Help me choose between two piano teachers...

Wow, this is a really interesting dilemma, and you are correct that each of these 2 teachers seems correct in about 50 percent of the case. If I had the money, I'd actually keep going to both simultaneously. Just remember to adjust your playing accordingly for each. You could then form your own opinion based essentially on a combination of the contrasting information along with skepticism on your part towards both, which will be the greatest impetus in forcing you to doublecheck via Google, etc., just WHO is right in each instance. I say this in all reverence to both of my former piano and voice teachers, but the best learning I ever did was when I set out to the library to prove to myself that they were ALL wrong. In each case, each of these teachers WERE wrong in some areas, but right in others. I suppose most would say to go with the Juilliard teacher because of her great instrument and background, but despite the piece of crap upright, what the Chicago teacher says in stark contrast to your Juilliard teacher's misinformation from time to time, makes the Chicago teacher very valuable.

I guess if you have to choose only one and it must be amongst these two, and especially if you are working towards an exam or competition, your better bet would be on the Juilliard teacher. But remember that no one teacher will be right in all areas, so always stay mistrusting enough to go the extra mile and keep doublechecking on info, no matter who gives it, if you want to play the best you can.

 

I'd agree with Nicole that the better one of the two would be the Julliard teacher, for several reasons. Honestly, though, I would personally keep looking a little longer if I had that option.

 

Sounds like two extremes - the Juliard teacher dogmatic and high-horse, the Chicago one practical to the point of being laid-back. A difficult choice ! Personally I'd feel more at home with the Chicago guy were it not for him hoarding his grand. Point in favour of tthe Julliard lady !

But maybe you should look further and see if you can find someone who holds a middle-ground. Lessons are supposed to be fun too, and I gather you are not aiming to be a professional virtuoso pianist.

 

Hey, I wonder if being able to spell Juilliard correctly is a requirement for entrance to the music program there. :shock: Who would figure it has that extra i, other than perhaps their.......................liaison.

 

They're both rather bad, in my opinion, but if I had to choose between them I'd choose Juilliard.

Really, playing on something like this is a punishment. I have played on similar piano's before and it was awful: It becomes impossible to put any emotion into a piece, and everything sounds really mechanical... This alone would make me drop the Chicago teacher.

Anyway, I suggest you look for a proper piano teacher who doesn't force you to practice scales all the time, but gives you some freedom to also play something you like. The sight reading part is a bit silly in my opinion. I'm not great at sight reading, but then again I hardly ever need it. Sure, it can be nice to be good at sight reading, but I don't see the purpose of really training it a lot.

tl;dr, look for another piano teacher, but in the mean time stick to these guys.

 

You know I could be completely off on this but somehow the piano itself always seems less important to me when it comes to learning or even playing for myself. Of course when it comes to recording or concerts you want the best that you can get. But for other purposes it would seem the ideas in the music and the plan of attack or more important then the actual sound the piano is capable of doing. And it is kind of fun to try to make a bad piano sound nice (and it is usually not impossible even for average piano players) Its too bad most piano players can`t carry their instrument around like violin players

 

Out of curiosity how does your teacher feel about teaching Bach or more specifically 3 part bach? I've noticed some teachers often are reluctant to teach Bach (perhaps because of my own lack of being ready) I often felt this was a bit silly. (I think if I played more bach when I was younger I could have surely benefited from it)