When I was a teenager, I would listen to the soothing piano music that’s played in the heart-wrenching drama serials on the telly. I love the music. The music spoke to me. I felt connected with the music. So, I decided that I wanted to learn to play the piano.

My mum and I went to this shopping mall called “Forum the shopping mall” very weekend. There’s a music school and a music retailer shop on the ground floor / basement. I often stood outside the school/shop and stared at the pianos, books through the glass. I supposed that’s what you call window shopping.

Finally, my family’s financial situation improved. My mum was able to afford piano lessons for me. That’s when I was 16. I started lessons at the music school. I was delighted. I was taught western classical music.

In Singapore and elsewhere in the world I imagine, to learn the piano is to learn western classical music. I’m not sure how that came about. But that belief is deeply entrenched in the minds of all people that I know. And also, it is imperative to go for piano exams. In fact, when parents discuss about their kids and their music education, the question that constantly pops up is “Which grade is your child in?” For those of you who is unfamiliar with the music exams, most major music examining boards in the world adopt a graded system. It usually starts from grade 1 and ends in grade 8. Thereafter, the diploma exams kicks in. Perhaps to meet the demands for students and parents who wish to have a sense of achievement, various intermediate grades or assessments flowed into the market. For example, there’s preparatory or initial grade which is pre-grade 1. There’s performance certificates at grade 5 and 8. There’s associate diploma to bridge the vast gap between grade 8 and the first level of the diploma exams. There’s also theory exams with their own graded system.

It is only after more than 20 years after I started my piano lessons that I question why learning the piano equates to learning western classical music. I think it’s a tradition. It’s how piano teachers were taught and what they teach their students consequently.

There’s many genres of music. Some of the key ones are:

• hip hop
• country
• classical
• pop
• blues
• metal
• rock
• reggae
• jazz

The list of music genres goes on, almost endless in fact. I question the years that a child/person spends on learning western classical music. Can the child/person play other genres of music? E.g. rock, jazz, blues, pop? No doubt it takes years to be skilled at playing a style of music. But are piano students exposed to those different genres/styles which I believe are essential to the music education of a musician?

At the very least, piano students should be asked “What type of music would you like to be able to play?” That should be the starting point of piano lessons.

I am uncovering better ways of teaching piano by doing it and helping others do it.
Through this work I have come to value:

Playing by ear over reading notes at all times

Creating your own music over executing other people’s works at all times

Performing frequently over taking graded exams

Improvising using scales and arpeggios over memorising them for exams

That is, while there is value in the items on the right, I value the items on the left more.

Written and signed by Joseph Hong on this day 27 October 2021

When I taught piano many years ago, maybe it was 20 years ago, I taught students the way I was taught – focus on passing exams by learning three exam pieces per year. As part of the exams, I will practise all my scales and arpeggios diligently. Needless to say, the focus during lessons is to focus on note reading. Come to think of it, that’s the focus of almost my entire piano education – to learn music by reading notes and executing them. I can play some pretty impressive pieces too.

Nowadays, especially in the last year or so, there’s a transformation in my teaching:

• I no longer require students to practise on an acoustic piano. It’s fine if they have a digital piano or a keyboard. After all, the focus is on making music. Unless the student is learning western classical music from me (which I generally stopped teaching now), there is really no need for an acoustic piano
• I focus on teaching chords: students learn comping i.e. coming up with accompaniment (without notes) to play along to their favourite music, accompany the family on Christmas carols, etc.
• I focus on teaching different styles of music e.g. blues including boogie woogie, pop and rock. Of course, there are different styles in western classical music e.g. baroque, classical, romantic and 20th century. However, the emphasis in the latter is to read and execute notes while the former is learn the vocabulary of each style and create your own pieces. For example in blues, students learn the common turnarounds, endings, introductions, licks by rote which are then memorised.
• Students are strongly encouraged to play by ear and create their own arrangements of tunes. Unless a pianist is taught using Suzuki which focuses on the ears, playing by ear is usually frowned upon in lessons taught the traditional way. I suspect this is because most teachers don’t quite know what to do or progress the lesson.