Let's get right to it.
What is the one factor that will have you playing the piano freely and easily? It's not technique.
Most students can learn the technical aspects of piano playing extremely well and still sound wooden and lifeless.
In fact, the most technically advanced students can sound extremely sophisticated when you hear them.
The quick as lightning runs - the facile arpeggios up and down the keyboard may dazzle the ear but...
if the playing lacks spirit, the music will suffer for it.
It's also not theory.
Knowing how to produce counterpoint or advanced harmonic techniques also won't make you a good improviser at the piano.
It has nothing to do with this at all! THE SECRET IS...
So what is it? What makes one student sound like the music is ethereal while another one sounds like a robot performing? It's your ability to let go and allow the music to tell you where it wants to go! I've said it before many times but it bears repeating.
As soon as you try to control the outcome, as soon as your ego thinks it can create a "good" music or a "better" music, the X factor slips away.
The reason it's so important to allow the music to lead you and not the other way around is simply that you are tapping into a source greater than you are.
And this source will give you music far superior than anything you could have come up with on your own.
RESPECT YOUR MUSE Bach, when asked how he could compose so much music responded this way; "My dear sir, I have to be careful that I don't trip over the music when I get out of bed in the morning.
" In a sense, he was saying that he really had nothing to do with the creative output.
He was allowing the muse to lead him.
Another amusing anecdote comes from Beethoven.
When a violin player complained to him that he couldn't play a certain passage because it was way too difficult Beethoven responded; "Do you think I worry about your lousy fiddle when the spirit moves me?" This is a perfect example of respecting your muse.
Beethoven heard something and wrote it down.
He wasn't thinking about the technical aspects of what was coming through him.
He was being respectful to his muse.
By the way, by doing this, by being respectful of your muse, you will discover things you will never have been able to discover any other way.
So the secret to successful improvisation is just to let go of your need to control the outcome.
Then, and only then will your true music come to the surface.
What is the one factor that will have you playing the piano freely and easily? It's not technique.
Most students can learn the technical aspects of piano playing extremely well and still sound wooden and lifeless.
In fact, the most technically advanced students can sound extremely sophisticated when you hear them.
The quick as lightning runs - the facile arpeggios up and down the keyboard may dazzle the ear but...
if the playing lacks spirit, the music will suffer for it.
It's also not theory.
Knowing how to produce counterpoint or advanced harmonic techniques also won't make you a good improviser at the piano.
It has nothing to do with this at all! THE SECRET IS...
So what is it? What makes one student sound like the music is ethereal while another one sounds like a robot performing? It's your ability to let go and allow the music to tell you where it wants to go! I've said it before many times but it bears repeating.
As soon as you try to control the outcome, as soon as your ego thinks it can create a "good" music or a "better" music, the X factor slips away.
The reason it's so important to allow the music to lead you and not the other way around is simply that you are tapping into a source greater than you are.
And this source will give you music far superior than anything you could have come up with on your own.
RESPECT YOUR MUSE Bach, when asked how he could compose so much music responded this way; "My dear sir, I have to be careful that I don't trip over the music when I get out of bed in the morning.
" In a sense, he was saying that he really had nothing to do with the creative output.
He was allowing the muse to lead him.
Another amusing anecdote comes from Beethoven.
When a violin player complained to him that he couldn't play a certain passage because it was way too difficult Beethoven responded; "Do you think I worry about your lousy fiddle when the spirit moves me?" This is a perfect example of respecting your muse.
Beethoven heard something and wrote it down.
He wasn't thinking about the technical aspects of what was coming through him.
He was being respectful to his muse.
By the way, by doing this, by being respectful of your muse, you will discover things you will never have been able to discover any other way.
So the secret to successful improvisation is just to let go of your need to control the outcome.
Then, and only then will your true music come to the surface.
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