Learn by Private Music Lessons or The Internet?
It Depends…
When faced with the question of what’s better, to learn from private music lessons or the internet, my answer is, “It depends.”
I’ve been playing music for a long, long time. I’m mostly self-taught, long before the internet was even a notion. To be fair, over the years, I have taken private music lessons on various instruments from time to time. Some were helpful, some were not. Today, if there’s something new I want to explore or learn, I’ll go to the internet rather than searching out a teacher to show me one specific thing I want to know.
I often say that if the internet had been around when I was a kid trying to teach myself how to play, I’d be a phenomenal musician today—a musical genius, in fact. Only because I was self-taught, though. I have the ability that if I see something done, if I have a burning desire to do so, I can often figure it out for myself. For example, I used to watch Midnight Special when I was a young adult, just to catch a glimpse of some chord or little lick I could add to my repertoire. We didn’t have VCRs then, or any type of instant replay, so whatever I saw in that moment, I had to grab it or… wait for the next wave, so-to-speak.
Not everyone is like me in that they can figure stuff out just by seeing it. I’m not even like me sometimes. When I think back to how much music I passed up because I just couldn’t figure it out… I often regret that I didn’t have an opportunity to take regular lessons from an actual person earlier in my music education. I learned a lot from other players along the way, but still, it was information without a foundation—without context. Sadly, I didn’t have the choice between learn by internet or private music lessons. That didn’t happen until much, much later in my life.
The Internet as a Resource
The internet is a great resource for people who can figure things out on their own. For many people, however, kids and adults alike, learning by internet is not easy. Even if they managed to figure it out, somehow, they still don’t know anything about the foundation of music. They may learn to play songs, but at the end of the day, they won’t really know what they’re doing. And that may be enough for some people, to just be able to play some songs. Awesome. It was enough for me, for a long time—until I realized that without foundational knowledge, there was a limit of what I could do as a musician. Once I gained a foundation, there was so much more I understood about the music I wanted to play because I knew what I was doing.
Many taught-by-internet students come to me, stuck, because they were able to figure out some things on their own with random instruction books, or by watching some videos. But, something just wasn’t working right, or they didn’t really understand what they were doing. Ultimately, we’d end up spending a lot of time correcting incorrect technique, or untangling misunderstood notions about what they’d been doing. Essentially, every student is different, and every individual often needs individual help. This is where private music lessons win.
Every person learns new things in a different way, even in music. Their brains process differently, and even their individual physical structure is sometimes not the same as everyone else’s. The way one person on YouTube makes a chord works for them, but what if your fingers are longer or shorter, or don’t bend a certain way? What if you cannot figure it out because you don’t see that your form is nowhere close to being correct?
Hands-on Instruction
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Based on its enormous growth and popularity, it is a fact that the internet is a great tool for learning. You can learn about just about everything in the world there is to know, including music. Also a fact is that the internet is a fantastic tool—but… it is lacking in direct, hand-on, human interaction and individualization. There are also about as many great sites as there are really terrible sites. If you’re new to music, how will you know which is which? Will you find out before bad habits are formed? This is when the answer to the question of whether to learn from private music lessons or the internet becomes more clear.
Private music lessons via Skype or Facetime also win over watching video “lessons” on YouTube or other online resources. Why? Because you have a live person on the other side of the screen watching you and listening to you. A person who can correct you on the spot, or help you find a better altnerative in real time. A person who knows you personally, and should know how best to get you to your personal goals.
The Price of Learning
Yes, indeed, private music lessons can seem expensive when you have in your mind you can just learn from the internet—for free. Private music lessons may even seem like a frivolous expense given the myriad free resources available online. If learning to play an instrument is a whim, something at the bottom of your bucket list, or something you can live without, then of course, private music lessons are going to feel like an expense. A luxury, in fact.
If, however, you have a burning desire, heck, even a strong desire, to learn to play an instrument, then private music lessons should be seen as an investment, because they are. They’re an investment in your own personal development (or your child’s) because music, and the learning of music, is good for the soul and your mind. Learning music stimulates the brain in more ways than practically any other endeavor. (Find out more about why learning music is important HERE) What you learn today can literally influence the rest of your life; in particular, music education can improve the quality of your life.
Learning music the right way isn’t always easy or cheap, but the right way is often the best way.
So, to answer the question of whether to learn to play music by internet or private music lessons? Like I say, it depends—upon the individual and the circumstances.
Please feel free to contact me to discuss whether private music lessons are for you (or your child).