I want to become a piano teacher

[kuya]

I hope I posted this in the right section, would the teaching section be more correct?

I live in Germany, Im 16 years old and have been playing the piano for 3 years.
I decided I want to become a piano teacher, currently Im in highschool, 2 more years until I enter university ( hopefully). As the title says, my dream job is to be a piano teacher in a conservatory or music school. Currently, Im doing my best to improve as fast as I can.

What do I have to pick as a subject? Piano playing with a major in teaching? Is it going to be really really difficult? Is it possible for me to do it, even though I didnt entirely grow up playing piano? Should I go for a larger city or a smaller city ( for university)? Should I consider universities abroad?

Thanks.

[keyboardclass]

All you need is a recognized qualification if you want to feel confident.  DipABRSM in teaching isn't so hard - you can do it outside of uni.

[chris_goslow]

That is a fabulous dream.  That's great that you know what you want.  Go for it, and Godspeed to you!

[lattlay]

Hi Kuya,

haha you remind me of me when I was in high school; I also wanted to be a piano teacher

ALOT of universities offer joint BMus/BEd degrees if you wanted to do it that route, but BEd is mainly for teaching music at actual schools (high school, elementary, etc.).

If you wanted to be a piano teacher only then a high level diploma will do.

If you wanted to pursue music in University then as a general rule (every school is different) you need to learn a baroque piece (ex. Bach, Handel, etc.), a classical sonata (ex. Beethoven, Mozart, etc.), and a piece from the romantic period (ex. Chopin, Brahms, etc.). Also, know your scales/chords/arpeggios and be able to sight read ok and you should be good to go.

For my audition I played Bach's Prelude and Fugue in C, Beethoven's Pathetique (Op.13), and Chopin's Fantasie-Impromptu (Op.66).

I hear that getting accepted into a conservatory is harder though.

Good Luck!

[kuya]

Thanks alot for the replies.

I think I will try and apply for both, conservatory and university. I will try to learn pieces for auditions soon, so I can present them as good as I can.

[kuya]

UPDATE:
I told my parents about my dream and they didnt respond in a happy matter. They were crafting their own little plans about my education. They got it all planned out already, they know Im good in chemistry so they intend to send me abroad to a university so I can study Biochemics or Biotechnology or something like that. I told them that I liked chemistry, its pretty interesting and stuff but I would NEVER sacrifice my free time for chemistry. There's the cut, I like chemistry - ok but I LOVE the piano and classical music. My pile of 2nd hand and special prize CDs is getting larger and larger, Im playing 4 hours a day piano and watch alot of documentaries about classical music. Even if theyre not home alot, they mustve already noticed my connection with music is something special. They still dont want to let me be.

 Last night when I argued again with my mother, she said things like "Do you know how much money you get when you're teaching in a music school? I got a friend who is teacher in a music school and he always complains about his salary! Its not enough for a living ! And how do you intend to go through your university life? Do you think you're good in playing the piano or something? Do you think you're talented? This is just like a stupid childhood dream of yours! And you're already 16!"

What I felt was a mix of anger, sadness and disappointment. What I felt is that she probably didnt grow up, watching movies, cartoon series or reading books about people who do everything they can do achieve their childhood dream. Im really disappointed.. she went from complaining like that to things like " If youre gunna study music, I wont send you any money, you can be homeless if you want to, you're nothing if its not I who gives you the money. Have fun working the whole day to pay the rent, and have fun eating bread everyday. (we are an asian family)".

This is, however, not stopping me from my focus, I still want to put this through, more than before, just to proof my parents you don't need money to be happy, you dont need to be Lang Lang to earn money with music.

Id like comments on these things: Is the salary of a pianoteacher really that low? Is it enough and feed a family? How should I react about my mother's feelings? Am I doing the right thing here? Is it more important to try to achieve my dream rather than to listen to my parents and do something I will probably lose interest in?

Thanks for reading, Im looking forward to the comments.


PS: I thought it was inapropiate to write her what she really said, it was really alot more inpolite.

[keyboardclass]

Do you really want to have to do what you enjoy most?  People do make a living but it's not great.  Why not become a public school teacher?  Anyway chemistry and piano are not mutually exclusive - look at Borodin.

[kuya]

I would enjoy teaching in a public school, too. But it's not the same. I think getting to be a piano teacher became my goal in life. I think I wouldn't be satisfied.

Im not looking to make a great living, I just want enough to be able to feed a family and rent a flat. I dont care if Im not able to buy expensive clothes or have a nice computer.

[keyboardclass]

Your flat will need an extra room for a piano and neighbours who will tolerate hours of playing a day.  Also, you work on your own - I think that turns some piano teachers rather weird.

[ted]

The conflict between idealism and material necessity is always present in those of artistic commitment. Each of us must find the appropriate compromise and no general solution exists. I encountered similar severe criticism from parents and many others when I was young. In retrospect I was probably stupidly idealistic and that things turned out all right was due more to good luck than good management. So proffering advice based on my life is at best misleading and at worst dangerous.

On the face of it, and certainly compared with me at that age, you seem to have your feet well on the ground. The only thing is that you have to be good enough at what you want to do to make a permanently sustaining career out of it. Your parents' objections are probably sincere and are most likely based on real negative experiences they have encountered in the past. The way their concern was expressed might have left something to be desired but it does reveal that they care for you, and that is something to be glad of these days. However, you also say that your parents are not often home, which leads me to wonder if general communication is all it should be.

I therefore tend to agree with keyboardclass in that there would be very little harm in maintaining two irons in the fire, at least for a few years. I have no idea what income piano teachers receive so I cannot advise about that aspect.

[lostinidlewonder]

Last night when I argued again with my mother, she said things like "Do you know how much money you get when you're teaching in a music school? I got a friend who is teacher in a music school and he always complains about his salary! Its not enough for a living ! And how do you intend to go through your university life? Do you think you're good in playing the piano or something? Do you think you're talented? This is just like a stupid childhood dream of yours! And you're already 16!"

Your parents seem to care a great deal about you and their number one concern is that you are happy. They also fear that you may not know that you do not know how hard life is when you have to pay your bills, food and keep a roof above your head. If you want to do music for a living there must be a real urge to do so and not something that you just do because you enjoy it. I love piano and chose it as a career after doing Engineering/Computer Science, I did choose it because of several things and money was certainly one consideration.

You do not go into work and think you do not need money to survive, it is a stupid way to live your life as this 21st century is money orientated whether you like it or not. I would not have chosen piano as a career if I didn't think I had something unique to offer the industry. I personally felt a great hole missing in piano education and performance here in Australia and started to fill the gaps in my own community when I was in high school teaching my first students. Later on I was teaching music next to studying engineering and computer programming. Eventually my endeavours in music came to a critical point and I had to make a decision which way I wanted to go, I met with a famous concert pianist who encouraged me to pursue piano as a career and was severely disappointed that I was on another career path. After studying with him I made the decision that I would take music for a living. I demonstrated to my parents that I could make a living with piano (they supported my piano my whole life but never as a sole career path) by doing a series of solo concerts which raked in more money than the average yearly wage in less than a month.

At the same time you need a constant income because doing concerts for a living is too much of a bohemian lifestyle, for me at least. I could survive comfortably on doing around 5 concerts a year and merely playing piano for myself the rest. But that would be like 1 month of work and 11 months of time to myself. I looked into touring for my whole life but that is totally uninteresting to me as I am very family/friend orientated and I want to make a difference in my community not spread myself thin everywhere (also seeing the stress of the body and mind that a life time of constant touring has on top international performer scared me a little). Who knows as a musician your career can change in an instant, one day you are a piano teacher the next day you are a councillor, the next day you are a concert performer, then you conduct a group of musicians, you are a motivator guiding young minds and inspiring old ones, you are a business manager etc etc. A business minded professional piano teacher has many jobs and is not just a person who sits next to someone to teach them how to play piano. Although you will find more piano teachers are like this than not and why when you think about doing piano for a career these group of piano teachers come into mind, those that merely teach piano and nothing else.

So what do you know about the piano industry? What do you have to offer that people didn't know they needed?

[lattlay]

Kuya,

What you could do is go into something like chemistry (to appease your parents) and do a minor in music. Or if even that is too much for them to bear, make all your optional courses music related ones. All the while practicing hard everyday and getting better at piano.
Really, you only need an official certification to teach piano (sometimes not even that!), so do your degree in something else and once you graduate you should have spent enough time on your piano studies to get a certification so that you can teach.
So you can be a piano teacher when you are done university, but you still have a more safe degree to fall back on. Again, you don't need a music degree to teach piano. Hell, one of the best pianists that I've seen at my university is an English major.

Good luck!

[kuya]

Thanks for the replies again.

lostinidlewonder, I think you got me wrong. I dont want to become a concert pianist, I know Im not fit for that, what I want to become is a piano teacher.

lattlay, thats good to hear. The other problem is that I find no motivation in things my parents recommend. There's is really nothing that struck my mind or made me say "Im fit for that !".

Well, Ill just wait and see I guess.

[lostinidlewonder]

lostinidlewonder, I think you got me wrong. I dont want to become a concert pianist, I know Im not fit for that, what I want to become is a piano teacher.

I wasn't talking solely about being a concert pianist. A professional teacher actually does more than just teach piano, if you think you want to become a teacher who merely teaches piano then you are restricting yourself. That is what I wanted to reveal.