Using Youtube For Teaching PianoAccompaniment

Activity Summary

Teacher should prepare before preforming this lesson by choosing the pieces according to student ability, grade, and program requirement; search Youtube links for pieces students will play along with, select useful performances, collect and save the links in a document available also during lessons.

Other important activities: keeping tracks of what is already done, making notes and reflections about students' achievements, and allowing some time for students to read and practice the pieces at home.

During the lesson every student performs 15 minutes  warming up, without accompanying the Youtube recording. Every student works on her / his own part's technically most difficult spots, or musically most complex points; one student plays along with new / different Youtube video recording - 15 minutes; the other student plays with another new / different Youtube video performance - 15 minutes. No recording is used twice. 

Benefits of this type of teaching piano accompaniment - by using Youtube - are many: more efficient teaching, more interesting, practicing real life public performance 100% of the class time. This way the teaching solves the main problem in teaching piano accompaniment: achieving adaptability, and musically breathing as one player, as ensemble. Accompanist achieves increased listening and adaptive skills, submitted to expressiveness and dynamics of the soloist, actively involved, achieving a balance of leading and following  the primary musical focus, breathing as one musical organism.