1,000 Days of Piano - Day 183: Small Efforts

On the wall of a classroom where I sometime teach is a quote, “Success is the sum of small efforts repeated day in and day out.” After doing a little digging, I found that the quote is by Robert Collier, an American author. Collier wrote the book, The Secret of the Ages, which I will have to read after Nurtured by Love. I’m beginning to realize that extraordinary accomplishments are often the result of ordinary humdrum actions. I wonder if my dull little efforts day after day will amount to anything. Maybe they will, and maybe they won’t. Either way, they will still feel like dull little efforts that are only glorified by the send of joy I take in doing them.

Note: The sonata is nowhere near performance ready. I’m just so pleased that I got to the end of the section.

1,000 Days of Piano - Day 181: Inconsistency

If I haven’t been consistent about posting to this blog, I have been consistent about practicing...sort of. The truth is that there is precious little consistency in December. The frantic holiday rush overshadows everything else. I’m clinging to my piano practice like a lifeboat in a sea of overwhelm. Whether or not I’ll get results remains to be seen.

1,000 Days of Piano - Day 175: Consistency

Right now, I crave consistency. After attempting (and failing) to write a novel last month, I need to get back on track. I stalled out at about 16,000 words, promptly came down with bronchitis, and everything came to a crashing halt. It’s time to continue, with daily practice and small steps. That’s my only compass for steering through the choppy waters of the holiday season.

1,000 Days of Piano - Day 169: Complexity

How soon can I teach simple yet entertaining pieces to my students after they learn Mary Had a Little Lamb and Go Tell Aunt Rhody? I’m currently using those two pieces to teach basic music theory to student who are ready for it. It isn’t the Suzuki way, I know, but I’m still teaching traditional piano, and I have students who read music. So many pieces go beyond the basic tonic, subdominant, and dominate harmonies, but if I go slowly I should be able to introduce a relative minor. Is it too much of a stretch to go from Mary Had a Little Lamb to Yellow Submarine? Not if I limit the piece to just the chorus. Yellow Submarine is brilliant in its simplicity, and the lyrics are imaginative enough to capture anyone’s imagination. No one ever achieved anything worth while by playing it safe, so I might as well take the risk.