How to reignite my love for piano?

[therealelaineyu]

So I had private lessons from age 6 to 18 and a break for three years studying a science degree at university. During the lockdown, a year of lessons for preparing for grade 8 and a few other extra pieces for fun. Was never keen on doing grades but I could already play grade 8 level pieces at 12 years old. But now I've taken a break for two years so I can get my career and house moving sorted amongst getting a diagnosis for autism spectrum disorder. Also 10 months of therapy done online which will be completed at the end of this month. I will shortly resume piano lessons with a different and more experienced teacher in April. I have lost motivation in practicing the instrument and I don't know how to reignite my former passion for piano. I've tried getting a set text sent to me every morning to remember to practice piano but myself just isn't moving towards the instrument itself and get sidetracked by other things instead such as surfing the web to read about autism or going out for a 40 minute walk (have to do this everyday because it is good for my health). Is this something my piano teacher could sort out or someone from this forum could help with?

[brogers70]

Something you might try. Don't make plans for a rigorous practice regimen. Don't force yourself to practice. But when you've got a few minutes, fool around at the piano; play bits of things you've liked in the past. Spend five minutes on one little thing you'd like to work on, even just a single phrase. Then, if that gets you interested, spend another five minutes; if not, go take a walk. Don't make such a big set of goals and things you have to accomplish that it gets in the way because it seems so overwhelming. Just fool around a bit, for a few minutes whenever you feel like it. See what happens.

[fred7863]

I keep a YouTube playlist of piano instructional videos that I've found intriguing, things where when I listened to them I felt motivated to try the technique illustrated but didn't have the time at the moment. Over a few years I've collected far too many to actually practice them all. But when I'm feeling unmotivated I'll choose one at random (either choose myself or use the YouTube 'shuffle' feature), and work on it for a few low-key minutes.

This is really just a slightly organized way of using brogers70's suggestion to "play bits of things you've liked in the past". This way I don't have to think of something, I already have a list and I choose one at random. If the first random choice doesn't quickly catch my attention I'll move on to the second one, or the third. Sometimes it works as a warmup to my organized practice routine, sometimes I just keep working on the interesting (random) techniques - for my purposes (strictly amateur), either way is fine.

[anacrusis]

I'm a bit curious, why are you starting piano lessons if you feel you have lost your love for piano?

Or is it that your fundamental love remains, you are just not very keen on practising right now?

If so, I think you can allow yourself to not practise if you don't feel like it. At one point, I got burnt out on playing, took a five week total break, and then started feeling drawn to playing again, and practising naturally resumed at its own pace.

A new teacher, if they're good and a good fit for you, can also help inject new inspiration and passion by showing you new avenues to explore.

[thorn]

I've had a similar problem and came to the realisation that it wasn't the piano that I'd "fallen out" with, it was the culture that comes with classical training which I won't get into here as I don't want to derail your thread!

Anyway, my personal solution was to not have a teacher, to not work on exams/diplomas, and to not worry about playing to anyone (competitions, YouTube etc). It really worked. I played through stuff I learned years ago which helped me feel like I'd achieved something. I tried stuff that was too difficult for me 10 years ago when I last had a teacher and found I could make a significantly better go of it (though still at the edge of my technical ability).

Most of all I didn't put any pressure on myself. I never made myself "work" on a piece- if I wanted to clumsily play through some stuff for a couple of weeks without actually "practicing" then that was okay. If I then wanted to put it back on the shelf and try something totally different then that was also okay.

Last point is I played a lot of non-classical stuff. If you're post-grade 8 then there are loads of advanced film, video game etc. transcriptions out there that are fun to try. Classical music will always be my favourite genre but that's not to say we can't play other stuff.

[lelle]

I've had a similar problem and came to the realisation that it wasn't the piano that I'd "fallen out" with, it was the culture that comes with classical training which I won't get into here as I don't want to derail your thread!

Maybe it's worth get into it, I think it could benefit people to hear your perspective even if it's not totally on point with OP Did you go to a conservatorie or similar?

[therealelaineyu]

Thanks for your suggestions. I did manage to start practicing an hour and a half yesterday because I watched incredible pianists playing at Van Cliburn's competition 2022. It seems that seeing that they're some levels above me motivated me to improve.

I've now figured that I just need to see someone really inspiring on youtube first before practicing. When I was a child, this was the trick that worked but obviously I was at a lower level back then so even grade 6-8 pianists would motivate me. But now obviously the same level people does nothing to motivate me lol.

[therealelaineyu]

I'm a bit curious, why are you starting piano lessons if you feel you have lost your love for piano?

Or is it that your fundamental love remains, you are just not very keen on practising right now?

If so, I think you can allow yourself to not practise if you don't feel like it. At one point, I got burnt out on playing, took a five week total break, and then started feeling drawn to playing again, and practising naturally resumed at its own pace.

A new teacher, if they're good and a good fit for you, can also help inject new inspiration and passion by showing you new avenues to explore.

Because I generally have too much spare time. I work in the evenings but have nothing to really occupy my mornings and afternoons.

I still love listening to piano. My aim is to learn ARSM diploma level pieces from my new teacher. I think partly the problem was previously I was learning from someone who'd only passed their grade 8 in piano and didn't do a piano degree themselves as my current teacher says. And now I'm at the same level as them there wasn't much to learn. It was time for an upgrade. My current teacher charges £10 more but she's a university master's level trained piano performance major and is a concert pianist herself.