Piano Classics or Jazz/Pop? New Solutions for Old Problems

Teachers are in desperate need of ways to teach jazz, pop and folk music. I believe that the teaching of these musical idioms can, and frequently should, be integrated with the teaching of traditional piano repertoire. As we aspire to give our students a truly complete set of musical skills, it's highly advantageous to embrace music from both its written and aural traditions. The former includes great masterworks by composers such as Bach, Beethoven, Chopin, Liszt, Debussy and Carter. The latter includes jazz, pop and folk music, as well as scores of other genres easily accessible in today's world of music. However, our schedules are all so busy, and good materials have been difficult to find. How can we begin to include this full spectrum of materials in our lessons?

Many of the most successful teachers have surmounted these obstacles by employing the use of their own creativity, in addition to using pre-designed materials. They have successfully negotiated a balance of using tried and true core curriculum books, along with their own materials and the pieces their students request. Unfortunately, other teachers, at the expense of enjoying a truly good rapport with their students, seem to be oblivious to, or even go so far as to purposefully ignore, important musical trends in pop culture, such as hip-hop. Some of these teachers believe that only the classics will last, that high art shouldn’t mix with the vernacular. Though much pop and rock music is simply commercial fluff, these styles are nevertheless an expression of the world we live in. Granted, it is more difficult to find art music in pop and rock form, but it does exist. Once identified and fed through the filter of a caring and talented teacher, these appealing and singable forms of contemporary music are of immeasurable value in the piano student’s curriculum. 

Good quality folk music is an important form of music that comes from aural traditions; one is hard pressed to name a composer who was not influenced by folk music. As such, it's often more acceptable for teachers to identify with it, and it's easier for them to find learning materials based on it. Folk-oriented music is also important because it is a large part of what preschoolers sing in their music preparatory classes. If materials, soon to be developed for the beginning, late beginning or intermediate level piano student, were to use these common tunes, as well as contemporary and familiar vernacular music, they could help bridge the gap between pre-school and elementary music study. Richard Chronister, a leader in the piano teaching world, believed our next undertaking in the world of piano pedagogy was making sense of this continuum.

To begin to achieve this, piano teachers will need to break out of a mold of sorts and employ the use of their own creativity. They will also require the availability and support of special new materials to encourage them and show them how. At the conservatories they graduated from, even in the best music schools in America, jazz studies have generally been segregated from music departments that emphasize traditional repertoire, even though many of the musical skills needed to become a fine performer or teacher in either category are similar. Surprisingly, jazz originated as American music, yet music schools in the US have matriculated pianists who lack skills necessary to perform the music of this country. Sadly, many pianists who graduate from these institutions lack skills, not just in jazz, but also in any style of improvisation. Yet Beethoven improvised more than he wrote down. Mozart improvised cadenzas. With the right materials and support, the scores of talented and resourceful independent teachers in the US, who are not confined to a particular school's curriculum, are in a unique position to spearhead efforts to build a complete set of musical skills in their piano students.

Frances Clark believed that each new musical element should be presented to the student first in sound, then in reading. This works beautifully in practical application, and students succeed with this approach, so it makes sense to expand on it. Yet, this principle seems to have been slipping away in recently published materials. Materials teaching jazz, with their common emphasis on listening skills, may be one wonderful way to revive it. Piano teachers and pedagogy experts have done an admirable job in the past three or four decades developing materials for students which maximize and solidify music literacy, but at present are focused too exclusively on the written tradition of music. We have been missing out on the rich oral traditions, or aural traditions, of music making, as they exist throughout our vast world of music and the history of music.

Materials for students learning jazz and other improvisational styles can be designed so that these studies complement and enhance students’ understanding of traditional repertoire, rather than detracting from or competing against what students usually learn in piano lessons. These are the materials of Whole Music Lessons. Integral Keyboard Teaching fosters the growth of a complete set of skills which beneficially includes successful approaches to music literacy, as well as enjoyable, practical theory, arranging, ear training, composing and improvising skills. Most important of all, it engages and nurtures the student's own musical voice. Students who learn in this integral way are excellent sight readers, and are also always ready to sit down at the piano and simply play something, whether they have a piece memorized or not, or whether they have music with them or not.