The Hidden Advantage of Piano
The advantages of being a singing teacher who can play piano are obvious.
It’s handy for teaching a tricky melody, playing supportive song accompaniments, devising vocal warm-ups… connecting with your students, coaching them, and making in-the-moment music together.
But piano has a power of its own.
You can’t fake piano skills. Or just be naturally talented. Or suddenly transform to jaw-dropping virtuosity.
Some kind of effort and commitment is required.
And the assumption is: if you’ve mastered the piano, you must be very good at what you do.
A decent piano skill set signals expertise, musical mastery, and professional competence—
Without you saying a word or singing a single note.
Children might not notice all this, of course.
But parents do. Employers do. Fellow music professionals definitely do.
And you can be certain your choir will too.
The piano is like an instrumental business card—it works for you to attract hidden opportunities and open doors you didn’t even know existed.
Great!… “I’ll get my piano going” you say, all fired up with enthusiasm.
But here we hit the big problem for singing teachers, vocal coaches, worksop leaders and pop choir directors in that…
Singing Teachers Have a Unique Set of Piano Problems
And they are different from piano players.
Which is why standard piano lessons and courses don’t always solve the problem.
Because—funnily enough—piano lessons teach you how to play the piano!
And piano lessons are taught by piano teachers.
And piano teachers, no matter how brilliant, don’t understand the delicate art of drawing out a singer’s voice, confidence, and style. Because that’s not what they do.
They focus on getting you to play the piano well.
Which helps—but it doesn’t do your exact job: drawing out the singer’s voice, confidence, and style…
Which is why—unless you’re learning piano for other reasons—piano lessons aren’t always the answer for singing teachers. Even though it can feel that way at first.
Quickly it becomes frustratingly obvious: even though you are diligently spending time on this piano thing, there isn’t that immediate improvement in your teaching. There still remains a skills gap.
This is deeply frustrating! Particularly if you want to get it done.
What we have to remember here is…
World-Class Piano Virtuosity Isn’t Your End Game
The legacy of the piano is huge.
Classical repertoire, jazz improv, commercial styles, Latin grooves, sight-reading, chord chart interpretation, singer accompaniment, locking in with a rhythm section…
The list goes on. From the outside, it can feel overwhelming. This mountain to climb.
But here’s the liberating bit:
You don’t need to be an impressive blend of Herbie Hancock, Alicia Keys, and Lang Lang.
In fact, jaw-dropping virtuosity can get in the way of teaching effectively.
The good news?
To teach singing from the piano, you actually only need two things:
Skills that might be different from mine. And different from your colleagues’.
Meaning there are entire areas of piano learning you can cheerfully ignore.
Once you understand this, learning the piano stops feeling like an endless climb—
And becomes something achievable.
And, dare I say it… fun.
