These days, there is much pressure for parents to begin their children in activities from an early age. We know that children tend to pick up new skills easily and we want for them to have an opportunity to become experts at these new skills. We also see curiosity, desire and eagerness to learn in our children and want to capitalize on that.
Music lessons are no exception. We often get calls asking the question, “When is the best time to enroll my child in piano lessons?” The answer to that is a tricky one, and varies for each child. The right age for one may not be the right age for another. Here are a few questions to ask yourself if you are considering enrolling your child in music lessons:
1. Does my child have an attention span to sit still for chunks of time and listen to instruction?
Many teachers today are very creative in using off-bench activities during lessons and have a plethora of activities to make lessons fun and engaging. However, the fact remains that your child will need to sit at the piano for some periods of time during the lesson. It is important that your child have the attention span to do this.
• 1888 ~ Friedrich Schorr, Hungarian bass-baritone
• 1917 ~ Laurindo Almeida, Grammy Award-winning composer, musician, guitarist
• 1919 ~ Marge Champion (Marjorie Belcher), Dancer, actress, choreographer with Gower Champion, model for animated Snow White
• 1924 ~ Theatregoers heard the song Indian Love Call for the first time in the operetta Rose Marie, which opened in New York City.
• 1927 ~ Sophie Tucker recorded her signature song, Some of These Days, for Columbia Records.
• 1931 ~ The radio show 15 Minutes with Bing Crosby debuted on CBS. The singer became a super-hot property after the debut.
• 1936 ~ David Blaki, British composer
• 1939 ~ Sam Gooden, Singer with Roosters
• 1940 ~ Jimmy Clanton, Singer, songwriter, toured with Dick Clark’s Caravan of Stars
• 1943 ~ Rosalind Ashford, Singer with Martha and the Vandellas
• 1946 ~ Marty Grebb, Musician, keyboards with The Buckinghams
• 1957 ~ Steve Porcaro, Keyboards, singer with Toto
• 1958 ~ Fritz McIntyre, Keyboards with Simply Red
• 1965 ~ The Beatles received a gold record for their single Help!, from the movie of the same name.
• 1997 ~ Sir Rudolf Bing died. He was an Austrian-born opera impresario who worked in Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States, most notably being General Manager of the Metropolitan Opera in New York City from 1950 to 1972.
• 2000 ~ Elvera Sanchez Davis, a tap dancer and the mother of Sammy Davis, Jr., died at the age of 95. Known as Baby Sanchez, Davis began performing at 16 in the chorus line at the Lafayette Theater in Harlem. She continued her career into the early 1940s, dancing for six years in the chorus line at the Apollo Theatre. In 1923, performing in a touring show called “Holiday in Dixie”, she met and married Sammy Davis Sr., also a dancer in the show. Their son was born in 1925. He became a tap-dance prodigy by age 10, trained and brought up by his father after his parents separated. Mrs. Davis retired when the Apollo disbanded its dance chorus, though she danced informally into her 90s. She also performed in touring revues and in films including Carl Micheaux’s 1936 “Swing”. Davis continued to be involved with tap dance until her death, serving from 1989 as an adviser to the New York Committee to Celebrate National Tap Dance Day.
Sammy Davis, Jr. died in 1990 at the age of 64.
• 2001 ~ Troy Donahue died at the age of 65. He was a matinee idol who climbed to stardom in the 1950s with his role in “A Summer Place.”
• 2001 ~ Jazz saxophonist Jay Migliori, who worked with musicians and singers ranging from
Frank Zappa to Frank Sinatra, died of colon cancer. He was 70.
Migliori, who was also a founding member of the Grammy-winning jazz group Supersax, played on some 4,000 recordings during his career. Although he described his own style as “modern acoustic jazz with roots in bebop,” he was equally comfortable working with country stars like Glen Campbell, a wide variety of rock musicians including Zappa and the Four Seasons and pop stars as varied as Dean Martin and Celine Dion. He performed with more than two dozen bands over the years, including those led by Miles Davis, Stan Kenton, Terry Gibbs and Maynard Ferguson. In 1971, he joined Supersax, an ensemble built around a five-saxophone section that specialized in orchestrated Charlie Parker solos. He also recorded several albums of his own, including “Jazz in Transition” and “Smile.”
• 2006 ~ [Jean-Josephat] Clermont Pépin, Canadian pianist and composer (Implosion Symphony), died at the age of 80
Picture a seven-foot grand piano in a studio. The lid’s missing, so you can see all the strings. Researchers suspend a rod embedded with 32 microphones over the piano’s body.
“We played this middle C at a very soft level, a medium level, and a very loud level,” says Agnieszka Roginska, a professor in NYU’s music technology program. She says using a pianist to play middle C over and over wouldn’t be scientific. So they’re using a disklavier, a fancy player piano triggered by electronics. “So we could hit the same note, with the same velocity, thousands of times,” she says.
They’d record the piano in one spot. Then move the microphones eight inches. Record the note. Move the mics again. Record the note. Over and over and over, until they reach the back of the piano. At the end, they get “what is basically a very dense acoustical scan of the radiation pattern of the grand piano,” Roginska says.
1653 ~ Johann Pachelbel, German composer and organist
More information about Pachelbel
• 1887 ~ Emile Berliner filed for a patent for his invention of the lateral-cut, flat-disk gramophone. We know it better as the record player. Emile got the patent, but Thomas Edison got the notoriety for making it work and making music with his invention.
1854 ~ Engelbert Humperdinck, German opera composer
Read quotes by and about Humperdinck
More information about Humperdinck
• 1933 ~ Conway Twitty (Harold Lloyd Jenkins), Songwriter, CMA Male Vocalist of the
Year in 1975, Grammy Award-winner with Loretta Lynn, owns booking agency, music publishing company, Twitty Burgers, Twitty City theme park
1935 ~ Seiji Ozawa, Japanese conductor
More information about Ozawa
• 1940 ~ Dave White (Tricker), Singer, songwriter with Danny & The Juniors
• 1944 ~ Leonard Slatkin, Grammy Award-winning orchestra director of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and National Symphony Orchestra
• 1946 ~ Barry Gibb, Musician, rhythm guitar, songwriter, singer with The Bee Gees
• 1946 ~ Greg Errico, Drummer with Sly and The Family Stone
• 1955 ~ Bruce Foxton, Guitar with 100 Men and The Jam
• 1957 ~ Gloria Estefan (Gloria Maria Milagrosa Fajardo), ‘Queen of Latin Pop’, Grammy Award-winning singer
• 1960 ~ When Oscar Hammerstein II died, the musical theater lost an outstanding composer. To honor the man and his music, every New York theater turned off its lights on this night in 1960.
• 1972 ~ The O’Jays received a gold record for Back Stabbers. It was the first hit for the group from Canton, OH. The O’Jays would place nine more hits on the pop and R&B charts. Five of them were gold record winners: Love Train, I Love Music, Use ta Be My Girl, For the Love of Money and Put Your Hands Together.
• 1977 ~ Singer Debbie Harry (of Blondie) signed a recording deal with Chrysalis Records. Chrysalis bought the group’s private stock label for $500,000. With the high visibility of the former Playboy Bunny, it was difficult to think of Blondie as a band, and not just Debbie Harry.
• 1982 ~ Clifford M Curzon, England, pianist, died at the age of 75
• 2001 ~ Sil Austin, a jazz artist who recorded more than 30 albums and the Top 40 hits Slow Walk, My Mother’s Eyes, and his signature song, Danny Boy, died of prostate cancer. He was 71. Austin taught himself how to play the tenor saxophone when he was 12. Four years later, he played Danny Boy on the Ted Mack Amateur Hour, a performance that caught the attention of Mercury Records. Austin performed all over Europe and Asia, usually traveling with his wife, the Rev. Vernice Austin.
• 1834 ~ Amilcare Ponchielli, Italian composer
More information about Ponchielli
• 1903 ~ Arthur (Morton) Godfrey, Ukulele playing, TV/radio entertainer
1918 ~ Alan Jay Lerner, American lyricist for the musical theater
Read quotes by and about Lerner
More information about Lerner
• 1930 ~ Dudley “Big Tiny” Little Jr, American pianist on the Lawrence Welk Show
• 1939 ~ Jerry Allison, Drummer with The Crickets
• 1939 ~ Frank Sinatra recorded All or Nothing at All with the Harry James Band. The tune failed to become a hit until four years later – after Ol’ Blue Eyes had joined the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra.
• 1945 ~ Itzhak Perlman, Israeli-born American violinist, recorded with André Previn and Scott Joplin
• 1945 ~ Van Morrison, Songwriter, singer with Them
• 1955 ~ Anthony Thistlethwaite, Saxophone with The Waterboys
• 1957 ~ Glenn Tilbrook, Guitar, singer, songwriter with Squeeze
• 1959 ~ Tony DeFranco, Singer with The DeFranco Family
• 1970 ~ Debbie Gibson, Singer
• 1976 ~ A judge ruled that George Harrison was guilty of copying from the songHe’sSo Fine (a 1963 Chiffons hit). The judge said that the chorus to Harrison’s My Sweet Lord was identical to He’s So Fine and it eventually (appeals went on for about five years) cost the former Beatle over half a million dollars.
• 1987 ~ This day saw the largest preorder of albums in the history of CBS Records. 2.25 million copies of Michael Jackson’s Bad album were shipped to record stores. The LP followed in the tracks of the Jackson album, Thriller, the biggest Jackson-seller of all time (35 million copies sold). The Bad album was successful but sold only 13 million copies.
• 2002 ~ Lionel Hampton, American Jazz vibraphone player and actor, died at the age of 94
• 2016 ~ Jacques Leduc, Belgian composer, died at the age of 84
• 1842 ~ (Victor) Alphonse Duvernoy, French pianist and composer. His works include operas, various pieces for piano and orchestra, chamber music, songs and piano music (including a set of 100 studies).
• 1853 ~ Percy Goetschius, American music teacher and critic
• 1919 ~ Kitty Wells (Muriel Ellen Deason),‘The Queen of Country Music’, Country Music Hall of Fame, married to Johnny Wright
• 1922 ~ Regina Resnik, American mezzo-soprano
• 1922 ~ The New Orleans Rhythm Kings recorded Tiger Rag, one of the most familiar ragtime jazz tunes ever. It was released on the General record label.
• 1935 ~ John Phillips, Singer with The Mamas & The Papas, actress MacKenzie Phillips’ father
• 1941 ~ John McNally, Singer, guitarist with The Searchers
• 1945 ~ Van Morrison, Irish blues-rock singer, songwriter and instrumentalist
• 1968 ~ The Beatles recorded their first songs for their own Apple label. The initial session included the big hits Revolution and Hey Jude.
• 1968 ~ The stars came out for charity as John and Yoko Lennon hosted the One on One concert in New York’s Madison Square Garden. Among the music greats appearing were Stevie Wonder and Roberta Flack. Over $250,000 was raised to aid mentally retarded children.
• 1984 ~ Beatles fans paid $271,180 dollars for memorabilia at an auction in London, England. An unpublished manuscript by John Lennon brought the largest amount – $23,056. A snare drum belonging to Ringo Starr brought $1,440.
• 1826 ~ Walter Cecil Macfarren, English pianist and composer, born in London
• 1850 ~ Wagner’s opera, Lohengrin, was performed for the first time.
• 1894 ~ Karl Böhm, Austrian conductor
1913 ~ Richard Tucker, American tenor
More information about Tucker
• 1924 ~ Dinah Washington, American rhythm-and-blues singer. She popularized many, many great songs, including What a Diff’rence a Day Makes, Unforgettable, and several hits with Brook Benton.
• 1925 ~ Billy (William Wayne) Grammer, Singer
• 1931 ~ You Rascal You was recorded by Henry Allen, with the Luis Russell Band, for the Victor label.
• 1939 ~ Clem Cattini, Drummer with Tornados
• 1948 ~ Daniel Seraphine, Drummer with Chicago
• 1951 ~ Wayne Osmond, Singer with The Osmond Brothers
• 1964 ~ The Beatles appeared on the cover of LIFE magazine.
• 1984 ~ The Jacksons’ Victory Tour broke the record for concert ticket sales. The group surpassed the 1.1 million mark in only two months.
• 2002 ~ Kay Gardner, whose last musical work with the Bangor Symphony Orchestra memorialized the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, died of a heart attack. She was in her early 60s.
On hearing of her death, symphony officials scheduled Gardner’s work, “Lament for Thousand,” for the orchestra’s season-opening concert Oct. 13 at the Maine Center for the Arts in Orono.
Gardner was a pianist, flutist and conductor who performed in 46 states and several countries.
More than 20 years ago, she sued the Bangor Symphony, unsuccessfully, for sex discrimination after she had applied for a conducting position and learned that orchestra members had been asked how they felt about working with a female conductor.
In 2000, she was the guest conductor for a 40-member orchestra of women from the Bangor Symphony, playing a repertoire written by women.
Gardner studied music at the University of Michigan and at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. In 1972, she helped found a feminist and openly lesbian women’s band, Lavender Jane.
Let’s face it. Most kids don’t want to practice the piano. And if they do find the time to practice, it’s usually because their parent kept nagging them. How frustrating!
Piano teachers are frustrated too. It’s nearly impossible to teach students new concepts when they don’t understand the old ones–all because of a lack of practice.
If you’re a parent in this situation, I have just the solution you’re looking for.
In this upbeat book, I share all the tips I’ve discovered in my 14 years of teaching piano. You’ll learn fun, practical ways to get your kids to the keyboard.
But this easy-to-read guide goes one step further. I’ll show you simple ways to encourage better quality practice. Even if you’ve never had a music lesson in your life!
I wrote this book for kids of all ages. There are creative ideas for elementary students and also a section for teens.
There’s even a section for what to do if your child wants to stop taking piano lessons. That’s right, there is hope and my book will show you exactly how to get them interested in piano again.
Don’t be the kind of parent who sits on the sidelines waiting until their child wants to practice. Piano lessons are too expensive for you to let another “no-practice” day go by.
This book is your answer to get your child to the keyboard, have good quality practice and develop a life-long love of music.
Thank you for your interest in the O’Connor Music Studio!
Available times are on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays during the day and after school for all ages and levels. There may be other times available if requested.
After you register, you will get a confirmation email with the information you need to access the Student Portal. After logging in you may choose from the available lesson times or request something different.
Your $20.00 interview deposit will be credited towards the second month of lessons.
If you are a transfer student, please bring your most recent method book(s) and notebook to the interview.
Prospective students must have a piano, organ or electric keyboard to use for daily practice.
Roadtrip! students (ages 4-5) are scheduled for half-hour lessons with their parents present.
Beginning children (ages 6 to 9) are scheduled for half-hour lessons.
Youth (ages 10 and up) may be scheduled for half-hour lessons or forty-five minute lessons.
Adults are highly encouraged to take hour-long lessons, but are always welcome to schedule half-hour lessons at first.
1653 ~ Johann Pachelbel, German composer and organist
