THE OLD WAY

Most piano lessons teach you how to play other people's music. The whole point of the lessons is to teach you how to recreate and perform music that other people wrote.

But you want to write your own music.

So this approach won't solve your problem. You need a training system on the piano that centres around playing and developing your own ideas. 

You've probably got a decent ear already. You know what sounds right, and what doesn't. After all, you've been listening to music ever since you were born! But…

• You feel disconnected from the music-making process because you spend way too much time clicking and dragging midi notes around in your DAW, rather than playing your ideas on your keyboard first
  
  
• You get an idea for the main hook of your track, but you don't have a quick way of turning it into a balanced melody that captures the emotion of your original idea
  
  
• You usually make music in the same old key because you're relying on the handful of chord progressions you learnt when you first started
  
  
• You don't understand how to sequence chords together to control the energy in your songs, let alone how to add melody notes that fit over them
  
  
• You may even rely on melody and chord generator plugins to spit out the main musical ideas for your tracks, and you're tired of this approach

The problem you have is that you don't quite understand how the building blocks of music (scales/modes, chords, progressions, and melody) actually fit together at a fundamental level.

Your knowledge is patchy at best, probably picked up in fragments from countless online tutorials and courses. We've all been there!

Ultimately, you've never followed a specific training plan for long enough to convert this knowledge into a skill. The skill of music composition. 

Put bluntly: You've neglected your musical training.

THE NEW WAY

This is where I can help you. Imagine this:

You're sitting down in front of your piano, you hit record in the DAW, and you just play the ideas that come out. No pressure, no judgement, just pure play.

When the time feels right, you stop playing, and end the recording.

The next day, you listen back to what you played, and find an absolute gem of a hook. This will be the seed for your next track. 

In your next piano session, you take this raw idea, and develop it. Maybe you experiment with some variations to the melody, or maybe you swap out one of the chords in the progression. Whatever you choose to do, you're excited that you're working with an idea that you created, in the moment, in real time. 

You have an idea that is worth developing. 

This is the path I teach: from guesswork to genuine fluency, built through scales and modes, chords, progressions, and melody, until playing your own ideas stops being a struggle.

The deeper we dive, and the more consistently you play, the wider the range of musical expression you'll develop.

We won't rely on gimmicky tricks, or flashy shortcuts. This is all about giving you a systematic approach to piano-playing that trains your ability to create captivating music, in your own style.  

I'll give you the tools. What you choose to build with them will be up to you. 

Hi, I'm Ian

My musical path in a nutshell:

Piano Player ➙ DJ ➙ Dance Producer ➙ Music Teacher & Piano Coach.

Every stage has evolved naturally into the next.

Teaching and coaching is where I currently invest most of my time. That being said, completing my own creative work alongside my coaching work is a major priority. 

I believe that the most relatable (and effective) educators are those with 'boots on the ground', who teach from direct experience, not just from a textbook.

In this way, I'm just like you; a normal human being, passionate about the art of making music. There's nothing better than meeting up with a fellow music-enthusiast and geeking-out about all things music!

WHY I TEACH

I genuinely love helping melodic dance music producers build the practices, skills and knowledge that unlock their ability to create their own music. Piano is the vehicle, not the goal in itself.

Producers usually come to me with strong technical skills but little understanding of how composition actually works, and that gap is exactly what I coach at the piano.

This isn't about surface-level learning or chasing quick wins. Meaningful progress towards music composition comes from deliberate, structured practice over time, not shortcuts. And it certainly doesn't come from traditional piano lessons that prioritise sight-reading, exams, and Mozart!

READY TO COMPOSE WITH REAL FLUENCY?

One-to-one coaching, built around your starting point.

First, we figure out what you already know and where the gaps are, then build a path through scales and modes, chords, progressions, and melody. Everything is aimed at helping you make your own musical decisions, in real time, so you can create music that's truly yours.

I've been teaching and refining this material for over 15 years now, and I only take on a small number of one-to-one students at a time. This is deliberate. It helps me ensure your lessons are carefully sequenced and relevant to your specific needs. 

The Loop That Makes This Work

Each lesson introduces something new, but the real progress happens in between, when you apply it on the keys when you're by yourself.

Come back, and we review what went well, clarify and solve any problems, then move on to the next step.

Skip the practice, and the loop breaks. This is why consistent playing sessions matter more than any single lesson.

Momentum is everything.

You'll make the best progress when you spread your sessions out equally across each month. This keeps the Learn, Apply, Feedback loop moving.

This is why sessions can't be paused month to month. That said, if something genuinely gets in the way, a busy travel month, life happening, just tell me and we'll sort it out.

IS THIS FOR YOU?

These sessions are NOT for everyone, and won't help you if…

• You can't commit to regular practice between sessions, multiple times a week (daily playing is the goal). Turning up without having practised interrupts the practice and feedback cycle and undermines your progress. Life happens sometimes (I get it!), but you'll only see real results if you're building momentum between lessons.
  
  
• You're not able to keep on top of booking your own sessions regularly.
   
• You want to learn to play other people's songs. This is not repertoire-based teaching.
  
  
• You're looking for casual, drop-in lessons with no regular commitment.
  
  
• You want a casual hobby rather than serious skill development.
  
  
• You're looking for shortcuts or quick tricks. This is about understanding how music actually works, deeply enough to be able to play your own music.
  
  
• You just want to learn music theory, without playing the piano. Every piece of theory gets tied straight back to what you're playing, hands on the keys, this isn't a theoretical course, it's a practical programme of study.
  
  
• You want to read music as the main goal. I might reference notation occasionally as a visual aid, but this isn't notation-based teaching, the focus is building the fluency to play from your own knowledge of the keyboard, not from the page.