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Guest post by Dakota Gale, the latest article in his series aimed at amateur adult pianists

I clearly remember the first time I rode Tyler’s, a popular bike trail near me. I walked some rocky uphill ramps, awkwardly landed jumps, and generally hacked my way down it like a noob.

I still had a hell of a fine time.

These days, I’ve ridden Tyler’s dozens of times and know every major feature. I fly down that sucker.

But is Tyler’s more fun, exciting or fulfilling now versus my first time? 

In general, is there a way to develop appreciation and deeper comprehension rather than boredom for a repeated experience?

Travel to the same places. Hobbies we’ve done for years. Meals we’ve made for a decade.

Or piano pieces!

Navigating the creative gamut

Like a new bike trail, the first time I play a piano piece my brain scrabbles to survive, jamming the notes into my brain. I’m walking super rocky sections and scoping out switchbacks, one measure and phrase at a time.

Take Schubert’s Serenade, a song I’ve always loved that I started playing. In my initial efforts, I pushed through the technical challenges of the piece and could “play” it. Then I tabled it for a month, letting the music sink into my synapses. Cue round two, with more nuance and expression…and yet I was barely getting started.

Bridging that gap between what I CAN do and what I WANT to do is the hardest part. With any new piece, I listen to recordings and think, “yup, do that, fingers!” Then I sit down and create some monotone pabulum akin to playing bongo drums with wet laundry. *sigh*

The gap between my expectations and my abilities is frustrating sometimes. Like some truculent kid, I want to play it like a pro, now now now!

After I turn my pre-frontal cortex back on, I can (usually) reframe things. Because truly, I find this so motivating: I’m going to grow not just with new pieces, but enjoy a deep satisfaction revisiting piano works for the rest of my life. Something fresh to discover, to experience.

And dang it, I AM making progress. Even if I’m no master, there’s magic in the journey and daily satisfaction in the learning. I don’t need to be pro to have fun. (Maybe it’s more fun not worrying about earning a living with it?)

Plus, pushing myself on challenging songs pushes me to greater heights on those I already play. It’s the same thing that happens when I ride technical trails on my bike. I may not slip effortlessly through the toughest moves, but that difficulty makes other trails feel even more cruisier in comparison.

Unlike during piano pieces, sometimes I pause mid-climb on a bike to eat…

As piano, as life

I love how this mindset so easily translates to other endeavors or pastimes. We’re different people when we revisit a city or national park, reread a book, or play an old song. Depth, additional context, a slower pace…it all modifies the experience and likely results in a deeper appreciation.

With all this in mind, I’m continuing to actively push myself to share not-perfect work like my beginner drawings and music recordings. (Sharing my writing on my blog starting a decade ago was an early effort in that arena.) 

It’s tough because I want the work to be better, to make insane progress overnight. Sometimes I shake my head at how hard it is to take what’s in my brain and put it on paper or piano.

Whatever. There’s a reason every book on creativity decries perfectionism and Ira Glass from This American Life talks about “The Gap,” that space between what we envision and what appears in reality. I’ll probably always find blemishes and wish-it-were-different aspects of ANYthing I create.

The good news? It creates constant motivation to keep improving, growing, seeking.

That’s a beautiful thing.

As for Schubert’s Serenade? Maybe it’s not perfect, but I’m looking forward to a lifetime of it evolving beneath my fingers.

And if I get frustrated, I can always go rip down Tyler’s on my mountain bike.

When he isn’t playing piano, Dakota Gale enjoys exploring the great outdoors, learning languages and drawing. He also writes about reclaiming creativity as an adult and ditching tired personal paradigms in his newsletter, Traipsing About. He can often be spotted camping and exploring mountain bike trails around the Pacific Northwest.

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Guest post by Dakota Gale, the latest article in his series aimed at adult amateur pianists

Not gonna lie: I had no idea what to write for this month’s Notes from the Keyboard.

Why? Well, honestly, for a lot of December and much of January, my enthusiasm for piano was lower than a gopher’s interest in sunbathing. 

Not that I wasn’t still playing consistently. I was, if less each day. I just didn’t feel that spark, the deep joy that I usually get from sitting down and banging on lovingly caressing the black and white keys.

Spoiler alert: I’m feeling much better now, back in the piano groove.

What changed?

Simple: my repertoire.

At the beginning of December, before a 6-week winter break from lessons, my teacher recommended – ok, convinced me – that it was time to learn a fugue. Specifically, Bach’s Cm Fugue from the Well-Tempered Clavier. 

I’d managed to mostly avoid Bach’s work, if only because I’m hard-headed and bring my own pieces to my teacher for study. (He does choose pieces for me, just not that often. The recent Beethoven sonata I wrote about, for one.)

Anyway, The F**kin’ Fugue. Out of the gate, I enjoyed it. Finding the theme, the left and right hand conversation, the different voicing. I dug the intellectual challenge.

Then… I stagnated with it. But I wanted to play it and knew it was good for my hand independence, among other things. My future piano self would be so.damn.grateful. I must persevere!

I’ve done this before, but (wisely) realized when I needed to back off and just enjoy myself. This time, I pushed too long and started skipping my morning piano session, only sitting down for a lackluster few minutes in the evening.

We all know what happens when you push the day’s exercise or homework or piano to the evening. Quality suffers and dogs yowl forlornly at the sky, that’s what!

For me, the former for sure happened, and I’m quite sure our elderly cat eyed me with disdain a few times too. That was enough: I realized I was in a slump and clawed my way out of the piano slump. 

You know what I did instead of the dang fugue? I went back to the repertoire I love. Chopin. Alexis Ffrench. I retackled a samba version of Happy Birthday. I even played the much-maligned LUDOVICO EINAUDI! (I’ve written about him before.)

My energy changed overnight. Revisiting older works and fun, lighter new pieces reinvigorated me. And it drove home a big reminder:

I’m an amateur. I’m doing this FOR FUN. I don’t have to learn anything on a deadline. That means it can be – should be – fun. 

We pianists know it’s a lonely pursuit filled with hours of solitude. It’s necessary to enjoy the scales, the sightreading practice, and the brain-melt of a new piece. Otherwise, this hobby isn’t happening. That’s like aspiring to run marathons, but hating the morning 5-mile jaunt!

And so I end this post, dear reader, with a reminder. If you find your interest flagging in piano (or any hobby), ask yourself “How could I make this more fun?” 

Perhaps it’s as simple as switching repertoire, or maybe it’s setting up a digital piano outside to mix things up. Playing with other people. Taking a break from the keys to strum a guitar? 

For me, the primary goal is enjoyment, personal fulfillment and being able to play Happy Birthday (samba version!) for a good friend. If I feel like digging a hole and chucking my piano deep into it, then I’m doing something wrong.

Now I just need to remember that next time I’m wrestling for too long with a difficult piece. For now, my love affair with piano continues.

Dakota Gale

When he isn’t playing piano, Dakota Gale enjoys exploring the great outdoors, learning languages and drawing. He also writes about reclaiming creativity as an adult and ditching tired personal paradigms in his newsletter, Traipsing About. He can often be spotted camping and exploring mountain bike trails around the Pacific Northwest.

Read more articles in his Notes from the Keyboard series here

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Guest post by Dakota Gale. The latest article in Dakota’s series Notes from the Keyboard, aimed at adult pianists

I recently attended a piano performance, during which I spoke with a 92 year old woman sitting next to me. She’d played and taught piano for decades. When I mentioned that I take lessons online, her eyes widened. “ONLINE lessons? But…that is the most amazing thing!”

She’s not the only one surprised. “Wow, you take lessons online?” is a common response from most people, even after the nuclear proliferation of pandemic Zoom meetings.

Yep, ever since I began taking lessons in spring of 2021, I’ve done them online. My teacher, Antonio, is located in southern Brazil; I’m in the Pacific NW in the U.S, thousands of miles away. And it’s not just me; plenty of people do it, including:

  • Those looking for specific expertise (e.g. Chopin etudes from a professional)
  • Those being careful while going through chemo or with a disease affecting their immune system.
  • Those who travel a lot (tougher if you’re flying, obviously)
  • If you have a favoured, dear teacher, but one of you moves, going online allow you to continue lessons.

Me and Online Lessons

For me, initially I took online lessons because of two things: to save money and to avoid COVID.

Since then, I’ve seen additional benefits. For one, they’re much more time efficient. No travel across town! For parents, I imagine this would be a huge benefit since you’d avoid shuttling kids around. (Actually, one of my friend’s kids is taking lessons with Antonio.)

I travel fairly often and like to keep lessons going. In fact, I’m currently rolling around the Pacific NW with my wife for three months in a Airstream travel trailer. Between mountain bike rides, hikes, and hanging with friends, I’m both continuing to play consistently and still taking my weekly lesson. Courtesy of Starlink satellite internet and a digital Kawaii piano, I’m not skipping a beat.

When my teacher is on vacation, I’ve also taken lessons with professionals such as Grzegorz (Greg) Niemczuk, who I found on YouTube. You might be surprised how many YouTubers offer lessons (a friend takes lessons with the popular Heart of the Keys YouTuber.)

You know what makes piano better? Playing outside!

Beyond all those boring logistical things, Antonio being Brazilian brings a fun perspective to my experience. (I’ve learned a few choice phrases in Portuguese, for one!) I’ve also learned about (and love!) Brazilian music that I would otherwise not know, including tangos, the music of Tom Jobim and Ernesto Nazareth, and folk songs arranged for piano.

It inspired me to start a listening quest of different genres and international composers that has deepened my relationship to piano. Perhaps a local teacher would have provided that, but certainly it would have been different.

The nuts and bolts of online lessons

For those wondering how this is possible, allow me to describe the situation:

  • Antonio uses a Yamaha grand piano to teach. On it, he has four cameras for his face, top down on his hands, sideways on his hands, and another on his pedal. He even uses software that allows the camera to track his hands (AI magic!).
  • The sound quality is quite good–the nuances he can hear and comment on astonish me.
  • For my setup, I use a different system depending where I am. At home, it’s my computer with a webcam plus my phone on a stand looking straight down at my hands. While traveling, I just go with my phone on a small tripod set up to the side and occasionally my laptop in front of me. It works great.

The benefit of all this: the only time I’ve missed a piano lesson is when I’ve taken bikepacking trips. I challenge you to carry a full-size digital piano through the mountains…no thanks. A pianist needs to take a break from the keyboard SOMEtimes!

Resources:

To find an instructor, just type “piano lessons online” into any search engine. A few popular services: Superprof or Wyzant; a fellow traveler I met on this trip used Preply to find her ukelele instructor. (If you want to work with Antonio, just ping him on Whatsapp at +55 48 9181-9164.)

Cheers to piano on the road!

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Following one of those wonderfully serendipitous encounters on the internet, I am delighted to present “Notes from the Keyboard”, a series of articles for adult amateur pianists, by Dakota Gale, chronicling his own experiences of learning the piano as an adult.

Four years ago, my wife surprised me with a digital piano for my birthday. I’d mentioned my desire to learn a few times and, ever the muse, she called my bluff.

I couldn’t read music. Finding middle C was a quest. I was a B-E-G-I-N-N-E-R.

And yet…she was right. At 38 years old, I tumbled rapturously into the world of piano. 

Four years later, the honeymoon phase is over, and yet I remain motivated to play every day and am still loving the journey. (<–understatement: I’m head-over-heels for it.)

I even do stuff like learning to do portraits by drawing musicians! (My wife tells me that’s eccentric…) 

I’m playing pieces by Chopin, Debussy, Beethoven, Liszt, and other famous composers that I thought were a decade off. Even facing the inevitable frustrations of piano study, I’m finding joy in piano every.single.day.

Learning piano transcends fun – I feel like I’ve unearthed a gift, a path to access some of the most beautiful music ever written. Accessing the pieces revealed a fountain of satisfaction that isn’t tied to money or achievement, a much-needed oasis of play as an adult.

In fact, I’ll often drop into a flow state for 30 minutes and be surprised when my timer goes off. Where else do we get that feeling once we’re done playing with Legos or mud pies?

You, mega-savvy adult reader, can do it too!

Adults CAN learn to play piano

I share my achievements not to brag (many pianists young and old far outshine my abilities), but to offer hope to adult learners. If you’re telling yourself, “Oh, I could never learn to play” or “I’m not musical” or “only kids can learn piano,” let me persuade you otherwise.

I’m shocked how many people tell me only children can learn. Well, kids are “naturals” at learning because:

  1. They don’t over-complicate things, focusing on foundational blocks that are small and approachable. (Be it music, language, or other skills.)
  2. Kids are able to practice more undistracted hours because an adult provides housing, food, and does their laundry. Their job is to be curious sponges; our Adult Role is often yawn-tastic Tuesdays, repeated.

Adults lack those luxuries. We put pressure on ourselves, try to play songs that are too hard for us, question if the time investment is worth it, and simply don’t have as much time to practice.

I’m an adult. (It snuck up on me.) On top of all the typical adult stuff, I have far too many hobbies. Sometimes friends do annoying things like interrupt my piano reverie to invite me to dinner or on bike rides. *sigh* The inconsiderate louts, I must practice!

And yet by carving out time each day to study piano, in a few months I reached a deeply satisfying level of proficiency that kept me coming back. After four years, I’m frankly astonished sometimes at what my fingers can do.

As a bonus, it’s beautiful for people to listen to (or so they pretend). A skill I’ll enjoy and develop for a lifetime, long after I’m done taking irresponsible risks on my mountain bike.

Beyond that, I’m fired up! I look forward to enjoying creating music the rest of my life and only wish I’d started earlier.

Dear reader, welcome to “Notes from the Keyboard: Adult Piano Chronicles” on The Cross-Eyed Pianist. This will be an ongoing series about my journey learning piano as an adult. I’ll share my journey (ups and downs!) and headaches with pieces and how I resolve them. I promise to absolutely not take myself too seriously—after all this is a hobby, not a vocation.

If you have ideas for topics you’d like to hear about from a dedicated amateur student of classical piano such as myself, please don’t hesitate to reach out. I’m looking forward to sharing this journey with you!

Dakota Gale

When he isn’t playing piano, Dakota Gale enjoys learning languages (especially Italian) and drawing. He also writes about reclaiming creativity as an adult and ditching tired personal paradigms in his newsletter, Traipsing About. He can often be spotted camping and exploring mountain bike trails around the Pacific Northwest.

This site is free to access and ad-free, and takes many hours to research, write, and maintain. If you find joy and value in what I do, why not

BUY ME A COFFEE