Hi all,

Was speaking with a friend of mine who was looking for a bit of advice.

They were a fantastic pianist in their day having studied music in college and specialised in solo performance on piano in their final year. They completed both associate and licentiate diplomas. However, in 2001 they stopped playing piano.

Recently they wanted to get back into playing but cannot seem to get their fingers working again. They took out some pieces but nothing was really coming together. They are very disillusioned about the whole situation. Although they recognise that they have been away from the piano a long time, they are amazed as to how stiff their fingers have got. They were picking my brains on suggestions as to how to ease themselves back in gently to playing the piano. They know they will probably not reach the same standard again but they so dearly want to play piano to a reasonably standard.

If you had a student come back to you under these circumstances what would you recommend that they do - ie exercises/ pieces?

I told them that I would air their problem here and pick the brains of the experts!!!

Without knowing your friend it's hard to comment, but I would guess that their expectations of what they are able to do after such a long break may be high. It's rather like having trained as a thoroughbred horse and expecting yourself to be able to run at a national racecourse straight away.

Maybe your friend needs to set their sights a bit lower in these early days, setting their sights not on what standard they are hoping to eventually reach but rather on the sheer joy of playing again. A trip to a music shop to find some new repertoire, or finding a group of friends who want to make music together might provide new routes into music..

My advice: there is a lot of FUN to be had with the piano, so focus on the fun and let the rest take care of itself

This is a situation I was in a few years ago when I stopped playing for almost four years. My fingers were indeed really stiff when I started playing again and my brain just couldn't get my fingers to do what I wanted them to! This lasted a good few months. I started off playing easier pieces of Grade 6-7 standard and gradually my fingers loosened up. Doing a bit of Hanon and Czerny helped too. It was also helpful to do some initial muscle stretching exercises, head, neck shoulder, arms etc. before starting.