If you're going to spend your time and money studying with a teacher, you need to make sure you find a good teacher. Congratulations. You found me. Let's get started.
For those of you who want to be able to sift through a larger selection of music teachers than just me, me or me, I'll try to demystify the whole "finding a music teacher" thing. This is important to me. I have made the bulk of my living over the past couple of decades teaching music lessons, and there are a lot of terrible teachers out there. Trust me. I've studied with them. By terrible, I mean a teacher who gives a student a bad feeling about themselves or their instrument or music in general. I have had a bunch of younger students whose parents have said something like, "Oh, I studied piano when I was younger, but I always hated it because the teacher was this grouchy old man who would always yell at me and make me play terribly boring music and clap in my ear ONE and TWO and THREE and FOUR why CAN'T you KEEP a SIM-ple BEAT?" or something similar. That burns me up. Remember- the ENTIRE reason you are reading this right now is because you want to ENJOY making music.
If you are looking for a music teacher, I do not envy you. It is a difficult process. You're entrusting the development of a creative part of you (or your child, spouse or friend) that you may be embracing for the first time to a complete stranger. In addition, since you may not have amassed a great deal of knowledge about the genre of music or the musical instrument you want to begin studying, you have no way of evaluating a teacher outside of your own experience or your music teacher's opinion of him/herself, which is not particularly objective. Here are some basic facts that you should keep in mind when looking for a teacher:
1. A good performer does not necessarily a good teacher make.
2. An impressive resume does not necessarily a good teacher make.
Having now eliminated any means of evaluating a potential teacher entirely, I'll proceed. The absolute BEST way to find a teacher is through word of mouth. If you (or your intended lessonee) has a friend with similar musical tastes, interests or skills, and your friend is really enjoying a particular teacher, give that teacher a call. If you have no word of mouth recommendations, make a list of potential teachers and interview them. Write down a list of songs/pieces that you would like to play. This is why you want to start taking lessons, after all. If a teacher hears you mention a song or a type of music that you're interested in and makes grumpy noises and says things like he's never heard of that genre or she doesn't think that's really music, hang up the phone immediately and delete the number from your speed dial. If you get the chance to study with the foremost authority on Baroque piano music, that's wonderful, but if you really want to play Green Day tunes, that teacher may not be particularly suited to your musical needs. Ask the teacher what he/she thinks about technical exercises, about the importance of reading music based on your musical interests, about how to keep from burning your shirt when you set your guitar on fire during a performance. Ask any musical questions you want. If a teacher doesn't have a few minutes to discuss music in general and their teaching philosophy in particular, don't hire them. If the teacher is not attentive to your needs as a potential student, they will be even less so after you've actually paid them.
Once you've selected a teacher and plan to have a lesson, bring a recording device to your first session. Your teacher should play whatever piece of music you are working on for you when introducing it, and if you record the lesson, you'll have it to refer back to during the time before your next lesson. Your ears are the most important part of your body for playing music.
At the end of a successful music lesson, you should be aware of where you are musically and you should be able to see the path you need to take to get to where you want to be, both immediate and long-term, such as "I know my D major scale, but I sometimes forget the D# in my E Major Scale, and since the Bach fugue I want to start working on is in E, I need to spend some time working on the E major scale to get comfortable with that key," or "I want to learn the 3rd through 5th position pentatonic minor fingerings on the guitar, because I feel like I'm stuck in one place and I want to be able to slide all over the whole neck of the instrument while I'm soloing over "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)."
If you don't feel as though you have this knowledge, ask your teacher. If your teacher has explained it to you and you still don't get it, ask again. If your teacher explains it once more and you still feel lost at sea, get another teacher. To some, music comes naturally. That is fine, but when a teacher starts assuming that music comes naturally to a student as well, the student will often get lost or discouraged. It will take a few lessons for you and your teacher to understand what aspects of musicianship make sense to you and what aspects you will have to take in baby steps. If you don't feel as though you have a good line of communication with your teacher, you are not studying with the right teacher.
Remember, a music teacher WORKS FOR YOU. If your music teacher is not doing a good job, fire that teacher and get another one. There are a lot of music teachers out there. In the greater NYC area, you can't throw a stick without hitting six of us, and some music teachers deserve to have a stick thrown at them. Especially when you're starting out, the right teacher makes a HUGE difference.
I'm glad to talk shop. Email me at karlos(at)karlmuzik.com.