Greetings! The first New England snow brings welcome thoughts of music shared in lovely warm concert halls and studios! Our October 24 Program was well-attended and featured a superb presentation by Gail Berenson on the teaching of style through physical gestures and sound concepts. Exploring the Baroque period up to the present, she provided a wealth of information and musical examples. Notes from Ms. Berenson's presentation will be available soon on our website. It was wonderful to see everyone there and I hope that you are planning to attend our exciting November and December events!

On Monday, Nov. 14, at 9:30am, join fellow NEPTA teachers at the home of Adele Dreyer, 166 Burgess Street in Westwood, MA for a lively interactive discussion of "Teaching Composition to Students of All Ages." NEPTA members and composers Deborah Yardley Beers, Donna Gross Javel, and Ruth Shyu will present. For more information contact Adele at cresc@aol.com, or at 781-769-8323.

Please mark your calendars in advance to attend the NEPTA Teachers' Recital on Saturday, Feb. 4, 2012 at 6:30pm at the Rivers Music School in Weston. This exciting concert of solo and two-piano music will be followed by an elegant wine and cheese reception.

All NEPTA competition forms for 2012 are now available for downloading at our website: www.nepta.info. These forms are password protected and current members are required to submit their email address in addition to their password. Below you will find the competition dates followed by postmark entry deadlines in parentheses. Please refer to the NEPTA Program Booklet for more details on repertoire and timing requirements.

March 31, 2012 Saturday morning and afternoon

M. Steinert & Sons, Boston, MA

(Application postmark deadline: February 29, 2012)

April 14, 2012 Saturday morning and afternoon

M. Steinert & Sons, Boston, MA

(Application postmark deadline: March 17, 2012)

April 14, 2012 Saturday morning and afternoon

M. Steinert & Sons, Boston, MA

(Application postmark deadline: March 17, 2012)

NEPTA invites all of its members' students who love to play jazz piano, with or without any improvisation, to participate in the newly designed Jazz and Pop Recital. Students who have composed original Jazz and Popular Compositions may also submit applications to the Jazz and Pop Recital. For those students who are budding composers in the classical idiom, the Composition Recital is for you! 

These recitals will be held on March 4, 2012, with a submission deadline of February 4, 2012.

Jazz and Pop Recital

Examples of jazz pieces without improvisation include original jazz piano pieces written by pedagogical composers such as Lee Evans, Jon George, William Gillock, David Kraehenbuehl, Martha Mier, Christopher Norton, Lynn Freeman Olson; as well as by concert composers such as William Bolcom, Dave Brubeck, George Gershwin, Scott Joplin, and Vince Guaraldi. Piano arrangements of jazz standards are also acceptable. In addition, transcriptions of improvised performances of great jazz pianists, such as Bill Evans and Art Tatum, are highly recommended for students playing at the advanced level. For the more creative type who wants to play something that they have written themselves, or a known tune upon which they wish to play their own improvised version, the Louise Hodder Olsen Award is given for an outstanding original jazz or popular composition, or an outstanding improvised performance of a known jazz standard.

Composition Recital

Have you a young Sebastian Bach or Clara Schumann in your studio? Please encourage your young composers to perform their original compositions for solo piano or piano ensemble in this recital! The Alice Proctor Award is offered to encourage creative excellence in composition.

If you have any further questions about these March 4 recitals, please do not hesitate to contact Recital Chairs Ruth Shyu at rshyu@verizon.net or Miriam Gargarian at gargarianpiano@verizon.net.

NEPTA is pleased to announce the winner of this year's Miriam Pizer Award: Geoffrey Zou, age 7, student of Bert Yocom. Congratulations, Geoffrey and Bert!

Congratulations and warmest thanks to the following members who have stepped forward to volunteer in these vital NEPTA roles. You are the lifelines of the organization!

Ranko Konishi-Houston: Assistant to the Mildred Freiberg Competition and the Hamlet Davidson Competition

Veda Kogan: Assistant to the 20th and 21st Century Recital

Robert Finley: Chairman of the Joseph Beaudoin Fund Committee

Colleen Henry: Assistant to the Junior Century Recital

Arline Carboneau: Assistant to the Junior Recital

David Ratcliffe: Assistant for Technology

Our ever popular Music Sale, comprised of donated books and sheet music for sale at bargain prices, will resume on Monday, December 12 at 9am at The First Parish of Watertown thanks to the generous efforts of Ruth Ross. Proceeds as always will benefit the NEPTA Scholarship Fund.

Please watch for a special mailing asking for your input on the allocation of the Joseph Beaudoin Fund, a recently acquired bequest to NEPTA. Your vote is greatly valued and respectfully requested.

NEPTA MEETING NOTES                                                 SEPTEMBER 26, 2011

First Parish of Watertown, 35 Church Street, Watertown, Massachusetts

Submitted by Linda G. Vieira

SPEAKER: Dr. Scott McBride Smith

Dr. Smith is the Cordelia Brown Murphy Professor of Piano Pedagogy at the University of Kansas as well as CEO and President of the International Institute for Young Musicians. He has co-authored Guide to Microjazz and the new piano series American Popular Piano as well as the college textbook The Well-Tempered Keyboard Teacher.

His talk had two focuses: producing a good tone from the beginning and stage fright. Starting with producing a good tone, he explained that there are two ways to start a sound on the piano: starting on the key or starting above the key. A slower motion produces a rounder tone. Some of the images Dr. Smith uses with students are caressing the keys, pushing through a cloud or putting your hand through water. He demonstrated that the sound does not decay after you play a note; it actually gets a little louder.

The idea of repetition is counterintuitive to students: if I can already play it, why should I practice it? Teachers tend to talk about the result they want rather than talking about the motions to produce that result. Many pianists think that playing fast is easy; playing with good tone is not. Dr. Smith's hands are not particularly flexible but a good tone came naturally to him because he has thick finger pads. A teacher should show and explain the motions that help a student produce a good tone.

Referring to his handout "Fundamentals of Good Tone," He discussed some myths about technic.

Myth: When you work on scales, you are practicing your technic. One needs to pay attention to the choreography and tone to really practice technic.

Myth: Talented students don't need to work on technic

Dr. Smith said what is often referred to as talent is a set of skills that are learned well and if you work hard to learn something, you learn it better. A precocious child is one who can do things sooner than another child the same age. If a child is identified as talented, they are likely to be given good training. Studies have showed that babies are born with perfect pitch but will lose it if it is not reinforced. Perfect pitch is also something that can be learned.

Dr. Smith demonstrated pre-technic choreography that he uses with young children progressing from using big to small muscles. Students often play more difficult pieces at an earlier age than in previous generations. The notes and tempo may be accurate but not enough attention is paid to fundamentals and creating a good tone. Good tone quality should be nurtured right from the beginning.

Dr. Smith acknowledged the challenge of teaching students who have digital pianos. Although he did not have any solutions, he tries to take a student where they are and then take them when he would like them to be.

Stage fright usually develops around age 10 and tends to worsen. (Not what we teachers or performers wanted to hear!) Dr. Smith became familiar with the warm-up routines of many concert pianists as he drove or accompanied them to their performances. There was no common routine and on occasion a warm-up routine would consist of not warming up. However, the one thing the warm-up routines had in common is that it made the pianist feel confident. Adrenalin reactions last about seven minutes and it is better to accept and manage this rather than panic.

He added the following comments to his handout about the

ABCDE's of Building Self-Confidence

1. Adversity: refers to meeting challenges such as memory slips

2. Beliefs

3. Consequences

4. Disputation: alternative ways of looking at things

5. Energization: strategy to overcome

Providing students with lots of successful performances is important. He assigns repertoire that is slightly harder than a student's level but still achievable.

Dr. Smith has weekly performance classes with a party after for his students. They are always getting ready for a performance. However, he also said students learn more from their failures so learning to cope with such things as memory slips or inadequate preparation is as important.

For viewable and printable PDF's of Scott McBride Smith's hand-outs, click here.