What are your greatest strengths and weaknesses?

[musicluvr49]

I think my greatest strength is musicality, And my greatest weaknesses are probably keeping the same tempo, and playing evenly at a fast rate.

What about you guys?

[keyboardclass]

Big heart, ill health.

[gyzzzmo]

Good at get'n women, bad at keep'n 'em 

[m1469]

I don't know what my strengths would be, at this point, but I do know that sometimes my mind really gets into my way.  Not that this is always the case, but sometimes it really, definitely, is. When it's actually getting into my way, it's obviously a weakness.  Hmmm ... I wonder if playing is basically some mysterious balance of intellect and instinct, and that everything we do or learn about somehow falls into those two main categories?  Even though these are somehow distinct characteristics, they can seriously help each other, too.

[pianowolfi]

Good at get'n women, bad at keep'n 'em  

My weakness: I am bad at both
My strength: I don't care about it anymore

[becky8898]

Strengths  - having really amazing velocity .

Weakness - playing to fast.


Cheers, Becky

[thinkgreenlovepiano]

Strength: I love piano... I'm really persistent... and I pay attention to detail

Weakness: rhythm and maintaining a steady tempo... =(((

[kentar]

Strength - musicality, voicing, very large jumps
Weakness - velocity

[nanabush]

Strength - sight reading and overcoming new techniques; I can learn a piece (see weakness below) quickly with [most] of the details there.

Weakness - not ironing out mini-issues early on leads to a load of grunt work several weeks before an exam!  Fingering changes, GOOD legatos, pedalling, dynamics - they're always about 85%, but it's that last bit that I have the hardest time actually fixing.

[nataliethepianist]

I think a lot of people are going to say something similar to this! My greatest weakness is sight reading. I have never done it well, so I can't find the motivation to practice sight reading! Do you have any suggestions on how to improve?

My greatest strength is that, although I don't sight read a well as I would like to, is that I am able to learn difficult pieces even though I have not been playing for too long, there for I advance quickly (I am not trying to brag, I just like a challenge!)

Good luck with your studies!

- Natalie

[omar_roy]

I think a lot of people are going to say something similar to this! My greatest weakness is sight reading. I have never done it well, so I can't find the motivation to practice sight reading! Do you have any suggestions on how to improve?

Have your teacher give you too much music and not enough time.  You will either adapt and overcome (by improving your sight reading as a result of necessity breeding the skill), or you will have a mental breakdown.

Or just sight read as much as possible as often as possible.  Start from the very beginning with pieces that you can sight read very easily without looking at your hands, and move up from there.

[raisinbrahms]

Strength:  Sight Reading 

Weakness:  Too bad I can't play as well as I read.  My fingering and general technique sometimes border on hideous  I think a lot of it is because I know what the piece is supposed to sound like and I tend to rush through and not pay enough attention to detail...until I have to perform it anyway!

[musicluvr49]

I think a lot of people are going to say something similar to this! My greatest weakness is sight reading. I have never done it well, so I can't find the motivation to practice sight reading! Do you have any suggestions on how to improve?

My greatest strength is that, although I don't sight read a well as I would like to, is that I am able to learn difficult pieces even though I have not been playing for too long, there for I advance quickly (I am not trying to brag, I just like a challenge!)

Good luck with your studies!

- Natalie

Hi Natalie,
Well my sight reading skills were not very good, until this year when I started playing the piano for church. Learning a bunch of new songs every week has really helped me. So I would reccomend maybe a book of Bach chorales or something? Thery're pretty short, and hopefully it will help.

Good luck as well !

[tb230]

Greatest strength: sight reading.
(One tip is to read music also when not playing, i.e. when listening to CDs etc.. I used to borrow orchestral scores from the library and try to follow the various instruments as I was listening.)

Weakness: not paying enough attention to details
(I could say that sight reading is also my greatest weakness. Like raisinbrahms, I tend to rush things too early, and not spend enough time getting a piece to really 'settle down' in my hands. When I was young, I could go to lessons not having practised at all and my teacher would believe I had spent hours on a piece. Now, it's payback time....)

[pianoviolin]

greatest strength: learning really quickly, (only did piano for a year and im ive been pushed  up to above grade 8  )
weakness: sight reading! eh!

[stevebob]

Strengths:  I'm a fluent reader; I learned to read music at the same time I learned to read, and would sightread everything I could get my hands on as a kid.  I pay close attention to detail, and I love the craft of piano playing as much as the art.  And despite advancing age, I can still learn the repertoire I choose fairly easily.

Weaknesses:  I'm not a good memorizer and don't have the discipline to push myself in that area.  Also, I seem to enjoy the process of learning pieces (i.e., working out technical challenges) more than really mastering them to a finished, polished and performable state.  I typically get to the 90% point ... and then feel the urge to move on.  I guess the freedom to do so is both a blessing and a bane for an amateur like me.

[liszt1022]

My weakness is that my fingers can't play what my head understands. I can analyze part-writing and see exactly which notes need prominence and which line needs bringing out, but sometimes I just can't get the fingers to sound them out right.

[fenz]

strength: sight reading 
weakness: easily bored and moody.. i don't know how to handle this one 

[pianoplayjl]

Strength: scales
Weakness: technicality and musicality.