How things have changed …
Since those many years ago when I first played Piano, we have seen massive changes in technology which now make things either much easier than they were before or, for the first time, actually make them possible. If you’re not really a fan of technology, please, just bear with me and read on … you might be pleasantly surprised!
Digital Pianos
Aside the digital revolution, which I’ll come to in a moment, we have the technology behind Digital Pianos. In my teens, there were ‘Electric Pianos’ which I suppose were the predecessors of our current range of Digitals, however, no serious pianist would really have considered one as a replacement for an actual Piano. How things have changed …
There are now Digital Pianos available that almost definitely out-perform the majority of uprights, but potentially even start to challenge the lower end Grand Pianos. I don’t intend to write much on the subject – there are lots of great guides to them. Let’s just say that now, a Digital Piano is a real option to someone wanting to learn given that it:
- performs like a piano
- is smaller than a piano
- can be played using headphones (so is silent in the lounge)
You can even buy them on Amazon these days:
Of course, traditional pianos have also come on leaps and bounds with the so called ‘silent’ pianos – so a piano that has the action and strings of a standard piano but can also be played in ‘silent mode’ using headphones. There are both Upright and Grand Piano examples of this type of instrument.
When I first started to play again, I bought myself a Yamaha Clavinova (CLP 440). This served me extremely well for 5 or so years (and I still have to this day). Back in 2017, I moved house and bought myself a Grand piano – not because I needed one to progress, but because I’ve always dreamed of having one. I have to admit I do love sitting at it each morning to do my practice.
So here, I’ve gone from Digital back to Analogue as it were.
The Digital Revolution
Now let’s talk about the Digital Revolution (for want of a better expression). I’m probably thinking from the release of Smart Phones here … although in reality much of this existed before but was less easily accessible (you always needed your computer and perhaps a printer).
One of the major drives of this digital revolution are products like the iPad and iPhone … other brands are available. All of the following things are possible on a tablet of phone these days.
Sheet Music
If we start with the very simple topic of Sheet Music. In my youth, if you wanted to learn a new piece of music, generally your main option was to actually buy the sheet music (or a book). Otherwise, it was sometimes possible to borrow what you needed from a library and (probably illegally) take a photocopy of it. Rarely, you might know someone who already had the music and you could copy their sheet.
Now, it’s all (or I bet 95%) available in the digital domain. For most classical sheet music, there is the IMSLP website (imslp.org). Here you can download sheet music both legally and totally free of charge and either print it out (back to analogue) or use an iPad App such as ForScore so that you remain totally digital. Ironically, now I can probably afford to buy any music I need, I can get it for free, whereas when I was young, I didn’t have anything like enough money to buy all the music I wanted and free sources were not so easy to access.
Access to recordings
Then there is the ability to listen to recordings. I learned a piece for my Grade 8 many years ago and my teacher told me to go and buy a recording of it to get some hints on interpretation. Now, pick any piece you like and you can pretty much instantly go online and listen to (and generally watch) the world’s greatest pianists (both living and dead) perform it. I would never have been able to afford 10 different recordings of the same piece of music in my teens – especially as I was then learning a piece every few weeks.
Writing it down
All musicians need the ability to write down music (either transcribed or original). In the analogue age, you needed manuscript paper (or to create your own by drawing rows of 5 lines on plain white paper). Then came the painstaking effort of hand writing everything down – correcting errors etc. Now, there’s an App for that!! I have Symphony Pro installed on my iPad. This was initially free (I think) and is now £19.99. This app not only allows you to very clearly write down your music, but it will also replay what you’ve written (so you can aurally check for any wrongly written notes). It also apparently now works with the Apple Pencil so you can write by hand and it will translate into printed music.
Digital magazines
It’s great to be able to read a magazine on subjects for which you have a passion. Yep, there’s an App for that too! I subscribe to the Digital Edition of Pianist Magazine which gets automatically delivered to my iPad each month. This mean that (provided I have my iPad with me) the Magazine is always to hand. Equally, I have all the back issues and I have no problems with them gathering dust in the house. Equally, they do a cover-mount CD with each edition which, of course, having the digital edition, means you just click ‘play’ and can listen to it there and then – no CD player required.
There’s an app for that!
There are also lots of utilitarian apps such as Metronomes, Teaching Apps that give real time feedback on your playing, Practice Apps that help structure your practice sessions … the list is almost certainly going to keep on growing.
I actually created my own App which runs on my iPad for managing my Practice. It allows me to set goals, time how long I have been working against the goals, actually record audio or video to review later and some graphs showing how I have been practicing over time. I’ll do a write up another time and, once I have it perfected. I’ll let the first 20 people who contact me for it have a free copy.
Digital Teachers?
There’s another interesting use of technology and that’s ‘Skype Lessons’ … Now, no matter where you are in the world, it’s possible to get private Skype Lessons. These are available from renowned teachers without even needing to leave the house – wow! In the analogue age, most people were limited to the supply of teachers in their immediate area …. I guess only the very best prospects would actually move house to be near the teacher of their choice.
Whilst I am in IT for a living, I’m not really a fan of technology for its own sake. However, if there are any technophobes reading this, I strongly recommend you have a look at what is available. You’ll almost certainly find there are lots of useful things technology can now do for you to help you get more from your piano playing. Fortunately, these days most technology is also quite intuitive so accessible to pretty much anyone – no computer knowledge required!
