Frequently Asked Questions

The Term Dates for the current teaching year can be found on the Tuition Fees page.

I have found that with younger children, the greatest progress is made when lessons are given in person.

Children can navigate their way around the keyboard more easily if I am directly by their side to help show them the way. Similarly, learning to read the notation often takes a lot of mutual deciphering and interaction, looking backwards and forwards from the music to the piano, pointing and referencing as we go.

The other main consideration is ensuring younger students develop a good technique right from the outset. This will often mean I am having to be ‘hands on’, physically assisting a child to move their fingers, hands and wrists in a certain way to make their playing more fluent and comfortable. ‘You don’t know what you don’t know’, so encouraging and allowing a younger student to ‘feel’ and then understand the difference between playing a passage in discomfort, and then in comfort with greater control is very important.

Naturally, all of these aspects are equally as important for adult students too.

However, the process of teaching online relies more heavily on the use of demonstration, observation and verbal communication and instruction. As much as I’d sometimes like to reach through the screen to help a student, the only tools at my disposal are essentially ‘show and tell’.

In my experience, older students are better suited to a greater reliance on verbal communication (sometimes quite detailed and very specific instruction) than their younger counterparts. Unfortunately, in the majority of cases, young children, without the same cognitive and concentration skills, are unable to gain as much benefit from an online lesson as an adult student would.

So as a general rule, I only teach new, beginner students under 8 years of age in person. If your child is under 13 years of age, and you are keen to have lessons online, then we would undertake an initial introductory lesson assessment. Previous musical experience is an advantage in this age group, but not a requirement.

Even though your child may not be quite old enough to start online tuition, please still take the opportunity to get in touch and complete the New Student Enquiry form. I have a lengthy waiting list so it's likely your child will be a year or two older by the time a lesson space becomes available.

Ideally, you should use an adjustable piano stool which will allow you to adjust the height of the stool to your particular requirements.

I realise this may not be possible for everyone, so instead, find a chair or stool which is a good height so that when you put your arms up on the keyboard to play, your forearms are level and parallel with the floor - not angled up or down. If you need to use a small cushion to tweak the height, do so.

If you’re using a chair with a back, try to sit on the front half of the chair and not have your weight leaning backwards, resting your back on the back of the chair.

Avoid using an office chair which rotates - you want something which is stable.

Establishing a regular practice routine and sticking to it is the key to making progress.

While you don’t have to practise every single day (sometimes you just can’t fit it in) at least four or five sessions a week would be good to aim for. If it’s much less than that, your progress will be impeded.

Avoid trying to cram all of your practice into one session. The time in between your practice sessions is valuable as your brain will be consolidating all of those new neural pathways you’ve been laying down!

As you progress over time, the length of practice you will need to do will naturally increase.

Here’s a rough guide of the practise lengths I recommend to my students:

Only if you want to. There will be opportunities to play to other students in a relaxed and supportive environment if you’d like to improve your performance skills and gain more confidence.

Selected digital downloads of some of my pieces can be obtained from the Hal Leonard music website.

However, your best option is to contact me directly for the book you’re interested in. You can go to the Contact Me page and in the ‘Subject’ drop down menu, select ‘Book Purchase’.