F Sharp = G Flat

… and other useless things I learned from almost ten years of piano lessons.  Like how to shape your hands and how that’ll come in handy someday when those same hands become arthritic. You’ll know exactly just how much shaping is cool before it approaches uncool cramping. When it comes to posture, you’ll learn exactly what stature to employ when approaching the keyboard. Straight back and not sitting into your hips yet at the same point this almost frigid position is employed, fluidity must flow from the top of your shoulders to the ends of your fingers.  That little ditty takes time to master.  Isolating muscle tension, and you’re only seven years old.  You can barely isolate your peeing and pooping operatives at that juncture.  

F Sharp = G Flat.  They’re the same note which takes on a different name based on what key your music is written in.  So maybe you’re at the point of mental development to distinguish yes from no, right from wrong, stop from go and then you’re presented with a black piece of ivory that goes either way depending on what outside forces need it to be.  So there’s two sides to every key, but try having two sides to the same story and you’ll find yourself stuck in detention.  

Practice time.  Now you have at least one piano lesson per week.  A lesson should be where you learn things but it really takes on more of a recital atmosphere.  You find yourself proving yourself to the piano teacher.  Now in my personal case, the piano teacher was Mr. Morrison who drained a bottle of Hennessy in my parent’s driveway prior to coming in the house to teach me.  The only thing he taught me was the power of nasal filtration.  His breath could melt a thousand piano keys. Try performing while you’re gasping for oxygen.  So you practiced every single day of the week just to get to the lesson where you get to prove yourself and you choke … LITERALLY.  And that choke results in Mr. Morrison telling my parents I’ll need to “double up” my practice time.  Then I’m stuck mastering Bagatelle No. 25^[a] in A minor (WoO 59, Bia 515) for solo piano, commonly known as “Für Elise”.

Even the name of the piece has an identity crisis!  When I see a young piano protégé, I’m less impressed with their talent and more concerned about their mental stability.  If you’re parenting a child and shaping their world, I suggest you present them with something that’s black or white … not black AND white like the keyboard of a piano that’s a minefield of contradiction.