I play the piano, as well as a few other instruments, and I have found that after doing my last piano exam in April '07, I actually haven't progressed at all. As my schedule has become increasingly busier, I now don't get home until gone 9pm on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays, which leaves me with all of my homework/coursework to do, meaning I am not often in bed until gone 11pm.
The annoying thing is that I do actually practice piano - probably more than flute and definitely more than clarinet, and I have got almost nowhere in 8 years. Pathetically, my theory is better than my piano skills, and it took me about 6 months to get to Gr. 6.
It seems to me now, that piano lessons are just a waste of time, when I could actually be doing something relatively useful. But I really want to get really good.

Any suggestions?

(sorry it's a bit ranting/raving)

I was in the same situation as you a few months ago - and I DID stop having my piano lessons. I'd miss my favourite extra curricular activity by spending an hour with my teacher in the room next door, seemingly endlessly doing scales. I wasn't enjoying it, and it was getting me down, so I stopped them.

It's one of the best decisions I've ever made...

i wouldnt give it up completely. piano is a fantastic instrument ( slightly biassed, but oh well!), and it is extremely useful to be able to play it. i think maybe you should maybe take a short break, and then after a few months, start again, and just practise for 20-30 minutes a day, and have a break from any exams, and just have fun playing some pieces you really like. it would be a huge shame to give it up, because like i said, it is very useful, and theres always someone who needs accompanying at the last minute, or needs someone to play the organ/piano at church one week, etc, and it is also a fantastic instrument to play for enjoyment. it also helps a lot with theory and chords etc.

Jacob.

Just my luck. The week the organist was ill, I was in Scotland bored senseless!
Thanks for the advice though.

could you maybe have like a 'break' and just play it now and again to keep your level up and only have an odd lesson here and there (maybe once a month) just to check that you are not 'letting yourself go'??? kind of put it on the back burner and see how you feel about things in a few months?

You have taken a lot of exams in quite a few subjects, including grade five piano. It is a very useful skill to have and it would be well worth you continuing with your playing, if not your lessons for a while. You can always return to lessons at a later date. There comes a time when you have to decide which instruments are more important and most enjoyable to learn and to play. If piano is not too high on the list of favourites don't force the issue. Spend your practice time wisely by working at your first love(s).

My 10 year old son has recently stopped having his piano lessons as since playing the flute and taken to that like a duck to water he started to feel like the piano lessons where a chore. His flute has become part of his person and is with him last thing at night and first thing in the morning. I have let him stop his piano at the stage as I don't think you can force someone to do lessons and I feel you need to be enjoying them to get something out of them. I am hoping when he gets a bit older he will go back to the piano on his own accord as it seems such a shame to lose what he has. Maybe if you take the pressure off yourself for a while you may feel that you miss it and return to it again, only this time with more enthusiasm and that way you will find that you will improve.

I agree with this. My daughter injured her hand and couldn't play her violin. It was only then that she realised how much she wanted to do it!

If you enjoy playing ensemble music, your other instruments are a much better bet than piano. Too much of the best chamber music with piano needs a diploma level technique.

You don't have to give up the piano because you want to give up lessons. I was taught the fundamental stuff only, and that was when i was twelve, if you have Grade 6 you are sufficiently equipped to start doing your own thing, and teach yourself new pieces. I stopped playing the piano when i took up the classical guitar, it is probably my biggest regret as i missed out on 17 years when i could have learned stacks of piano repertoire...now it feels like i'm playing 'catch up'.

Don't give up playing the piano, you'll regret it later on. As someone else here advised, just give up the lessons if you're finding the workload too much for you. At grade 6 there's lots and lots of music you can play even G7/8 stuff and beyond. Go for self-improvement and experiment with your own ideas, you'll be surprised just how much you will develop in time. I finished formal lessons after G8 when I was 18 and just about to go to medical school but I still continued to play at every opportunity. Good Luck!

Since you want to get really good, here are my suggestions
1)you might feel you are not progressing when in fact you are, but as you ear opens you hear the mistakes
more clearly. This is, in fact, progress.
2)it takes at least 10 years to get to the point where you can start to get really good. relax.
3) you need a different repertoire.
4) you need to properly balance challenge with current skills: people learn best "in the flow", see the url flow
5) if you are practising "in the flow", you won't be all the time looking to see are you progressing, you'll
be too busy

I definitely practise "in the flow"...highly recommended experience

I followed your link, sounds like another 'American' crackpot!!

If you are going to give up piano, if you really don't enjoy it any more, and could do something better with your time, then give it up.

But beware. If you come back to it in 5, 10, or 20 years time you will curse yourself for all that lost time.

Nowadays even pianists that start to play as young teenagers are at a serious disadvantage trying to "catch up"to those that began as children. The truth is that if a younger person than you is well-taught, has adequate intelligence and physical co-ordination, and continues to practice enough, you will never "catch up".

Fortunately this matters only to the lucky handful that are capable of becoming professional recitalists!

Nevertheless, it is very likely that one day you will return to piano and YOU WILL REGRET any breaks that you have taken.

sorry, but you're missing out

My (layman's) understanding is that "flow" is mainstream psychology. Everything I have
read about it makes sense. Especially from the educational point of view it makes total sense,
based on my own experience teaching maths at uni level, also a lifetime of learning.

For example: Why do you think computer games are so seductive? It's not the violence because
tetris and pacman (if you're old enough to remember that one) are also highly seductive.
Answer: It's because they are designed to up the challenge as your skill level increases....
Indeed I have read in the Communications of the ACM, (the ACM is the serious computer
science academic professional society) which I subscribe to as part of my professional life, an
article about what constitutes good design of a computer game, and it was to keep the players "in the flow"
by correctly matching the increase in challenge to the skill level, as the skill level increases.

You may stop taking lesson but please don't lock up your piano......If you don't have much time on it, just get some nice manuscripts that you really really like (you have a lot of choices as you are already in grade 6) and play them when you are free or want to listen to them. One piece maybe will only take you a few minutes a day. Do not take it as a burden, but just something to relax.

In case you want to get back to piano in a few years time, although you will still need to catch up, at least you still know the basic of playing a piece and that makes everything easier.

If that statement is true then you would not be considering giving up.

If you really, really, really wanted to get good, with an intensity of passsion, you might consider giving up the other instruments, dropping other studies, getting a lesss demanding job, ... all kinds of things, but the one thing you would NEVER consider is giving up the piano.

If you had really intended to give up you would not have bothered posting your intentions to the forum either ... you would just have stopped! So my guess is that what you really wanted was some encouragement to continue, of which there is plenty in the earlier replies!

The better you get, the more time and efffort it takes to get better still. It takes a lot more work and time to get from grade 5 to grade 8 than rom grade 1 to grade 5.

As another reply said, you may feel that you are not improving, when in fact you are - just not as quickly as you would like. So long as you are practising the right things in the right way, often enough, and for long enough, you WILL improve.

What about having a discussion with your teacher about where you're going and coming up with a plan for the next 6 months to see how it goes? You could ditch exams, for a while at least, and get hold of a few good books that are maybe a little below your standard, with the intention of giving each piece a few days' practice in order to improve your sight-reading. This would mean that you'd find it easier to learn things more quickly once you go back to the treadmill. Each piece would throw up different demands with regard to technique, and you might just find that after 6 months of this, without really perfecting anything and without the hassle of scales and the like, you'll unwittingly improve more than you think.

Are you sure you're not improving?

About a year after I took my grade 8 I got a bit down, thinking, "Oh I haven't taken any other exams, I'm not working for any at the minute, I'm still the same standard player I was last year"...

I was just too used to getting a certificate to prove it, that I hadn't noticed my playing getting better. I took out some old music I'd struggled with the year before, and was able to sight read it

Something I do with pupils who feel a bit unsure of their own capabilities is to get one of their old books out and show them how easy it looks! "But when I first gave it to you, you thought you'd never be able to play it!"

Chat to your teacher about it as because she doesn't see you every day she's more likely to note improvements than you are.

I find that piano is such a useful instrument - when working through harmony exercises and going through bits of choir music, it's so useful to be able to play chords and 2 parts at the same time etc. Also, I find it helpful just playing through the accompaniments to my flute pieces just to see how it sounds. So even if you do give up lessons, definitely carry on with it in your spare time (if you have any!). Or you could concentrate on different skills like sight-reading instead of doing pieces all the time...?

Giving up lessons and quitting an instrument entirely are two different things. The former can lead to the latter if one is busy and has some negative perspectives about the instrument or one's proficiency with it when the lessons stop.

To learn to play an instrument well, you have to love it. To learn to play the piano well, you have to be truly enamored with it, because it is quite difficult to develop true proficiency with the instrument. The piano is no flute, with one line of individual notes to read. The grand staff and the complex motion with two hands over a large playing area while one's eyes are elsewhere renders the instrument more difficult than many treble clef instruments. (Don't misunderstand me. I love primitive flutes.)

I believe that spending a lot of time with some music you like and a metronome will do many seeking to go to the next level a great deal of good. You have to be certain that you are playing music written at your level, or this practice will yield nothing but frustration. (I am expert at playing piano badly...) You also have to have realistic expectations.

Settle in with a favorite work, and try to reach the point at which you believe that you have perfected it, in both emotional and technical areas. Don't rush. Don't invite frustration. Try to make every note perfect. It could take weeks or months, even for a short piece, but don't give the time a thought. Don't feel compelled to play many different works. Choose one, and for some period of time, try to make it your own. If you do this right, you won't even be aware of the time you are spending. That can be a little scary, but the allure is part of the reason one invests one's time in this manner.

Good luck.

This could be my youngest daughters post, she would really empathise wiht your feelings. She's only grade 2 and hasn't been playing as long as you so we're going ot try a different teacher.

Hope you find a soloution

Hi

First of all, WOW - you already play a huge range of instruments and that is an achievement to be really proud of.

I'm in a similar position to you, I'm doing a PhD and it takes every hour in the day and then some. I had thought of giving up lessons as I had no time to practise but I was determined not to as I just love playing for the sake of it. I've had to cut down my practise to about 10-20 minutes a day or sometimes just for an hour at the weekends. Please don't be too hard on yourself, you've got a lot to be very proud of and you certainly must be very talented. Sometimes we feel like we're not making progress and sometimes we all hit a plateau where we're not moving as quickly as we think we should.

Could you possibly reduce your piano lessons for now e.g. once a fortnight or once a month for now until things get less busy? Don't be too hard on yourself, it will get easier (I just started piano and have just managed to play Silent Night without swearing )

All the very best.
Blackbird