Has anyone ever had a teacher like this?

[amelialw]

Long story up ahead...
When I was about 7, I started private lessons with a distant relative in Singapore. When I saw my uncle playing all the different pieces when I was older, I just was captured by the beauty of the music so my uncle brought me to a music store with my mom and we bought a couple of those books. When I took those book to my teacher and told her I wanted to learn a couple of pieces by J.S Bach, Handel, Haydn, Debussy...and so on. She was just like "these pieces are too hard for you and you can't learn them"....I got so upset that I never asked her to let me learn anything in particular ever again. At that point I was already Grade 5 ABRSM. The only major composers' pieces I ever played was Handel, Mozart, Beethoven, Clementi, Kulah...that's about it.
On the other hand when I moved to canada about 3& a half years ago, I carried on with a famous concert pianist and teacher, she even auditioned me as she had other students she could take. I played Fur Elise for her and she was simply enchanted by my playing, musical sense and talent so she took me as her student. At that time 2 of my cousins were under her. After I started, she reworked my entire technique except appegios which she declared excellent. I carried on with ABRSM and then decided to switch after a year. When I started grade 10 RCM, she pulled out the syllubus book and she looked at me and asked me which composers I liked...I just shrugged my shoulders the only composer I mentioned was Mozart, I told her what my previous teacher had said and she was appalled. However now, i'm perfectly happy. I've learnt many other composer's works by now...still yet to learn a few of them like Liszt.


If any of you have the same kind of teacher as I did in singapore, I would advice you to go and find a new one.

[alzado]

Let's start out by my conceding that you are likely a better pianist than I am.

Here's my read on your posting --------    Both of your teachers might be right in some respect.  I know that I play pieces and I do not have the technique to play them in a superior way -- that is, to totally master them.  I can still play them.  To a professional, they will have some shortcomings, but they will still sound enjoyable. 

Here's one example.  Selections from Moussorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition."  I can attempt some of the easier sections, but I play them considerably under speed.  Likewise, I have trouble with Ravel's Pavane, trying to play the right hand with two levels of dynamic, loud on the melody notes and softly on the harmony part of the chords. 

I won't proliferate examples.  But I would go along with your new teacher.  Even if you cannot play the more advanced pieces flawlessly, you can probably play them relatively well.  And you will get better by challenging yourself.

[amelialw]

haha, don't worry i've already got better as you can see from my list of pieces that i'm learning. thanks though. i've almost perfected most of the pieces below and mastered them

J.S Bach Partita No.2 Sinfonia
Haydn Sonata in E flat HVI Hob/49;L/59
Beethoven Sonata in C major Op.2. No.3
Mendelssohn Rondo Cappriccioso
Rachmaninoff Prelude Op.32.No12
Prokofiev 4 of Visions fugatives
Chopin Etude Op.10 No.5&8
Schumann Piano Concerto in a minor

[counterpoint]

She was just like "these pieces are too hard for you and you can't learn them"....

Perhaps her inner voice said "these pieces are too hard for me and so my students can't play them either"     

[amelialw]

lol, maybe that's true...

[minstrel]

A good bargaining tactic is to use the you pick one, I pick one approach.

Another option is to just learn a piece, then randomly bring it in to the lesson to get your teacher to listen to it..  This was a cool thing to do because it brought more originality to the lesson, and the teacher doesn't have to listen to it in the week 1 phase.  Which they have to appreciate once in a while..!

Now that I don't have a teacher I have TOO MUCH freedom.

[miguelcatalao]

Well, i wonder if she meant those were too difficult for you AT THAT TIME??

[amelialw]

A good bargaining tactic is to use the you pick one, I pick one approach.

Another option is to just learn a piece, then randomly bring it in to the lesson to get your teacher to listen to it..  This was a cool thing to do because it brought more originality to the lesson, and the teacher doesn't have to listen to it in the week 1 phase.  Which they have to appreciate once in a while..!

I did that. It did'nt work

     Well, i wonder if she meant those were too difficult for you AT THAT TIME??
No, they were not. I was at Grade 7 ABRSM at that time, I said, she refused to teach me anything my Bach/Mendelssohn/ Schumann/Chopin/Beethoven/Haydn, there are easier and harder pieces you know. My present teacher said by the time you are at Grade 7 ABRSM you should have been exposed to many of these composers.

[amelialw]

Even if you cannot play the more advanced pieces flawlessly, you can probably play them relatively well.  And you will get better by challenging yourself.

I think you misunderstood me. My present teacher challenges me, she trains me to the extent that I can play the more advanced pieces flawlessly. She always picks on the little faults and in the end I always finish learning everything. The only thing I never finished off, I must admit was Chopin Preludes because i learned chopin's nocturne in e minor for 2 years before that so by the time I got to his preludes I was sick off it right away. I'm fine now though and I love chopin's etudes.

[miguelcatalao]

     Well, i wonder if she meant those were too difficult for you AT THAT TIME??
No, they were not. I was at Grade 7 ABRSM at that time, I said, she refused to teach me anything my Bach/Mendelssohn/ Schumann/Chopin/Beethoven/Haydn, there are easier and harder pieces you know. My present teacher said by the time you are at Grade 7 ABRSM you should have been exposed to many of these composers.

Well, strange really... I am forced to agree with you...

[jesuslovesthischick]

yeah, i've had a teacher like the one had in singapore..
10 minutes before the scheduled lesson she'd call me up and tell me that she was busy and reschedule the lesson. she did this so often i only saw her a couple times a month. for the 3 years i had her, i don't think my skill level increased at all 
she'd only give me easy, boring pieces and the one time when i made a request if she could teach me something (something by Chopin that my dad wanted me to learn), she refused, saying she didn't think i could do it. i learned it on my own.
i switched piano teachers a few months ago. i've gotten more progress than i have in a long time. he's teaching me a lot harder stuff than my old teacher ever would... level 6 and 7 stuff.

[ryanyee]

maybe they're just too full of themselves. my teacher's from china and my parents don't think much of him though. are piano teachers in singapore really underqualified or is singapore the worst place to learn any musical instrument? i really wonder..

[amelialw]

singapore is not the worst place to learn any instrument, there are a couple of excellent teachers there. There was a really good teacher at my church, I wonder why my mom never sent me to her but actually I would have went to her for lessons if I did`nt leave.

There are excellent music programs there for high school students too and they are pretty selective as to who they accept. I was accepted as one of the top 10 students too, same thing though...moved to canada.

I have no regrets moving over here though, cauz it just happened that one of the singaporean pianists was here teaching my 2 younger cousins so I started to go to my 11 yr old cousins lessons to see how she was taught and I really liked it. The teacher auditioned me and I played Fur Elise for her her knowing that that was the only piece that I shaped my hands correctely and played excellently. Well she listented to it and just loved it so she took me as her student.

Well... the strangest thing is that, I was the worst student she ever had considering that went I went to her I had flat fingers, horrible fingering and horrible technique. Guess what...I turned out to be the best. Both of my cousins stopped as they said she was way to strict..

jesuslovesthischick: I`m so glad that you found a new teacher, happy that you`re much more satisfied now!

Rayanyee: Well the better teachers from singapore mostly have studied overseas. And if you ask me the Royal Conservatory of Canada is a much better system then ABRSM.

[slobone]

I had the opposite problem with most of my teachers.

I have the misfortune to be an excellent sight reader, so they would give me a hard piece, I would take it home, and the next week I could play all the notes. Terribly, but I could play them.

Of course, they were very impressed and naturally figured the rest of the learning process would go very quickly... Wrong! Since I was lazy about practicing, especially about doing repetitions, I would basically just read through all the pieces an hour a day at home until the next lesson.

When they saw I was getting nowhere, they would get bored and move me on to the next too-hard piece. My second teacher (age 9 to 14) in particular had me doing all kinds of stuff like the Schumann Faschingsswank, the Bach D major fugue from Book I (a nasty little piece),  and a bunch of Beethoven Sonatas. When I go back and review this stuff now my face turns bright red because I know now horrible I sound.

Finally as an adult I got a teacher who was patient enough to let me work a lot longer on each piece. But frankly I think I'm doing even better on my own, setting my own pace, and working on a piece until I'm really satisfied with it.

[amelialw]

the other thing my teacher did, that really made me want to just drop her as a teacher was that everytime an exam was close-by she would give me mock exams, and force me to show the comments and marks to my mom and dad. They always had to sign my notebook too. A few times, she accused me of cheating, well this is the way she said it and she always had to make it so sickeningly sweet:"Amelia, i'm so dissapointed in you, it's not that i'm accusing you but.... " and then she would say how easy it was to copy my mom's signature but she could'nt. After that I just really wanted not to be her student anymore. Besides that, she would always call up my mom complaining that I did'nt practise enough, that she did it for my own good. I practised 3 hrs and it was just that she never told me how to practise, she would just dump work on me.
She made so many comments that I had flat fingers, but I did'nt know how to fix the problem.

I'm just so mad about all of this...phew, I let it all out!

[ryanyee]

singapore is not the worst place to learn any instrument, there are a couple of excellent teachers there. There was a really good teacher at my church, I wonder why my mom never sent me to her but actually I would have went to her for lessons if I did`nt leave.

There are excellent music programs there for high school students too and they are pretty selective as to who they accept. I was accepted as one of the top 10 students too, same thing though...moved to canada.

I have no regrets moving over here though, cauz it just happened that one of the singaporean pianists was here teaching my 2 younger cousins so I started to go to my 11 yr old cousins lessons to see how she was taught and I really liked it. The teacher auditioned me and I played Fur Elise for her her knowing that that was the only piece that I shaped my hands correctely and played excellently. Well she listented to it and just loved it so she took me as her student.

Well... the strangest thing is that, I was the worst student she ever had considering that went I went to her I had flat fingers, horrible fingering and horrible technique. Guess what...I turned out to be the best. Both of my cousins stopped as they said she was way to strict..

jesuslovesthischick: I`m so glad that you found a new teacher, happy that you`re much more satisfied now!

Rayanyee: Well the better teachers from singapore mostly have studied overseas. And if you ask me the Royal Conservatory of Canada is a much better system then ABRSM.

was your cousin's teacher abigail sin, perhaps?

[amelialw]

my cousin's teacher is currently my current piano teacher, she's not teaching my 2 cousins anymore.

haha...you wanna guess who my teacher is? she's from singapore and she's well-known that's all i'm telling you

[jepoy]

i had a similar experience with my first piano teacher. back then, she was the only piano teacher in our hometown who finished from a conservatory, so she was the best choice.

she taught almost exclusively using method books (mostly simplified arrangements of classical pieces). one time, i brought a piece my mother wanted me to learn because that was the piece she studied with her teacher when she was about my level. my teacher said she'd have a look at it first and teach it to me on our next lesson. when i went back for a lesson, she returned the piece and said that it wasn't worth studying because it didn't sound good. i was confused and hurt because i'd heard my mother play it many times and i loved that piece.

now that i'm a lot older, i'm taking lessons from a different teacher and the difference in approach is just world's away. he has produced piano competition winners and excellent pianist while my first teacher still continues to produce mediocre piano students.

[amelialw]

and to think that these teachers have so many students too....

I think my teacher had a few favourite students who she doted on, she was always praising them and telling me how well they did in their exams but I think those students although quite many did'nt have the talent they were just really smart so somehow they figured things out on their own.

The reason why she taught me was because she's a distant relative and lived a few doors away

...

[philippa]

I'm sure you're a great pianist, but do you have any idea how arrogant that post was?

[amelialw]

sorry, I'm just releasing my anger...phew now I do feel better

[jepoy]

on the point of teachers having favorites, that was so true with my first teacher. i noticed that she gave the best pieces to her niece while assigning really crappy, wornout piano cliches to the other students. one time, i actually overheard her buttering up her niece as the "star" among her students. although her niece was an excellent student, there were also other deserving students.

[amelialw]

ok this is what has happened lately, again sadly, my uncle who I mentioned in other topics, well of late he has not tried to stop me from becoming a musician again, has not said anything like that for the past 10 months but encourage me. out of the sudden today, my parents happened to eat out with him and he brought up the same subject again  as he wants them to stop my lessons, force me to get a full-time job and go along with that. Fortunately I was'nt there otherwise it would have been really unpleasant. I did notice so far though that suddenly for the last few weeks he never said a word to me about music.

I am really sick of this by now, as my teacher advices, i'm going to block it all out. However I want to make it clear to my uncle that nothing more is to be said out this and that no matter what he is just wasting his efforts if that's the way he feels.
As sad as it sounds as I am his niece, he is just making me dislike him although I've tried to forgot and forgive, but this time i need to stop it all...

Any advice?

[zheer]

Any advice?

  It does sound out of line for your uncle to try and stop you lesson, because even if you had a full time job, say as a doctor, you could still have your piano lessons.If you are looking to gain a degree in piano or PHD, this will help you get job if you decide to change career.
  I suggest you ask your teacher whether you are good enough to study in a music accademy,if yes then you have much to gain.However if not,then consider the big wide world and its possibility,really so many great careers are up for grab if you start young. Your uncle might have a point,just teaching piano and playing in small concerts (if lucky) is not all that great. I believe that many pianists have a blind spot,we love music so much that we forget that life is more than the four walls of the practice room. 

[amelialw]

I love music and i'm not going to give it up ever. I know that there are many other careers out there but I don't care. I can make it, I know I can, I just need some time. If I get a full-time job and try to study music at the same time I won't be able to cope with it, I can't handle alot at once.

[zheer]

I love music and i'm not going to give it up ever.

   *runs to safety*

[dan101]

Your disappointing teacher should have rearranged and simplified the pieces that you brought to her. If she was not capable of this, she should have suggested other similar, easier repertoire, with the promise that eventually you would tackle these harder piece.

People skills go a long way. I'm glad you're in a good place and with a good teacher now!

[jnyl]

was your cousin's teacher abigail sin, perhaps?

Abigail Sin is only 15 years old. But she's way superb and currently a second year student in Singapore's Conservatory.

[amelialw]

a 2nd yr at a singapore consevatory?

[jnyl]

Yes, NUS Yong Siew Toh Conservatory.

https://www.music.nus.edu.sg/news/070927-01.html
https://www.abigailsin.com

[slobone]

amelialw, I think you should try to get a second opinion from a different teacher. Find the best one you can, even if it's somebody who's above your level. Just say, "I need to know if I have a chance of having a career as a pianist. Can I come play for you?" Most teachers will be willing to do that and will give you an objective opinion.

If this teacher says you have what it takes to be a professional, then have him/her make a call to your parents. If not, then you need to think about what your alternatives are.

[amelialw]

I just talked seriously to my teacher, or rather she approached me on the subject, just last week.

She said that she knows that I have the passion, talent and am willing to put in the hard work but in canada here are so many music students getting masters/doctorate degrees and are not even guarrenteed a good future and a job that pays well. She recently went back to teach at the Nanyang academy of arts in singapore during summer and was very impressed, overall with the facilities, classes, everything and took into consideration for me what would be the best.
She told me that I should go back there to study at the music academy since i am a singaporean anyway but mainly because she feels that I will have a much better future, with more opportunies to grow as a piano teacher and pianist, that I will be able to fit in better over there with the students of my age and most importantly be able to get plenty of experience in while I complete my B.A degree.

Having taking all that into consideration, I have decided to return to singapore next year end of June after I complete the requirements for ARCT performers.

[ryanyee]

Abigail Sin is only 15 years old. But she's way superb and currently a second year student in Singapore's Conservatory.

how did you know? do you live in singapore perhaps?

[nyonyo]

Are you planning to live in Singapore? If you do, I think you make a mistake of going to school in Singapore. You need to differentiate yourself from the rest of people who live in Singapore. If I were you, I would go to Canadian or American school and then go back to Singapore.

This is just my thought....What do you think?? By the way, it sounds that your piano teacher really has a lot of say in your life...You must really trust and like her...Good for you!

[amelialw]

my teacher knows some excellent teachers at the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts, and will help me pick a suitable teacher.

I have already differenciated myself my doing my ARCT piano performance dip here instead of doing the ABRSM dip and i'm playing 2nd yr uni pieces already.

Yes, my teacher and I are really close, she understands me from all angles and always is able to help me overcome difficulties.

[ahkow]

Yes Abigail is in Yong Siew Toh now and studying under Thomas Hecht. One of my friends told me that she studies with him twice a week and has a steinway grand at home. don't know if it's true