News and Views
Helen Smith Tarchalski, Editor
A colleague once remarked to me that he felt somewhat "cheated" on some levels by his otherwise outstanding conservatory experience. He commented that although he was offered artistic ideas of the highest caliber, his teacher expected him to be able to simply reproduce suggested sounds and phrasing. I challenged that I believed an instructor at the conservatory level likely expects to provide advanced finishing touches toward polished performance skills, and exposure to a broad range of repertoire. My friend responded that I had evidently had a very different pre-conservatory experience than he. (Many thanks to my outstanding pre-conservatory teacher/coach of many years, Roger Pries, who died in October, 2002. He was an accomplished performing artist with rave notices in major newspapers, including a Washington Post review of one of his performances with the National Symphony which stated that he "played with a natural flair that is born, not trained." Mr. Pries managed to communicate this flair through his teaching, bringing out the best in scores of students.)
We have all observed or experienced at some time or another the "No-it's-supposed-to-sound-like-this!"(with little or no further instruction) approach to teaching. Many years after my conversation with the aforementioned colleague, I realized that this teaching approach of instructing the "what" without the "how" and "why" is bound to create some artistic lapses for even an accomplished student.
Our authors for this issue both agree that every teacher must coach and every coach must teach. The basic difference when describing a teacher should be determined by exploring the instructor's primary emphasis in his or her teaching approach. This question reminded me of Claire Wachter's article in the VIEWS column of the Spring 2003 issue of KEYBOARD COMPANION. Answering the question, What advice do you give to your graduating high school seniors?, Dr. Wachter recommended that students visit their chosen colleges and request to observe potential teachers. She suggested that students investigate teaching styles for compatibility with their own preparedness and learning style.
Marilyn Neeley
and Ingrid Clarfield explore this issue's question about teaching
and coaching, sharing with us vivid examples as they describe
the elements they believe determine the differences between these
two approaches.
from Marilyn Neeley's article
Is there an easy distinction between "teaching" and "coaching?"
"Don't ask questions like that! I am an Artist Teacher, not a Pedagogue!" This was the response given to the recently graduated student of a friend of mine when she asked for more detailed information about a new technical skill. Her teacher, a star at a well-known school, embodied in that answer an often stereotypical view of the "Teacher" versus the "Coach." Consequently, in preparing to write this article, I had hoped to find an easy distinction between teaching and coaching. This was definitely not to be!
Consulting the Random House Dictionary (Second Edition
Unabridged) was not very helpful. I found various permutations
of "to impart knowledge of or skill in" for the verb
"to teach." This was followed by the news that a synonym
for the primary definitions was "to coach." Fortunately,
the numerous choices for "to coach" yielded some faint
distinctions, mostly by providing more specificity: "a person
who trains an athlete, an actor, or a singer" or "who
prepares a student for an examination." Thus, it was possible
to draw the conclusion that a teacher may be likely to start at
the beginning, building sets of skills, while a coach may be preparing
someone who already possesses skills for their use in a particular
event or situation. . .
Marilyn Neeley was a prizewinner in the first Van Cliburn International Competition, has been soloist with over one hundred orchestras, and concertizes throughout the United States and Europe. She is Professor of Music and Chair of the Piano Division at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C.
from Ingrid Jacobson Clarfield's article
Teaching precedes coaching
I'm always intrigued by how a specific incident from my past comes back as the perfect answer to a question in the present. When I thought about the question related to the differences between teaching and coaching, I immediately thought back to a performance that took place nine years ago in New York City's Steinway Hall. I invited a friend, a concert pianist and college professor, to hear one of my nine-year-old students performing Mozart's Fantasia in D minor. My friend commented on the student's incredible attention to the musical and technical details as well as his sophistication in presenting a very stylistically appropriate performance. He then said to me: "That student must be a pleasure to teach. I'd love to be able to work with a student like that." When I discussed with my colleague how much teaching was required to produce that polished performance, it was clear to me that he really didn't comprehend. He discussed his amazement at the student's physical integration of all the rests and fermatas, control of the tempo changes required, the orchestral sound and voicing, and the improvisatory quality of the cadenzas. I remembered with amusement the lessons in which we tapped out the rhythm on the fallboard, worked with the metronome to integrate the tempo changes, marked in levels of dynamics to balance and voice correctly and dissected the cadenzas into groups to secure the control needed. A lot of "nuts and bolts" teaching occurred before dealing with the physical choreography teaching aspects of rests and fermatas, hearing changing tempos in his head, rhythmic freedom in the cadenzas, and orchestration. In addition, this Fantasia ultimately was discussed as an opera with the student describing the characters and the plot.
Several weeks later when I needed to leave town for a few days, I thought this would be an ideal time for my friend to learn what is was like to teach versus coach this young student. The most significant point was that the student was bringing new music to his lesson with my friend that required teaching. One of the pieces he had just started was Grieg's Nocturne in C Major, Op.54, No.4. . . .
(Editor's note: The teaching of this very same piece was also discussed in a past KEYBOARD COMPANION article:
Ingrid Clarfield, Professor of Piano and Coordinator of the Piano Department at Westminster Choir College of Rider University, is an active performer, clinician and author. She has presented workshops throughout the U.S. and Canada. Her books, From Mystery to Mastery, Artistic Preparation and Performance Series, and Burgmüller, Czerny, Hanon: 32 Piano Studies Selected for Technique and Musicality, are published by Alfred Publishing Company.
For the other Samplers from this issue
