Having been in the piano cover business for several years, I have had the opportunity to listen to and help produce covers of some very odd types. Most of the crazier ideas come from people wishing to cover something not related to a piano but there have been some great requests for pianos as well. I thought it might be interesting to write some of those ideas down to get people thinking about other great ways to reinvent piano covers.

Figuring out the best possible brand of piano to purchase for a player that is just beginning can be a pretty difficult task depending on the particular situation. No one can come right out and tell you what piano to buy, it's a decision that you must work your way to with a good bit of research.

Having your piano tuned is definitely the single most important part of the instrument's maintenance, but unfortunately, very few piano owners follow a reasonable schedule when it comes to having their pianos tuned. Piano owners often think that they can go years between tunings and everything will be fine, or that they can try to replace a professional tuning by subscribing to some myth or old wives tale (like keeping jars of water in their piano), but this simply isn?t the case. To truly get the most out of your piano, it needs to be taken care of by a professional, and with regularity.

You have been craving to learn to play piano? That versatile instrument called piano is particularly scintillating. Being a professional pianist would make you discover a lot of hidden facts about the piano. You will discover how sentimental and enrapturing playing the piano can be. So if you are really captivated by that magical instrument called piano, why don?t you start your piano course immediately? You will probably complain about the high cost of a private piano teacher and the inconsistency of taking a piano course. You can overcome such predicaments by pursuing online piano lessons.

Are you interested in learning how to play the piano? Being able to learn piano online is something many people seek out due to expensive local tutors. Starting out with online piano lessons is an affordable option for many.

You own a piano you love. But, you find that you need to put it in storage for a while. How should you go about doing it?

Frederic Chopin was alone among the great composers in that he made his living almost entirely from teaching piano.

All that matters is your child's experience at the piano. It doesn't matter what other people think, what others expect, even what the piano teacher thinks is irrelevant.

I've taught piano to lots of kids of all descriptions, but children with disabilities are the greatest beneficiaries of piano by number. The reason for this is that many of these kids may not be able to read sheet music. Thus piano by number is their only chance to enjoy playing music on the piano.

You know how most people say the piano lessons they had when they were a kid were a nightmare? I had the opposite experience. But maybe it was the teacher.

Many parents know that playing piano even a few minutes a day has many benefits for children. Today we want to consider the youngest of the children, the preschoolers.

A clever kids piano teacher knows how to disguise the repetition of short passages so that the student is not fatigued by the repetitive effort. In piano teaching, a short portion of a piano piece is usually called a "passage." A passage has to be worked on, like tilling a field, until it is smooth and may be recombined with the rest of the piece. Younger children require more creative effort on the part of the teacher in order to make the repetition of passages palatable to their shorter attention spans. But first we should ask, why repeat passages at all? The answer is, of course, continuity. Music is most pleasurable when it is continuous, not broken up by the stumblings of the inexperienced performer. For example, if you listen to a pianist or a band or sing in church, the group doesn't stop if there is a mistake: that is musical continuity. And continuity comes from familiarity. If you are familiar with every part of a song, it is reasonable to assume you can play the music continuously, so that we, your listener, can enjoy it. So the object of repetition is to familiarize your brain with every little wrinkle of the piece. Think of it as driving a thought deep into your subconscious, into the BACK of your brain. Glenn Gould, famed concert pianist and iconoclast, remarked that sometimes he looked down at his hands and thought he wasn't playing: the music was so ingrained in his brain that he was not aware of the efforts required to play Bach fugues without really thinking about it! But that's what you're after, a kind of out-of-body experience where you know the piece so well that your fingers almost play it by themselves. So how do we disguise repetition for the younger kids? First, teach them the rudiments of six short piano pieces they know outside of piano lessons, like Jingle Bells. It doesn't have to be a whole song, it can be a passage or fragment. Then, write the names of the songs on a Post-It in a numbered list. Take a pair of dice and let the child throw and see which song they have to play. This takes the tedium out of playing one piece over and over. Besides, the dice make it a game. Second, bait and switch. Work on a passage a little, then say, "Oh, let's drop that for a while," especially when you see the first signs of fatigue. Work on something else for a few moments, and then suddenly come back to the first, abandoned task. It will seem fresher to the child the second time if there has been a break. Third, make a game of it. Ask them to bet their mom's sofa that they can't play that song again perfectly. Make the basis of your bet something utterly ridiculous, like their washing machine, but act very serious. They will play along. As they repeat it, maybe point out a thing or two, a fingering here, add a part there, and work on it a few seconds, then move on. Take all three of these ideas and combine them, and you have a child-friendly way of "practicing," repeating short passages over and over without the child feeling exhausted. Offering a child a piano game in equal measure to hard work is a recipe for a happy student who proceeds at their own, comfortable pace.