Tiffany Koo, Age 5, Piano

Tiffany Koo, Age 5, Piano, California

This background information is from the Capistrano Connections Academy website written three years after the taping of the video of Tiffany Koo playing Chopin's Nocturne #20 in c sharp minor shown below. I find it amazing that online school can be successful even at Tiffany's young age in allowing her the flexibility to continue her piano studies at her advanced level.

Tiffany is an eight-year-old second grader at Capistrano Connections Academy (CapoCA).  She lives in Redlands, California. She is a professional pianist who travels the world performing in concerts and competitions.
Tiffany is a quickly rising piano prodigy. She started playing piano at the age of two and amazingly played Chopin at just five years old. She has gone on to perform before large audiences, who don’t frighten the talented artist. 
The balancing act for Tiffany comes when trying to manage her love for piano and school.  After encountering issues with balancing her schedule between piano and academics, Tiffany was enrolled in Capistrano Connections Academy.  The program has allowed her to pursue her passion for performing in piano concerts and develop her academic education as well.  Her mother says...
“...Since joining CapoCA , Tiffany can access and review school work anytime from anywhere, this makes her study convenient and efficient, which results in more time available for her music. Now we are confident about her learning, especially the school’s intuitive online program which helped Tiffany to excel academically." (See Source)

Rainbow Piano Technique - Day 3

On August 10, 2011 we spotlighted Olivia who is 6 from Georgetown, Utah. I asked her mommy teacher how it was going and she wrote the following:

"It is more independent with the rainbow book.  I don't have to tell them what to do as much as the other Bastein books.  I ordered the pdf document; it was only 10 bucks. We'd been doing the other books off and on for a while, but without letters or finger numbers she was really struggling and with this she just picked right up.  Maddy, age 4, and Jack, age 2 like it a lot too. With Jack I use symbols along with the colors like sun, pumpkin, fireman, and sky. I don't like how similar the colors are though like on the right hand there's two kinds of oranges next to each other and two kinds of green and blue and stuff like that right next to each other.  Also on the "easy" songs the hands are supposed to move around in one song, so I have rearranged the pages a little bit. There's only like four songs that don't have the hands moving or don't have eighth notes. I like the concept, but I don't like the songs that she put together."

Richard, Age 3, Piano

Richard, Age 3, Piano, Pasadena California

I ran across a very intriguing piano teaching method for young children the other day and I am very excited to try it with my little girl, Addison, when she starts taking piano lessons with me. (She is only 12 months so it won't be for a little while yet.)

The method is named the "Rainbow Piano Technique." The creator is Annie Wang the mother of the young pianist Richard Hoffman. The LA Times wrote a story on him which included the following quote. "His shiny leather shoes dangled from the piano bench -- his legs too short to touch the ground. By the third piece of his first piano recital, one of his shoelaces had become untied." (See Source)

The following video is of Richard playing the piano when he was three years old. At that point he had been playing for approximately 9 months. Enjoy!

Aimi, Age 4, Piano

Aimi, Age 4, Piano

Aimi Kobayashi is a 15-year-old pianist born on September 23. She started piano at the age of 3 and gave her first international debut recital at the age of 9. Her first debut CD came out January 2010 with EMI Classics. (See Source) This video of of her when she was four years old.

Jonathan, Age 3, Conducting

Jonathan, Age 3, Conducting

I couldn't take my eyes off this video.

"This is 3 year old Jonathan conducting to the 4th movement of Beethoven's 5th Symphony. This piece was conducted by Herbert von Karajan and the Berliner Philharmoniker, one of Jonathan's favorite conductors and orchestras. Jonathan's passion for classical music became apparent when he was only eight months old. Shortly after that he began conducting on his own." (See Source)

Benjamin, Age 5, Harp

Benjamin, Age 5, Harp

This video is of Benjamin playing in a Concert for Amnesty International.

Julian, Age 4, Clarinet

Julian, Age 4, Clarinet, St. Albans England

Julian started playing clarinet at age 4, when he was given a plastic clarinet. This is unusual in the music world, where most students do not play wind instruments until age 11 or 12. (See Source)

The Holberg Suite

Edvard Grieg

&

Stranger on the Shore

Acker Bilk

Caden, Age 2, Drums

Caden, Age 2, Drums

Caden has been drummin' away since he was 1 year old.....good ol' Guitar Hero!

Check out this and other videos of Caden (HERE).