Rating: 
Summary: Noteworthy
Review: Noah Adams is best known as a commentator on the National Public Radio network's All Things Considered. His gentle humor and thoughtful insights translate well into print form.In "Piano Lessons," Adams conveys the attraction of music, even for those of us who have little experience or talent in producing it. He details the course of a year in his life, a year when he decided to invest in a piano and learn to play it. Adams mainly used self-teaching methods, but also participated in a session with a private teacher and attended a week long music camp. Besides chronicling the routines of practicing and acquiring a greater familiarity with the instrument, Adams' book branches off to cover other aspects of his life during the time, and a sizable amount of history of the piano and of notable pianists, past and present. Those tangents are mostly interesting and enjoyable, thanks to Adams' polished prose style.
Rating: 
Summary: Gentle, pleasant, and light -- but with a bit of substance.
Review: Noah Adams' Piano Lessons reminds me of John Jerome's Elements of Effort; Stone Work; and Truck; and also of Tracy Kidder's House. Each of the aforementioned books is a nice blend of non-fiction about a bit of the world mixed with a bit of humanity, by writers who know what they're about. Adams' book tells the story of why and how this NPR correspondent decided, at age 51, to learn to play the piano. It's a gentle and pleasant story, thanks in large part to the author's skill and quietly humorous, self-deprecating style. He weaves into the book enough information about pianos, their construction, their history, musicians, and so on, to interest at least a non-expert general reader (much as, say, Tracy Kidder wove in information about how houses are constructed). Piano Lessons is a very enjoyable read.
Rating:
Summary: For All Who Would Play
Review: Noah Adams, in his book Piano Lessons, presents an honest, straight forward guide on achieving one's goal in middle age. This is not a just a book about piano lessons, but more a story about becoming who we really want to be, or even more, who we really are. Mr. Adams tells the truth about procrastination and about dedication, those traits that tend to haunt us through our middle years. Have we really achieved what we've wanted out of life? And what can we do if something is missing? One thing Noah Adams did was keep a record of his goal setting and the achievement of that goal. By writing the book in the form of a journal, the reader is able to watch his progress as he sets out to learn to play the piano. He starts big, with the investment of an $11,000 Steinway and the rest is history. He stumbles through a Miracle Piano Teaching System on the computer ($259.95), various piano technique books, a music camp and finally some honest to goodness piano lessons. The book ends with Mr Adams presenting his wife, Neenah, with a concert for Christmas, complete with tuxedo, brass candlesticks, candles and the favorite pieces he has longed to play for many years. This might sound overly sentimental, but to many of us who have procrastinated all of our lives in the music field, Piano Lessons is true inspiration. Mr Adams would be pleased to know that as soon as I finished the book, I perused the internet and ordered $75 worth of music books ("Hooked on Easy Classics"). I have built the fire in the little guest house where my inherited piano(my mother's) has rested for five years virtually untouched. I am going to warm up the strings and start playing.
Rating:
Summary: For All Who Would Play
Review: Noah Adams, in his book Piano Lessons, presents an honest, straight forward guide on achieving one's goal in middle age. This is not a just a book about piano lessons, but more a story about becoming who we really want to be, or even more, who we really are. Mr. Adams tells the truth about procrastination and about dedication, those traits that tend to haunt us through our middle years. Have we really achieved what we've wanted out of life? And what can we do if something is missing? One thing Noah Adams did was keep a record of his goal setting and the achievement of that goal. By writing the book in the form of a journal, the reader is able to watch his progress as he sets out to learn to play the piano. He starts big, with the investment of an $11,000 Steinway and the rest is history. He stumbles through a Miracle Piano Teaching System on the computer ($259.95), various piano technique books, a music camp and finally some honest to goodness piano lessons. The book ends with Mr Adams presenting his wife, Neenah, with a concert for Christmas, complete with tuxedo, brass candlesticks, candles and the favorite pieces he has longed to play for many years. This might sound overly sentimental, but to many of us who have procrastinated all of our lives in the music field, Piano Lessons is true inspiration. Mr Adams would be pleased to know that as soon as I finished the book, I perused the internet and ordered $75 worth of music books ("Hooked on Easy Classics"). I have built the fire in the little guest house where my inherited piano(my mother's) has rested for five years virtually untouched. I am going to warm up the strings and start playing.
Rating:
Summary: Noah Adams is the best reason to learn to play the piano
Review: Reading this book is like sitting down with a cherished old friend (who happens to be wonderfully witty, sensitive, articulate, discerning, and capable of moving you to tears) to talk about why you yourself should run out and buy a piano in your middle age and spend lots of time every day falling in love with it, as well as with the process of learning something new and beautiful. It's also a book about a lot more than just learning an instrument: it's about pianos themselves (how they are constructed, how they are all different, and how they are all objects of substantial beauty), music of all kinds, and the people who love and make music in our world. Like Mr. Adams, I took up an instrument having never learned to play as a child (in my case, the violin) and found in this book a million new reasons to want to continue learning to play it. Nobody could fail to love this book on a possibly unlikely subject, and certainly no one could fail to fall in love with the man in the tuxedo playing for his wife on Christmas eve
Rating:
Summary: An Inspiration to Adults
Review: Regret not learning the piano or other instrument growing up? Noah Adams teaches us that second chances do happen and with patience and dedication, you too can follow your dreams. I took my first lesson a week after reading this book. Its funny, touching and profoundly true. I enjoyed it immensely.
Rating:
Summary: Inspired and inspiring book for would-be pianists.
Review: Several factors came together to bring this book to my attention. I have listened to Noah Adams measured tones on NPRs All Things Considered for years. I studied piano reluctantly for fifteen of my first nineteen years on Earth.(Jewish fathers always want their sons to be doctors by day and concert pianists by night)But most importantly, at the age of forty, with years of neglecting the piano behind me, I had almost decided to buy one again and not only try, belatedly, to justify my expensive lessons but also inflict something similar, but less obsessive, on my own son.Mr Adams book is a beautiful memoir, gentle and ardent. It is a fine blend of history, anecdote, experience and passion. A fifty year old man, successful and assured takes on a challenge - to learn to play the piano - and brings us, month by month, through trepidation, irritation and confidence and joy to the emotional ending that leaves one wishing the book could be longer. I will buy that piano this month.
Rating:
Summary: Worth the struggle
Review: Since I'm in my forties and just bought a digital piano to learn and play music for the first time in my life, I thought it would be interesting to read this book for some tips and inspiration. I did, however, find it quite difficult to get into. Perhaps this is partly because I am not American and also because I don't know much about either the places the author mentions or most of the names he drops. But I persevered, and am glad I did, because although I didn't get what I expected I did enjoy reading about the experiences of going to a music camp and the authors encounters, conversations and interviews with various amateur and professional musicians. These were the best part for me, and especially to explore what making music means.
Rating:
Summary: Worth the struggle
Review: Since I'm in my forties and just bought a digital piano to learn and play music for the first time in my life, I thought it would be interesting to read this book for some tips and inspiration. I did, however, find it quite difficult to get into. Perhaps this is partly because I am not American and also because I don't know much about either the places the author mentions or most of the names he drops. But I persevered, and am glad I did, because although I didn't get what I expected I did enjoy reading about the experiences of going to a music camp and the authors encounters, conversations and interviews with various amateur and professional musicians. These were the best part for me, and especially to explore what making music means.
Rating:
Summary: Ironic title, but a good read
Review: The irony of "Piano Lessons" is that it's not about taking piano lessons at all, at least not weekly piano lessons with a teacher, and so you might read this book as a primer on how NOT to learn to play the piano. That said, I enjoyed this book and found it to be a lovely meditation on the beauty of the piano and the difficulty of fitting an amateur passion into a busy, career-laden schedule. I thought to myself that if a fine writer and talented journalist such as Adams could take such a weird approach to learning to play - erratically using music software and turning his back on his lovely new Steinway! -- then I shouldn't be afraid to try. It's been a year since I read "Piano Lessons," and I now own a piano, am six months into weekly piano lessons and am at the skill level where I could play "Traumeri" (although I haven't tried to do so). "Piano Lessons" helped kick-start my own musical adventure. How's it going with you, Noah?
|
