Episode Overview

In this insightful episode of the Piano Pedagogy Podcast, hosts Jacqueline Beckoff and Arianne Lakra dive into the expansive topic of articulations in piano playing. From introducing articulations to young students to refining techniques for advanced players, the discussion offers a comprehensive look at one of the most nuanced aspects of piano pedagogy.

Throughout the episode, Jacqueline and Arianne share their personal experiences and teaching strategies, highlighting the challenges and rewards of mastering articulations. Join them as they explore effective teaching methods, the importance of tailored approaches to individual student needs, and the transformative power of overcoming musical challenges.

Watch it on Spotify, YouTube, or your favorite podcasting app.

Episode Notes

Foundational Concepts in Teaching Articulations

• Introducing Articulations to Young Students:Jacqueline and Arianne discuss the best time to introduce articulations to young students. Jacqueline prefers to wait until students are out of their first primer book, whereas Arianne likes to introduce the concept through composition notebooks, making diagrams that branch into different types of articulations. 
• Kinesthetic and Auditory Approaches: Arianne emphasizes a kinesthetic approach, ensuring proper bench height and foot support for students to use forearm weight effectively. She uses wrist rotations and large hand lifts to teach legato and non-legato, making sure students observe and imitate her motions. Jacqueline complements this with auditory methods, playing scales in different articulations and asking students to describe the differences.

Challenges in Transitioning from Non-Legato to Legato

• Overcoming Technical Hurdles: Both hosts agree that transitioning from non-legato to legato can be challenging, especially for young students with smaller hands or weaker fingers. Jacqueline uses rotational approaches for legato, having students mimic doorknob motions to create a smooth sound. Arianne introduces legato on black keys to utilize the stronger second and third fingers, ensuring the hand is opened out for better grip.
• Dealing with Frustration: Handling student frustration is crucial. Jacqueline often uses her dog, Mai-lo, to help students step away from the piano and alleviate stress. Arianne suggests water breaks and changing the topic to maintain a positive learning environment, emphasizing the importance of encouragement and not fixating on mistakes.

Advanced Articulation Techniques

• Non-Legato as an Overlooked Technique: The hosts discuss the often-overlooked non-legato articulation, noting that many method books do not address it adequately. Jacqueline shares her late realization of the importance of non-legato and how it should be taught and appreciated for its unique sound qualities.
• Individualized Teaching Methods: Arianne and Jacqueline stress the need for personalized teaching methods, especially for students with different intellectual experiences and language barriers. They explore the use of buzzwords and visual aids to help students grasp complex concepts more effectively.

Approaches to Teaching Articulations

• The Nature of Articulations: Arianne introduces the idea that articulation is not just about how notes are grouped but also about how the fingers move to produce sound. This deeper understanding helps students reduce tension and achieve the desired sound quality.
• Defining Articulations: The hosts discuss the importance of students being able to define musical terms like articulations. Jacqueline proposes exercises to build definitions collaboratively, making the concept stick in students' minds and enhancing their ability to discuss music intelligently. 

Episode Recap

This episode of the Piano Pedagogy Podcast is a treasure trove of insights for music teachers, providing both foundational knowledge and advanced strategies for teaching articulations. Jacqueline and Arianne's thoughtful dialogue offers listeners a chance to reflect on their teaching methods and the potential to deepen their students' musical understanding through effective articulation techniques.

Join Jacqueline and Arianne next week for more enriching discussions and expert insights into the world of music teaching. If you have your own experiences or thoughts on the mnemonic debate or other teaching strategies, feel free to share them on the Defined Music Teacher Facebook page.

Show Transcript Jacqueline: Hi and welcome back to another episode of the Piano Pedagogy Podcast. My name is Jacqueline Beckoff, and with me, as always, is Arianne Lakra. I own a successful piano studio in Southern California, and so does Arianne. How are things going for you this week?

Arianne: Things are alright, you know, been a pretty tumultuous week for me, just on a personal level. But I'm here and I'm excited to do the podcast on articulation today.

Jacqueline: Awesome. Yeah, this week has been pretty unremarkable for me in my studio. It's the first week back from break after our successful recital. So, just catching up on stuff and setting new plans in motion. But articulations, let's dive right in. Where do we start with such a monstrously large topic like articulations? When's the first time you mention the word articulations to a 7-year-old?

Arianne: I like to introduce the concept of articulation in their composition notebooks. I give each student a composition notebook to jot down notes from class and do little exercises at home. I write it down and make a diagram, saying, "Articulation" at the top, and then it branches off into the different types. By the time they know legato and staccato, it's not a bad time to introduce the term, or if you want to wait until they know some others, maybe in Faber Level 2, or the late elementary stage, that's fine as well. I can understand not wanting to bombard students with these more categorical terms at first.

Jacqueline: Yeah, I think the prevailing pedagogy these days is that there should be a long period of non-legato playing from students before they start doing something like legato. I introduce the term articulations with children under the age of 12 when they get out of that first primer book and learn about legato and staccato. I name the term articulations at that point, but I don't mention legato, non-legato, or staccato. I don't mention the concept until that last unit in the primer book. That's when I start preparing them for legato, but I still don't call it legato. I don't call them articulations. What about for older students?

Arianne: For older students, usually right off the bat because they ask about it. A lot of students will ask proactively, "How do I know when to do this versus this?" And they'll mime the gesture of, say, staccato or something smooth, like legato, so usually way sooner than kids.

Jacqueline: Yeah, absolutely. The curriculum I use for adults and teens introduces articulations much earlier than for kids. It's something that I talk about at that early stage. The adult book, I think it's the second unit when they get off of pre-staff and onto staff reading, followed pretty quickly by articulations. Why don't I go through and explain my preparation stage for articulations? The first one that I do is legato, and just like when we are starting all of our things, we should start with sound, right? We start with sound, getting them to hear. So I play a scale. I play it legato, I play it non-legato, and before I start, I say, "I'm gonna play this. All the notes are gonna be the same. All of the dynamics are gonna be the same. Everything's gonna be the same, but something is gonna be different." I started adding that disclaimer because students tried to describe the differences in my sounds with terms they were already familiar with. So I preempt that. I say, "The rhythm is going to be the same. The notes are going to be the same. I'm going to play the same speed, the same dynamics. But something is going to be different." Then I play legato, non-legato, and ask if they've noticed a difference. If they say yes, I ask them to describe using any words the difference in sounds. If they need help, I might say, "Which one sounded like popcorn, and which one sounded like water?" That usually gets students going for non-legato or legato, using those kinds of terms. But most of the time they don't need help. They can say one sounds bumpy, one sounds like a ball rolling, etc. I'm not looking for musical terms at that point, just anything that relates to their life that helps those sounds make sense. That's the first part of the preparation stage. I do that activity, then get back to our lesson. Do you think your students would be able to describe using those kinds of words?

Arianne: Yeah, I think that's a cool way to do it. It's pulling in their background knowledge from other life experiences to make associations with these articulations. I like that. For me, it's a lot more of a kinesthetic approach and audio. Also, my very first thing that I like to make sure of when I'm introducing staccato or legato, is that the bench is at the appropriate height and distance away from the keyboard, and that if their feet cannot touch the ground, they have some kind of foot support like a stool, or a footrest of some kind, even a cardboard box filled with things that you don't really need tends to work well. Especially when it comes to staccato, I like to have them imitate what I'm doing, so I'll sit right next to them on the keyboard. No matter what the age group, I try to emphasize the importance of the use of forearm weight as opposed to just motions like this or that. For listeners that are not watching right now, I just mimed wrist bobbing up and down and hand bobbing up and down without the support of the arm really, just disconnected from the arm. I try to avoid that kind of motion and prevent that bad habit of playing staccato that way before it even starts. Generally, when students are encouraged to really pay attention to how I'm demonstrating something, they follow suit pretty well, kinesthetically. It's nice because students who are observant with their eyes, it's all connected. And then they also get the audio outcome that is desired. So I like to do it that way for staccato. Lagato can sometimes be a little bit more challenging, even though I think it is technically introduced earlier.

Jacqueline: You introduce staccato first?

Arianne: They introduce legato.

Jacqueline: I don't know how the books do it, but you mentioned staccato, do you do staccato first?

Arianne: Not always, but sometimes just depending on the student. Sometimes students stumble upon it on their own. So I just kind of embrace that and go into it a little more.

Jacqueline: I got you. Keep going.

Arianne: With legato, it can be a lot more challenging in my experience to effectively teach it. There are some things you can use, like talking about the process of walking and having a discussion about how the feet actually cooperate in order to walk.

Jacqueline: Up and down at the same time, right.

Arianne: Yeah.

Jacqueline: Down, up, down, up, down, it's down and up simultaneously. That's an interesting. I've never used walking for it. Are you done?

Arianne: There's one almost foolproof method of teaching legato that I've found, but I'm sure some teachers might find issue with it. I like to have the student put the side of their thumb down on middle C, and all 4 fingers up in the air as high as possible. Then at my cue, they switch so that now their second finger is on D, and thumb is up as high as possible.

Jacqueline: Interesting.

Arianne: Then they usually catch on and just go through all of the fingers like that. Then I say, now, instead of reaching as high as possible with each finger, reach a little less high and then a little less high. Now you're playing legato smooth and connected. One finger always has to be down to take the other finger's place. That seems to work better than simply describing legato verbally.

Jacqueline: That's really interesting. The way I approach legato is the sound first approach. Because I think the mechanics of finger legato are very complicated. So I do a rotational approach for it. I have them put their right hand on middle C, number one on middle C. I ask them to do a doorknob motion, wrist rotation, and then we go from C to G, one to five. Instead of having to pay attention to fingers going up or down, if they're naturally moving their weight from middle C by rotating to the left, then they're going to G by rotating to the right. It's not really possible, it takes more effort to hang on to the C. When you shift your weight to the G, it's never happened. They shift their weight from C to G and back to C, that creates that smooth sound. That's something I do probably the second week. I have them play middle C, and then lift comically high off of the piano.

Arianne: Thank you.

Jacqueline: Sometimes I have them touch their nose or pat their head, then I have them move to G. I really like something you just said, which is something I use in a lot of different approaches. You have your students start with a comically overdone version of whatever you're asking them to accomplish. So in this case, there you were doing comically large finger movements to get to the legato. In my case I'm having them do comically large hand lifts to get that non-legato sound. Just having them achieve the sound, even if it's not in the same mechanism that they would then use it most of the time. Using wrist rotation is not how I teach them to do legato for the majority, but the fact that it's a simple way for them to create the sound with their own body and then make the connection between, okay, this finger's done, but I need to get this finger to the next one, even though it's a rotational motion instead of a finger motion.

Arianne: Kind of a bonus of your legato method of going from C to G and doing wrist rotation is, it introduces the concept of wrist rotation if it has not already been introduced, and it introduces the concept that you can play two notes legato, even if they're not just one step away from each other.

Jacqueline: I think that's a really good point. I'm a big fan of technique gestures as we've discussed previously on this podcast. Faber has them built into their technique book. They don't introduce wrist rotation until much later, 2B, 3A, 3B. It's really late. It's really late in there for them to be introducing wrist rotation. I introduce it much earlier with the doorknob approach. Everyone's turned a doorknob. It's related to their life. That's something that's really useful. Being able to do skips legato is interesting. I'm thinking like in the Level 1 book, right after they introduce legato, it's all finger legato. It's all adjacent notes, it's all seconds. I think it's almost entirely seconds.

Arianne: It doesn't have to be. That could be a modification to the usual method that we as teachers use. Do you want to just stick to the beginning of teaching legato with just steps? Or would you want to maybe start out teaching skips, or something like that?

Jacqueline: You don't have to choose your own adventure. You don't need to go the way that the particular method book has laid it out for you. You can teach legato before they even see the symbol, before they even see the slur with scales, with five finger scales. I try to have my students know the C and G major five finger scales before they leave their primer books. They're doing their scales with their articulation before they even learn them. One thing I want to mention is that non-legato is never, at least I've never seen a method book that uses the term non-legato. I don't want to say there aren't any out there, but Faber introduces legato and staccato, and just fails to mention or build any pieces around the idea that when you don't have a slur, it's supposed to be non-legato.

Arianne: I've wondered about that.

Jacqueline: It seems like a big flaw.

Arianne: It's pretty comprehensive in most other regards. But once you get to the point where you're playing repertoire from the canon, it's something that absolutely needs to be known.

Jacqueline: I've spoken on the podcast about how my early piano education had mixed outcomes. A lot of that was, I wasn't the greatest student when I was young. Another one was, I moved frequently, so I was constantly having another teacher pick up from where a previous teacher left off, which is very disorienting for a student and for a teacher. We all know. It sounds crazy to say this, but it wasn't really driven home for me until university at the age of 23 that the lack of slurs is something that I should pay attention to. Non-legato is something that can be beautiful, and that it shouldn't just be homogenized into a mishmash of legato.

Arianne: I'm not surprised it took until university for you and many others to figure that out or be taught that. A lot of times, the implication is that legato is the default when there's no articulation mark, especially when you're playing neighboring notes, ascending lines, descending lines, etc. I think that goes into another area of this discussion, which is articulation in general. My teacher growing up went into this extensively, yet I don't really see it in a lot of the pedagogy literature or any piano-related literature, which is that there is another possible interpretation of the word articulation. It's not simply as far as I know, the word articulation has two contexts. There's the context of talking about how notes can be grouped, staccato, legato, tenuto, marcato, whatever. There's this other interpretation of the word articulation that needs more attention in the field, which is when you articulate notes, let's say you're playing a Bach prelude, or something like that with tons of eighth notes or sixteenth notes. How do your fingers move to produce the sound? What is the overall articulation even when it is not explicitly written in the score? To me, that's a little bit different because it's simply the knowledge of how to move your fingers in a non-legato way effectively to reduce tension and increase exactly the kind of sound and feel that you want to get for your piece.

Jacqueline: I think that's interesting. There are so many different facets of what you were just talking about. I wonder because there's let me see what am I trying to say? There are so many ways of getting into that interpretive articulation. There are so many different ways of getting into those very personal approaches to Bach. Very personal approaches to that kind of music and how you, a teacher, approach them, how a student approaches them. It's less discussed, less written about because everybody's method is so personal and individual. Some people prefer editions of Bach that have no articulations written at all. I like to tell students with Baroque music like that, there are three approaches. There's the approach that we should try to be just like the harpsichord. That's the approach. I hated Baroque music when I was a child because my teachers told me it should all be non-legato, should all be mezzo forte because we're emulating the harpsichord. We should be as faithful to that instrument as we can, and they lacked dynamic control, articulation control. This music should sound like that, and I despised it. It was terrible. I had a humongous distaste for Baroque music. Then there's the other side where people add pedal and ritardandos and crescendos and rubato, and they use the full suite of tools that the modern piano has at its disposal. They prefer additions that have all of these, like the Schirmer editions that were edited in the 1900s, late 1800s, and reflect the attitude at that time. Lots of articulations, right? Something they don't even mention is that Bach didn't write a single one of these articulations. Then there's the middle approach, which is the one I've settled into, that we should be faithful to the harpsichord. We should harken back to that, but let's not make it sound like it's boring, and it has no dimensions, no articulations, dynamics, and whatnot. How far do you take it with Bach?

Arianne: I'd say I've settled into a similar middle of the way. I like to read from the Urtext editions. I think you can put a little pedal in there. You can do a little bit of dynamic changes in there. Look to the greats, Schiff, all these world-class pianists who are performing the works of Bach. Of course, they're going to employ techniques that the modern piano affords us that could not have been employed back when these pieces were written. I'm sure Bach was at times disappointed that keyboard instruments could not behave the way orchestras could.

Jacqueline: We know it's not like articulations weren't invented yet. We know he used them in other music on instruments that were capable of dynamics, articulation, and that kind of control. So I think it's disingenuous for us to perform. We're not on a harpsichord. We shouldn't try to completely emulate a harpsichord because the tone and the timbre, everything is already different. So I think it's disingenuous for us to treat it like it should be 100% non-legato, 100% mezzo forte. It's disingenuous. It's already different. We're already on a piano. Why are we playing this game? If Bach were alive now, first of all, wild. Second of all, if he had access to the modern piano while composing his preludes and fugues, his French suites and partitas, all of his music, I'm pretty sure we can say with near 100% certainty he would have included dynamic marks and articulations.

Arianne: Agreed. Oh, my gosh.

Jacqueline: Why would we not?

Arianne: To hear a composition that he could create once he understands the workings of the modern piano, I would love to see what he would come up with.

Jacqueline: That would be a fascinating experience. That would be so interesting. Even if he just lived, if he was born 20 years later, if he made it to the piano forte, what would that have done? If people like Mozart made it to the same piano that Liszt was using, what would that have done? It's a very interesting thought to have for sure. For non-legato, it's such a, and I was one of them, I was one of those people that just kind of bulldozed over non-legato. Why not? It's so easy to just not do it. It's so easy because legato, it's so easy for legato to become the default. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it. When someone says, let's just play it normal here. What does that mean? What does normal mean? Let's just play it normal. What is normal? Is that legato? Is that non-legato? Is that mezzo forte? What does it mean to just play a section? We're just going to do it normal.

Arianne: Whenever you introduce the concept of non-legato to students who are starting to dive into the major canonical works, maybe they're doing the Well-Tempered Clavier or something like that, explaining the methodology and the technique behind non-legato can be kind of challenging. I like to set them up with recordings of great pianists who practice non-legato in certain pieces that they're working on because they do such a great job. I'll also demonstrate a little bit too. I've definitely gotten complaints from my late intermediate to early advanced students before that, hey, non-legato actually is really uncomfortable and legato is so much easier. Why don't we just do that? There's more tension.

Jacqueline: It's weird because with older students, I guess that's a complaint we get with older students. My younger students, at least my younger students, they stick with non-legato much longer and it becomes normal to them. I put that in air quotes for those of you not watching. I put that in air quotes because it's what they're used to. I wouldn't move a child onto legato if their non-legato was still tense if they didn't have the right technique for it. With adults, because I introduce it so much earlier, they haven't necessarily developed a tension-free technique by the time legato comes around. I've noticed that the outside fingers, finger 5 and finger 1, this is something that mostly happens with my older students. They like to use a drop of the wrist or a slight rotation into number 5, into finger 5, to play with their pinky. I like to talk about, I think I may have mentioned this earlier on a podcast episode, that when their fingers misbehave, it's very easy to blame the fingers. Why is my finger doing that? Why is my wrist dropping? Why are my fingertips flat? Why are these technical failings happening? It's very easy to blame the fingers and make the body parts responsible. But at the end of the day, their body's only doing something or not doing something because of the instructions that their brain is sending. The reason I bring this up is because I noticed that when I have students keep all of their fingers on the piano and do a legato, sometimes they tense down with 5 and 4 to prevent them from lifting up, and in doing so, they hit keys that they're not intending to.

Arianne: That happens. That's why I think it's important to emphasize the way that you can actually lift your fingers up off the keys in a more vertical manner when they're not being used to depress a key. Let's say you're doing a five-finger scale. Fingers 1, 2, and 3 are playing. 4 and 5, to a certain extent, can be up in the air off the key, not making contact with the key, as long as they're in the same vertical space occupied by the keys F and G. Does that make sense? I like to explain it in terms of that to anyone about 10 and up that, hey, you can still go up with your fingers when they're not in use because that'll alleviate the tension as long as your hand doesn't shift horizontally and throw off the rest of your hand position.

Jacqueline: I might benefit from being less militant about the fingers staying in contact with the keys. Certainly, it's a way to alleviate the tension. But I think at the same time, I would still want them to eventually reach that place where they can play without any tension. They could just not lift up their fingers. When 4 and 5 lift up, it's because their muscles are activating those fingers to lift up. There's so much fine motor control over legato. You're flipping muscles on and off simultaneously. You're bringing your 2 finger down while your 1 finger is coming up. You're bringing your 2 finger up while your 3 finger is coming down. Sometimes the signals get mixed. I noticed this more with adult students when they are learning their legato because they've had a lifetime of not using individual fingers. They've had a lifetime of not having to use one finger at a time because nothing people do in their life other than typing on a keyboard requires the usage of a single finger muscle, single finger at a time. Everything else is grasping or holding or something that uses all 5 fingers at the same time. Even texting, they're holding the phone, and then the thumb is moving. There's no activity other than typing on a keyboard that requires use of a single finger. So they're not used to activating that part of their brain and just using that. So when they're asked, "How do I stop finger number 5 and figure number 4 from lifting up when I'm playing my scales?" Well, if you're trying to stop it, or you're trying to put them back down, you've already lost. You just need to not lift them up in the first place.

Arianne: I don't know if I totally agree. If the fingers are constantly in contact with the keys while other fingers in the same hand are playing, I believe that actually increases tension overall. That's why I always, and even Marvin Blickenstaff talks about this a lot, the famous East Coast American piano pedagogue, he emphasizes the importance of wrist rotation exercises such as five-finger patterns, broken chords, things like that. When you do a wrist rotation, if the wrist is being rotated, then there's no way that the other fingertips can stay in contact with the keys. So I think it's a big no-no to keep the fingertips in contact with the keys. It adds to the tension of your hand overall and it doesn't allow for the downward momentum of the next finger to really take place. You can't have effective kinetic energy without creating potential energy by raising your fingers up in advance. Because scales and broken chords happen in a wave a lot of the time, it just doesn't make sense to lift the necessary finger up individually without also getting the other fingers ready on deck.

Jacqueline: I can understand what you're talking about in terms of preparing the fingers and the rotational aspect of the five-finger scale, going towards the fingers that you're moving towards. So I can definitely appreciate the potential for tension when preventing their natural motion if you're using your wrist in that way. Certainly with the preparation of fingers for scales. When you say that without lifting a finger, you can't get enough kinetic energy to make a sound. Am I saying that you said correctly?

Arianne: You could from the calories in your body and that sort of thing, but it's more organic when it is coming from gravity itself. You can get kinetic energy from your body without having to lift a finger to play a key. However, it's gonna be easier on your body and on the whole musician-instrument apparatus if you involve gravity in the striking of the key. This is what I like to talk about extensively when I go into my second interpretation of articulation, which is related to non-legato and things like that, or even any articulation style. It's all about how you position the finger or fingers before they strike the key. A lot of it is set up just like when you're playing golf and you swing, and you have follow-through. You need to draw that bow back before it can launch that arrow.

Jacqueline: I can definitely appreciate that. Let's go back to articulations. One of the things I've found interesting is the inability of certain students to define the category, or sometimes even name the category. This is a persistent thing that students have with defining articulations. If you asked your students to define the word articulations, how many of them would give you examples of articulations instead of defining the category? A lot of my students will give me examples, like, "What are articulations?" "Legato, non-legato." "Okay, but those are great examples of articulation, but if I asked you what food is, and you told me that it's a pancake, that's not really true." You lose the thing. But pancakes are not the entirety of food. What is food? "Food is stuff that you eat. It's tasty." "Yeah, okay, that's what food is." So what is articulation? The definition I'm curious to see what your definition in that sense is, on a categorical, how do you categorize all of the things? Legato, non-legato, accents, staccato, tenudos, legato, how do you define the category of articulations?

Arianne: Students start... I got into this before, but I'll add a little bit more. Before, earlier in the conversation, I was saying that articulation defines the way that you group together certain notes. But that's not all-encompassing because you can have an articulation just on one individual note that you're talking about. I would say it's the nature of how you enter and exit the key and what sound that creates. That's usually the definition I give to people.

Jacqueline: The enter and exit of the key and sound that it creates. I like that. I define articulations as the kind of touch that's used. Accents use a heavy touch, staccato uses a short, crisp touch, legato, smooth and connected touch. Touch is the keyword in that, and that helps to separate it from dynamics being the volume, instead of articulations being the kind of touch. I wonder what I can do better to help students define the category of things. I mean, it's, I suppose, a lot of repetition and asking for them to do the same kind of thing. But rhythm, they know what rhythm is, they can give me an example of a rhythm. But if I ask them to define rhythm, that's a much more difficult task for them. My definition is patterns of long and short sounds, or how long our sounds are. That's rhythm. But I suppose it's not a skill they need. They don't need to be able to define the categories of things. I don't know. I'm going off on a tangent here.

Arianne: No, I think it's pretty important. It's relevant to any of these topics that we discuss on the podcast. How can you effectively boost your students' understanding into the next level of mastery so that it's not just comprehension and application, but also analysis, evaluation, and so forth? I'd say to a certain extent, you're right. I don't want to necessarily just say repetition matters when it comes to introducing concepts or defining them or taking notes, things like that. But yeah, repetition, the concept in various contexts, reintroduction of a concept in various contexts.

Jacqueline: Hi folks, we were having a bit of technical difficulties. So let's back up a little bit. We were just talking about defining the categories of things, and Arianne was saying that it's important.

Arianne: Oh, okay, right? Yeah. There was a little. I lost you there for a second, but I was still on. I was just saying, yeah, it's important to boost your students' understanding of concepts so that they're not just applying them and comprehending them, but in fact, analyzing them and evaluating them. And I think one way you can do that is to just reintroduce the concept in different contexts. You know, like, introduce multiple pieces of repertoire that employ, that display the same concept, and you need to use it or have different discussions, different workshops, share different lectures.

Jacqueline: I, I...

Arianne: In as many contexts as possible.

Jacqueline: Yeah, I think that's so. So the generalization of moving that concept from one to one situation to another, and being able to integrate that. I wonder if that encourages a dictionary definition. If, or if, if for the majority of our student, if that dictionary, I would say, it is important for them to be able to, to say, this is what this is, what rhythm is. Rhythm is the patterns of long and short sounds. Articulation is the kind of touch. But I wonder, like talking about what are the articulations in this piece? Do we have similar articulations in this piece versus that piece, and I think that begets, you know, a, what I would say is, would be a deep understanding. But I think it's puzzling that my students seem to be able to get a deep understanding and have discussions about, for example, the articulations like, tell me about the articulations in this piece. Okay, this is staccato legato, and what those means. But then they, that deep understanding seems to fall short of just being able to answer what I would consider a seemingly easy question. What is articulations? What are articulations?

Arianne: I don't know.

Jacqueline: Because we don't. I don't talk about the definition. I talk about the definition once, right like?

Arianne: We do have to talk about it multiple times. And I think it also has to do with the fact that our brains are still developing, and we haven't necessarily been in academic settings, you know, for as long as we have. By the time you reach the university level, you tend to know what to expect from professors and teachers a little bit more when they ask certain things. Younger people are still figuring out how to just answer questions in general, no matter what the topic is.

Jacqueline: I think that I've noticed that it's with the younger students that have more difficulty with this. Like, would an 8-year-old, for example, be able to tell me what is multiplication, like, like a definition of multiplication? Or would they give me an example? Multiplication is when you multiply two numbers together. When you, when you like. Would that be the definition out again? Multiplication is when you multiply two numbers together, but like, or were they able to say, well, multiplication is when you add numbers a certain amount of times, or some other definition of multiplication. I'm curious if that's something that is just not for an 8-year-old or a 7-year-old to be able to, 9-year-old, to be able to do that skill as easily as a 25-year-old or a 40-year-old, or an 18-year-old.

Arianne: Totally. Yeah, I think that the older someone is the easier they're able to synthesize things and just create mental...

Jacqueline: Take the outside box and then say them in a cohesive way.

Arianne: Yeah, and there's so much more neural overlap, you know, everything starts to come together and make sense around 25 when our frontal lobe, or whatever is fully formed, or I don't know. That's the theory that's floating around social media these days. So I'm just gonna go with it and assume that that's true. And speak from experience, cause I felt like that's what happened with me when I turned 25. But I digress. Anyway. I mean, I think it also depends on this, the individual and their level of education, their level of engagement, their level of parent involvement. Frankly, you know? Have they been intentionally taught to think critically? If so, then they're more likely to persist if, if you let them know that whatever they define multiplication as or something before was not exactly the answer that you were maybe looking for.

Jacqueline: Yeah, maybe an exercise where we work together to build a definition of the thing, right? Because, you know, using the word rhythm all the time, and simply using that word rhythm in lots of different contexts doesn't beget a definition, right? And I wonder if an exercise where we work together and we write maybe on a whiteboard, we will write down like for articulation, since our, our, our episode is ostensibly about articulations. We write down all the different things we know about articulations, the different examples, what parts of sound they affect, what we do with our body to achieve those things and try to reach a definition similar to, for my students, the kind of touch that we employ. I wonder if that would be a beneficial exercise and maybe make a more lasting impact than simply repeating every lesson until they can parrot it back. What articulations are.

Arianne: Yeah, you know, there, there are some lesson plans in just education in general, not necessarily just music. But let's say you're a science teacher. And you're trying to teach the concept of metabolism. You can, you can arm your students with things like buzzwords, like, okay, you're talking about metabolism. One buzzword is energy, another buzzword could be conversion, you know, burning.

Jacqueline: Buzzwords. I like that. Buzzwords.

Arianne: So they, it is words to memorize. But I think if you have a group of buzzwords for every broader vocabulary term, then I think it'll help the student to get like a more, just get more perspective on the nature of each vocab word.

Jacqueline: I think that's really interesting. I like that a lot. Another thing that I find challenging sometimes is with students that English is their second language. And I, I'm limited. I only speak one language. So, you know, they are already on a, on a whole level up above me, but I am only able to relate to them in English. And when someone's native language is Chinese, for example. I think that trying to force a certain sentence structure or a definition. Is, perhaps, I'm not sure what the right word is here, inappropriate.

Arianne: Oh, yeah.

Jacqueline: Of course, a certain sentence structure, for example, articulations, is the kind of touch we use for sound, that might not be an appropriate template for someone who is English is their second language.

Arianne: Oh, yeah, situations like that, you know, where there's a language barrier or English as a second language or third, or whichever, however many, you really gotta play those situations by ear. But yeah, I mean for any student it's easier to grasp a single buzzword than an entire sentence. I find that students' eyes sometimes just glaze over or people zone out if you actually teach them in full sentences.

Jacqueline: Yeah, no. I like that idea of buzzwords and asking them, you know, just I mean articulations is touch that I mean.

Arianne: Yeah.

Jacqueline: It's touch, right?

Arianne: Then, what do we mean by that? Okay.

Jacqueline: Yeah, yeah.

Arianne: Samples.

Jacqueline: Developing into that. I think that's a really interesting concept, and one that could make a potentially significant impact on my students and on the teaching that I employ. Because I have a certain definition of these terms, as we all do, that you have a different definition of articulations than I do. And this is the definition that we're comfortable with, and the one that we teach from. It's very easy to just try to program our students to regurgitate that. But if they're able to instead call upon a group of words, a group of buzzwords for a term that, and that also helps with the language barrier that the sentences don't need to be constructed in a certain way. But I wonder, like intervals, would distance, distance, distance be enough? Right? Space like, because I define intervals as the space between two notes. The distance between two notes. Maybe I'm getting a little bit too sidetracked on this concept here.

Arianne: No, not at all.

Jacqueline: This is just fascinating.

Arianne: Distance, you can be really brief and concise by using only the words necessary to communicate a point.

Jacqueline: Yeah, interesting. I think maybe we should bring this back up in a later episode about teacher talk. Cause this, I think, would be.

Arianne: Yeah.

Jacqueline: Interesting to, to, to develop further, but back to articulations, back to articulations. It's been so long. The teaching of the term is secondary, probably to the technique and the sound and that element of articulations. What do you find to be the most challenging aspect of teaching something related to articulations?

Arianne: For me, the hardest part about teaching articulation tends to be when the student is in the elementary level, and they're transitioning from non-legato to legato for the first time. Sometimes it can be, sometimes you have to go through so many attempts, and the student has to go through so many attempts to achieve exactly the technique that I am looking for as a teacher. And you know, especially if they have smaller hands or weaker fingers. It really can be hard to clearly legato. So some things you can do is, you could start like, got to off on pairs of black keys in between the second and third fingers, you know. Make sure that their hand is opened out and everything. But they're still using their two strongest fingers in the hand to do it. And if it's on the black keys there's a little bit more chance that they won't slip onto the other ones. There's more grip. It's easier to see. It's easier to distinguish. They don't have to know any of the key names by heart, although they should by the time you introduce legato and these are some of the more fail-safe ways that I like to introduce legato. I'd say, let me, let me go a little bit further. Specifically, legato five-finger scales during Faso and back down. Those tend to be the most challenging for me to effectively teach because some fingers are stronger than others, and by the time they get to fa and so. I just, you know, some students are just like, it's too hard.

Jacqueline: Right? Yeah, no. I think that's interesting. Because when there is something that takes a lot of repeated attempts to get right. That can certainly be very frustrating. That can certainly be very frustrating for both the student and the teacher. So I think that of course, we want to try to minimize as much of those frustrating moments as humanly possible, and make that transition as smooth as possible. How do you handle those frustrations? How do you help your student handle those frustrating moments?

Arianne: Yeah, sometimes, students, if I try not to let it escalate to the point where they get frustrated. But if there is frustration, I'll just let them know that it's normal. It's a normal part of learning any skill to get frustrated at some time, and usually it means that they're onto something like they're about to make a major breakthrough and it keeps them motivated, you know. A little pep talk never hurts.

Jacqueline: Yeah.

Arianne: What about you?

Jacqueline: What's my question?

Arianne: How do you deal with those frustrating moments?

Jacqueline: I make a lot of use of my dog. Actually. I make a lot of use of my dog and getting away from the piano when those moments are aggravating. Because, getting away from that source of frustration. And I mean, Milo was just. He's very popular in my studio, my dog Milo. He's very popular in my studio. He's always in here. He's just loafing around and everyone says Hi to him, and on the way in on the way. So perhaps that's not applicable to a lot of people, but having an activity of some kind, whether it's petting an animal or doing jumping Jacks just something where they step away from the piano the source of their frustration. Because I've had once in. I want to say, once in my career, I don't know if that's entirely true. I know once as long for as long as I can remember, I've only ever had a student lash out in frustration. Once. I had a student. She was struggling on. Several elements on something, and the dynamics were off. The articulations were off, and we're trying to break it down, and she lashed out of frustration, and she banged on the keys with both of her hands. She just down on the keys, and that's, I want to say that that's only happened once in my teaching career. But certainly, you don't ever want to get to that point even with something that is frustrating. Kids are. They're so much less able to handle big emotions, big emotions for their tiny little bodies like frustration.

Arianne: Yeah.

Jacqueline: Such a big feeling even for adults. It's sometimes very difficult to manage frustration. And they're still learning emotional regulation.

Arianne: Absolutely. Yeah. If man, if there's ever, you know occasionally, once a year, twice a year, I'll get a student who seems perfectly composed on the outside. But then, you know, maybe something's tripping them up and out of nowhere. There's tears, and I'm just like, oh, my gosh! Are you crying? You know, and then they'll be like, yeah, usually, it's something to the effect of yeah, it's just my brain knows what to do. But my hands just aren't doing it, you know. There's some kind of disconnect between what the mind is saying and what the body is doing. And so that's just par for the course, and at that point, you know. You just step away from the piano and take a little water break.

Jacqueline: Yeah, or.

Arianne: Make sure that they're feeling cared for.

Jacqueline: Yeah. App.

Arianne: Otherwise you're gonna be known as a domineering kind of authoritarian, strict teacher.

Jacqueline: Yeah, with a ruler and someone who maybe throws things like markers at your students. You don't want to create a negative feedback loop. You don't want them to be frustrated because they're frustrated, and then they fail again because they're frustrated, which leads to more frustration, because it'll just if you don't, if you don't intervene, it'll just keep going, and they'll never get it right under those circumstances. So there's really there's no benefit from continuing with that specific spot on that specific piece in a specific practice method, there's no reason to continue. So, even if you're not gonna take a step away from the piano and move to a different activity. Move to a different song. You can come back to this one at the towards the end of the lesson, and just kind of recap. This is what we were talking about. This is what we need to do. But certainly remove the source of frustration in that instance.

Arianne: Yeah. This goes back to something that I read. I think in like a teacher guide to using the primer level Faber book.

Jacqueline: Oh, shaping.

Arianne: Sorry.

Jacqueline: I love that thing. I have that teacher guide. I love that thing.

Arianne: Yeah, the teacher guide says, look. This is geared toward 6-year-olds. So if there's a kid who is consistently getting something, making some kind of mistake, and the explanation as to how to fix it is just repeatedly going over their head? Be encouraging. Don't fixate on it, and just transition to something else. And sometimes that'll happen, you know. You know, we try it three or four times a certain way, and I'm like, well, you gotta, you know. Here's the thing you need to do to whatever achieve it. And if all three to four attempts are just the same, and we're not getting anywhere, I just go alright, alright cool, and then just change. So change the topic without even giving any negative feedback. That's just my personal approach. Not every teacher does it that way. I like to use positive reinforcement. So encouraging the good stuff and not paying too much mind to anything that I don't want to see until later, when I've had a night of sleep and I'm thinking about brainstorming ways.

Jacqueline: Right.

Arianne: Problem.

Jacqueline: Yeah, no. I think that that's really great. And I think it's important to remember that we teach concepts, not pieces. Who cares if they get the legato and this piece correct. It doesn't really matter. They're not gonna remember this piece in 15 years, or 10 years, or 3 years, or even a year, a month. Remember it, but you can. You can refine that legato in the next piece. I'm sure that your method book is not going to just abandon legato after just introducing it. It's okay. If they don't reach perfection on something. It's expected that they're not 100% perfect on every single piece. The elementary, and even perhaps early intermediate stages of piano teaching and piano learning are so much different than the advanced level. We don't work on six pieces for four months, four pieces for four months with our students. We expect within four months our students should go through 16, 20, 25 pieces at the elementary level in four months. They're learning a handful of pieces every week. Ideally. They're moving on every week from those pieces. Perhaps one of them is staying around for an additional week of refinement, but they should be moving through their pieces incredibly quickly. Otherwise something is going very wrong at the elementary level.

Arianne: Yeah. Couldn't have said it better myself.

Jacqueline: You think we might need to start wrapping up here, Aaron?

Arianne: Yeah, now.

Jacqueline: Takeaways here on our podcast episode today.

Arianne: Big takeaways are, you know, if you can, when you're teaching articulation, you're teaching the concept. Find a way to make the concept stick in your students' minds so that they can always apply it moving forward and really reflect on what articulation is and why it's important.

Jacqueline: Yeah, cool. Another, I think big takeaway, you know, it's really related for me the thing that I got most out of this episode, maybe not even related to articulations, is about definitions for things, and how we define the articulations, right? How we get the, because it is important that students be able to intelligently talk about the things that they know and not just do them, right? I think it's important. It's important that they're able to have intelligent conversations about the things that they know at a, at a, at a level and age appropriate, you know, place, but that a student should be able to talk about dynamics in a casual way. They should be able to talk about articulations in a casual way and how they reach that is different for different students that have different intellectual experiences, they have different levels of critical thinking, they have different level of parental involvement, they have different language experiences and cultural experiences. So I think that it's more important to focus on reaching that stage where they can intelligently discuss a concept, and perhaps throughout a constellation of related words like, when I say articulation, let's get some related words. Let's make a tree, make a bubble map, or something about that term, rather than expecting them to regurgitate the exact definition that I gave them, and just drilling it rote so that, because I don't do that with any other part of my teaching. Why, why is it that I just be like? Well, of course, this is the only way to do definitions. Just repeat it until you understand it, and you don't even understand it. You just remember the right words that I want you to say.

Arianne: Yeah.

Jacqueline: So I think.

Arianne: Another thing to memorize.

Jacqueline: Yeah, and it's memorization is not the same as internalizing it. So I think that we are due for a teacher talk episode in our future.

Arianne: Yeah, I think that would be fun.

Jacqueline: Anyway. Thank you all for listening to our episode of the Piano Pedagogy Podcast and we will see you next time.

Jacqueline: Bye.