What I Learned from Learning the Piano as an Adult
Set Realistic Goals — Challenging but not impossible
I started learning the piano at the grand old age of 40. And boy, was it hard going! Debunking that cliche “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks”, here’s what I learned from the experience.
It’s never too late to start → Start Now
I’m not going to lie. I’m sure if I had started learning the piano when I was 5 like my sister or even 20 years ago, I probably would have had an easier time of it. There were definitely times early on when I wondered if I was kidding myself. But those transient moments fade away when you are immersed in the learning. I cannot stress enough — it really is NEVER too late to start. There is no ‘I’ve left my run too late’ when you realise the race of your life is not against anybody else. It is FOR YOURSELF.
It’s really hard work → Determination
Again, I am not going to pretend it was easy. There is no magic wand. What it really took was good old pig-headed determination, especially in the early days when EVERYTHING was foreign. I had to be dedicated— I practised like my life depended on it — to get over that initial OGM-this-is-unbelievably-hard humps. Yet, when I look back at the payoff, it was definitely worth it. Had I given up at the first hurdle, the first lesson where I didn’t just fly through the exercise like it was nothing, I would never be able to enjoy the fruits of my labour today.
It takes time to get better → Persistence
For some reason, I didn’t think it was going to take long to learn the piano. I mean, I wasn’t aiming to be the next Lang Lang. I just wanted to play some songs and sing!
The funny thing is, you never hear kids complaining about how long it took for them to learn how to walk. Perhaps because we were too young when we learned that skill, perhaps we were too young to know “better” — to realise there is a ‘quit’ button somewhere in our heads. We just never gave up. We went from crawling to stumbling to falling to getting up and falling again until we eventually learned how to walk. We never cared about the time it would take. We never thought ‘Ah, what’s the point. It’s going to take too long / too much energy to do this. Let’s give up now.’ We just persisted. So, rekindle that long-forgotten persistence to help you, and you will get there in the end.
Improvements WILL come → Don’t Give Up
At first, the improvements were barely discernible. After weeks and weeks of going over the same bars of music, it seemed like I was going nowhere. Other times, it felt like I was going 2 steps forward and 1 step back. Then, out of nowhere, there would be a lightening bolt of serendipity…when everything came together. The left hand suddenly became friends with the right hand. The two hands suddenly connected with the brain. And the music flowed, if only for a bar. Improvement WILL come, even if hardly noticeable at first. I learned to tune into those feedback loops when I achieved even the littlest of wins. I congratulated myself on those small pieces of “mastery” and used those moments to build myself up and motivate yourself. Keep practising consistently and don’t give up.
Set realistic goals → Challenging but not Impossible
Because I thought this whole ‘playing the piano’ was going to be easy, I started with the lofty ambition to play Fur Elise — Easy Play. Big mistake. Huge Mistake. Not only did this prompt me to prematurely hurry through the basics in my naive attempt to get to my goal, it was WAY too hard for me work on as a starting piece. Consequently, I was frustrated, unable to concentrate and miserable. It took all the fun out of the learning. After I set my sights on something more realistic for my abilities at the time, I was able to derive pleasure and a sense of steady accomplishment from the learning. So, in setting your goals, aim for something challenging but not impossible. Enough to make you stretch, but not so much that it kills you.
Make your own kind of music → Chase Your Dream
Life is too short to follow someone else’s dreams. When I first told my parents I decided to learn the piano, they were immediately enthused, “Your sister plays Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata so well. Ah, this is great. You will be able to play Chopin one day! We love how Ruby plays the classics.” Remember that Fur Elise goal? Looking back, it probably had something to do with pleasing my parents or proving to them that I could play classical music too.
I did start out by trying to learn the classical piano pieces. As it turns out, I did not enjoy playing the classics one bit. On the verge of giving up, I chanced upon a YouTube clip of this 10 year old playing the piano and singing My Heart Will Go On and I thought, “I want to do that!” I discovered I love playing contemporary music because it means I can play (badly) and sing (even worse). I love subtly changing the mood of the music to reflect how I feel. As the Mamas and Papas said in their song, ‘make you own kind of music and sing your own special song’. If you want to invest the time to learn something new, do something you enjoy.
Seven years on, I may not have mastered the piano with the diligent study the teenage-me may have, but I can pick up a piece of Easy Play song and give it red hot go. I now get the utmost pleasure out of belting out Let it Go whenever I want. Sometimes, I play it with angry when I am fed up and sometimes I play it with melancholy when I’m feeling a bit down.
Looking back, I do marvel at how I managed to learn to play the piano, given all the hard work and the hours of practice to get to this point. I even occasionally wonder if I would have the energy and dedication to learn something else from scratch now. Deep down, I know I do —I did it before, I can do it again.
Like I said, we never doubted ourselves when we were kids. We persisted with learning how to walk and how to talk. Why should it be any different now if we decide we want to learn another skill as an adult?
