ARCT • Teachers’ Diploma (RCM) in-progress
Trained Music Together Teacher
Erin Plank (they/he) is a passionate young piano teacher. For their professional development, Erin received the highest exam scores in all of Canada last year for “Teaching Elementary Piano” with the RCM.
Erin’s main goal is to turn students into lifelong music lovers, not just pianists. I seek to provide them with the tools to practice efficiently at home, sight read a song at their friend’s piano, learn the melody to a song off the radio by ear, and nurture a technical foundation that lasts a lifetime so it’s “just like riding a bike” to play the piano. And even better, they’ll want to.
Get to know Erin…Beyond the Bio!
Hobbies: Piano, weightlifting, playing with my cat, and hanging out with friends
Musical influences: Ben Folds, Brad Mehldau, Edvard Grieg
Favourite food: Fried chicken sandwich
Least favourite food: snap peas, because I ate too many as a kid one time and threw up and now I dislike the smell
Favourite music: Romantic era piano music, Beach Boys and similar era music, math rock
Favourite song: “How Dare You Want More” by Bleachers
Favourite movie: Sing Street
Favouirite movie music: main theme for “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” or anything Star Wars
Favourite musical theatre/opera: Wozzeck
Best quote from your teacher: “Don’t show the audience you messed up, they won’t know! Keep going!”
Favourite quote: “That’s what life is, Happy Sad”
Favourite book: Recursion by Blake Crouch
Best thing about teaching at ABC: Getting to reach and connect with so many lovely people!
Latest Homework from Erin
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Thursday April 4 Lessons – Erin P
Great job everyone! You make me feel very lucky to have such lovely people to work with!
Liam
Sonatina in G major – Woohoo!!! Really nice progress. In the final section, get the RH ascending part legato when marked. Use any rest prior to a position change to move your hand ahead of time.
Walk the Talk – I LOVE the texture you’re playing with. The detached left hand creates a perfect amount of space for the melody to shine through. You ARE playing the rhythm right for the dotted quarter note part, however slightly behind the beat, which is why that last 8th note should fall BEFORE the metronome click and not on beat 1.
*New* Minuet in G – Leopold. Such a famous melody! HT first section. Don’t do the trills just yet.
Technique – Solid triads can be thicker and warmer in tone. Play scales hands seperate with focus solely on fingering this week.
Katarina
Somewhere over the Rainbow – You’re doing so well singing and playing at the same time! Try to keep your hands in their positions so you can build muscle memory of which finger plays which key. If needed, a low resolution version of the sheet music can be found here.
Sara
Air in Bb – LH figures that are exactly like the opening melody can be played legato to create unity (like in the 2nd section).
Sonatina in C – Great progress! Add in dynamics this week, the opening section is the quietest part each time it returns, and other parts have different textures and a larger sound so bring that to life.
Cloud Dance – stay big and in tempo until M12. This is the brightest moment of the piece, it is majestic and grand but it shouldnt drag. Your two note slurs and tempo changes are gorgeous.
Nighttime – I’ll hear next week.
Ballade – I’ll hear next week.
Technique is all great, you are well above the minimum tempo in all areas. Continue to add dynamics.
Marco
*New* The Snake – play this HS in the way that the hands are taking turns. Fingering is sooo important to get right off the start. All Bs are flat and Cs are sharp.
Morning Fanfare – dust off this one while paying attention to the page.
Universal and Superman – Great reading and passion to work on these! I will always listen to these and help guide you, but my focus will be on the RCM pieces for the next little while.
Technical skills – great job on the contrary motion scale 2 octaves! keep it all maintained.
Daniel
Periwinkle – There are still the same 3 details to fix this week. Please pay close attention to fixing these details ASAP so your muscle memory can adapt! M6 notes, m8 rhythm, m9 go up higher.
Breezy – Good job, but there are still articulations being ignored, at each legato break, the music must take a breath. The 2 beats in the box is still too messy hands together, go extremely slow and accurate with this. Don’t repeat until you get it right, repeat until you can’t get it wrong.
Entree – more detached texture is needed to bring the time period to life. Quarter notes should be detached. Great rhythms and feel tho! It really shines when you play hands seperate, I’m excited to hear it’s final state.
Technique – sounding nice. Ensure your broken triads are a constant flow of even triplets, and not a quick collection of notes and then slowly moving to the next position.
Parental involvement: please ask him what is the goal for each piece within each practice session or simply check in to see if he is working on fixing these small details. Once the foundation is secure, we can begin to polish, but accuracy first is integral.
Greta
Minuet in F – you’re right on track! Pick a spot you hesitate on and loop it until you can play it correctly slowly multiple times in a row, then collect that to a nearby bar and repeat.
*New* Follow the Leader – I would practice this where you have the hands take turns playing each melody outside of the context of any overlap or timing. Listen here.
Technique – great job with the 2 octave scales. Keep practicing it to get used to the fingering. Just remember standard scale fingering is used within each octave, the only thing that changes is using finger 4 to “reset” the hand to standard fingering within the 2nd octave.
Saturday April 6 Lessons – Erin P
Great job everyone! Sounding so good and making some crazy progress!
Hakim
Raptors – up until star. Remember to play the notes staccato (bouncey and detached).
A minor scale – based on C major scale notes, just starting on A
E minor scale – based on G major scale notes, just starting on E. Don’t forget your F#.
Maria
Viva la Vida – Play along with the recording to get used to the steady tempo. You tend to rush at the last half of the opening 4 bars, and tend to drag at the beginning of each verse. It’s sounding wayyy cleaner than last lesson, great job!
Fundoodle – If you have the time to get to this one have fun! Lots of triad shapes.
Shakira
Going Undercover – Here is the sheet music if you need. C minor position. You can do 3121 finger independence exercises when you’re not at the keyboard with your RH to get used to this. Then you can do two RH taps per one LH tap to simulate the last half of the song, RH is 8th notes and LH is quarter notes.
Contary motion C major scale – you’re making great progress at this!!! Good job.
Noreet
*New* Flute of the Andes – this piece uses the interval of a 4th again a ton. It uses entirely Gs and Cs, with the exception of one A.
C Major triads – CEG EGC GCE. You can play these broken and solid. Use fingers 135 and 125.
Preferred Books for Erin Students
Click to buy them here, and they’ll come right to your house! What could be easier?
BOOK TITLE
COMING SOON
Faber Piano Adventures
The 2nd Edition Level 1 Lesson Book introduces all the notes of the grand staff, elementary chord playing, and the concept of tonic and dominant notes. Students play in varied positions, reinforcing reading skills and recognizing intervals through the 5th. Musicianship is built with the introduction of legato and staccato touches. This level continues the interval orientation to reading across the full range of the Grand Staff. The 5-finger approach is presented here in a fresh, musically appealing way.