Understanding Piano By Ear Blog

“I took lessons as a kid but barely remember anything beyond middle C.” Someone told me that right after telling me they’d just bought a keyboard — twenty-some years after their last lesson — and had no idea how to start again. You could hear the hesitation in how they

“Quitting piano when I was a kid was the biggest mistake of my life.” Someone actually wrote that to me — word for word, no exaggeration for effect. Not “I wish I’d stuck with it.” The biggest mistake of my life. That’s a heavy thing to carry around for twenty,

A guy messaged me a while back who’d been playing for almost five years. Five years. And he said, almost apologizing for it, “I can barely read sheet music.” He described it like a confession — like he’d been faking his way through half a decade of piano and was

“I feel like I’ll never improve.” That line came from someone who’d been teaching themselves piano for about a year, working through YouTube tutorials, learning to read some sheet music, and still felt like they hadn’t moved an inch. Not “I’m improving slower than I’d like.” Never. As in, permanently

A student sent me a message a while back that stuck with me. She said, “I find the key, and then when it’s time to find the chords, I just freeze. I’ve watched so many YouTube videos on how to do this and I still can’t do it.” She wasn’t

She sat down at the bench fifteen minutes early, like she always did. Sheet music squared up, hands resting in her lap, trying to look calm. Then the door opened and a twelve-year-old walked in, plopped down at the other keyboard, and ripped through a piece she’d been chipping away