it did." I was listening to an interview with Erin Napier of Home Town on Southern Living's Biscuits and Jam podcast recently and this statement stayed with me. "A major part of my personality is documenting," she said, and I nodded to myself. In this episode, I'm sharing what I've learned about the art and practice of documentation, six things I'm documenting in the studio lately, practical resources I use to tr...
Dec 13, 2023•16 min•Ep. 67
Do you improvise with your students? If you have a classical background like I do, you may not consider yourself an improviser, but researchers and educators Christopher Azzara and Richard Grunow remind us that "we are [all] born improvisers, as evidenced by our behavior in early childhood." ( source ) In their series, Developing Musicianship Through Improvisation , they define improvisation as "the spontaneous expression of meaningful musical ideas." It doesn't mean making things up in the mome...
Nov 15, 2023•20 min•Ep. 66
I received an email from a listener recently, a piano teacher in North Carolina. She had purchased a set of my tonal pattern cards and was looking for ideas and suggestions for how to incorporate them into her teaching this year. This prompted me to sit down and think through the importance of building a musical vocabulary (rhythm and tonal), how we learn to read music, and creative ways to engage our students through listening, pattern recognition, matching, imitating, and improvising using a b...
Oct 11, 2023•15 min•Ep. 65
Last week, I posted a reel on Instagram of my annual planning process for my studio. At the end of the summer, I pull out all my books, curriculum charts, and other planning notes and spend several hours making repertoire plans for each of my students. There are lots of ways to go about this—it takes time to try things and hone in on a process that makes sense to you, helps you feel organized and prepared, and works for your studio. Today, I'll share a little more insight into my long-term plann...
Sep 13, 2023•14 min•Ep. 64
"I found this piece that I'd like to learn," one of my high school students said to me in a lesson earlier this summer. He carefully laid out the pages of the score of Alexander Scriabin's Prelude in C Major, Op. 11, No. 1 that he'd downloaded from IMSLP. "I have a question about it, though," he said turning toward the score. "How do you count this?" He pointed at the first line written in flowing quintuplets straddling the barlines. I leaned in to take a closer look. My student is very mathemat...
Aug 09, 2023•11 min•Ep. 63
You know those moments when something just *clicks*? When something suddenly makes sense to you that was confusing before or you make a new connection or you realize you're able to do something you didn't know you could do. Sometimes we call these a-ha moments or breakthroughs. These are some of my favorite things to observe in my studio: when a student recognizes a new musical concept, makes a new connection, or can do something independently that they couldn't do without help before. I've been...
Jul 19, 2023•13 min•Ep. 62
Summer is a great time to rest, recharge, and work on professional development. This is often when we as music educators attend conferences and workshops, participate in training and certification programs, take summer classes at a local university, and catch up on all the reading we intended to do during the year. If you've been listening for a while, you know I've shared several book and reading-related episodes in the past: I talked about Daniel Pink's book, Drive: The Surprising Truth About ...
Jun 07, 2023•14 min•Ep. 61
"What just happened?" I asked a 4th-grade student one Friday afternoon. "I made a mistake," she said, looking down at her hands still resting on the keys. We talked about that for a minute—how sometimes mistakes happen innocently. Sometimes, a mistake is a way of getting our attention, a way for the body to say to the brain, "Wait! I don't really know this yet." We listened for mistakes and inherent learning opportunities for the rest of the lesson. We talked about insecure fingers, uncertain rh...
May 17, 2023•12 min•Ep. 60
We've been working a lot on rhythm in the studio this spring. I've always made an effort to incorporate a rhythm activity into each lesson, but I've found myself being more intentional about this in recent months and becoming more aware of how I teach rhythm and how students develop these skills. In this episode, I'll share seven ways I'm practicing rhythm in the studio with students from 1st through 12th grade, including several teaching strategies, games, and challenges for those who need some...
Apr 19, 2023•13 min•Ep. 59
"Do you know 'Brave' by Sara Bareilles?" I asked 10-year-old Anthony in a piano lesson one week. "Yeah," he said. "Well, I read recently that 'Brave' and [Katy Perry's] 'Roar' have a lot of things in common. What do you think?" "Huh. I've never really thought about it!" he said. We listened to both songs a few times and made a list of musical characteristics on the whiteboard. I let Anthony take the lead on what we were listening for—accompaniment style, key, tempo, vocal register, and contour—s...
Mar 29, 2023•16 min•Ep. 58
I was talking with one of my high school students a few weeks ago about music by women composers. We were studying "Canoeing" by Amy Beach in the Celebration Series Level 7 Piano Repertoire book, the third piece in her Op. 119 collection, From Six to Twelve for Piano written in 1927. We listened to a recording of the piece and played through the score. We discussed how the rippling eighth notes between the hands create a sense of paddling, left then right. We talked about Amy Beach's life, marri...
Mar 01, 2023•14 min•Ep. 57
It was 1997. My piano teacher had just shown us a picture of Belle, Bonne, Sage , a rondeau about love written in the shape of a heart by 15th-century French composer, Baude Cordier. This signaled the beginning of the annual studio-wide Valentine composition project. Every year around this time, my piano teacher invited us to write our own piece of music, a "musical Valentine," as she called it. The idea was to not only write an original piece, but gift it to someone—maybe a grandparent, friend,...
Feb 08, 2023•12 min•Ep. 56
What does the beginning of a New Year signify for you? What kind of season do you find yourself in these days? I recognized recently that I am in a season of learning. Of course, I am still actively teaching five days a week, but at the same time, I'm reflecting, jotting down stories and realizations at the end of the teaching day—things I'd like to do differently next time or things I didn't plan but observed or participated in that ended up teaching me something as well as my student. I'm read...
Jan 18, 2023•14 min•Ep. 55
