Why I Teach Children

From a statement I recently released about my teaching:
An actively concertizing pianist, I teach children to play the piano because I love their unspoiled responses to sound from which I continue to learn how music works.   My goal is to lead young learners to savor the sound of the piano, to hear how it is the root and source for all the great music written for this endlessly fascinating instrument.  

We start with music of our time because those are the sounds most familiar from movies and other media.  The beginnings set the tone for life; and live music becomes an integral part of their life, whatever life they choose.

Mutual musical attentiveness is the essence of the art practiced here.  Listening and being listened to form a reliable basis for personal and inter-personal musical focus from the very outset. *  When sound comes first, music becomes as much the stuff of dreams as of conceptual experience.  The child learns how his or her responses yield insight into a composer’s intentions.

*I also coach parents and their young children--even infants--on music as a powerful interactive bond.