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Anyone who has ever learned an instrument knows what you mean. It happens a lot, it's frustrating and hacks you off but you just have to get on with it. I can't tell you how infuriating it can be to have a lovely instrument and not to be able to get the best from it.

Would changing teachers be something to mull over?

I just feel like I want to bang my head against the thing some times as the harder I seem to try, the more I seem to be chasing my tail with it and I want to feel I've made SOME sort of progress given the hard work I persistently put in. But no. There has to be something I've been doing wrong all these countless months and years but the problem is I cannot identify it and neither can Mabel. I've changed methods - and as you know I think I've tried every possible method available all to no avail. I'm now at the point when if I think about it too much I feel tearful - and all because I have a problem and I do not know the answer to it, or nobody will tell me the answer to it or tell me how to solve it. So I put 2 and 2 together and make 5 and come up with theories of 'musical dyslexia' (technically known as line and space oddity) which I've googled.

I'm not sure how much more I can take bearing in mind I will have another g3 homework piece on Tuesday that I only have 2 weeks to learn. This piece took me four weeks - bearing in mind I practice often - at least twice daily. I don't think it would be a good idea to have a lesson every four weeks.

Therefore now I am faced with spending yet another evening away from my wife in front of the piano in an attempt to learn these seven simple tunes, six of which I've played perfectly to Mabel between February 2014 and now. I hate to say it but my inability to be able to do this and my efforts to correct it is taking over my entire life. And I'll bet the solution to all this anxiety is so simple if only I knew what it was.

I cannot carry on like this.

I can honestly say that practice was better last night than I envisaged it ti be. I have to remember as far as these repertoire pieces go:

1. play the first phrase/couple of bars of the right hand first

2. likewise with the left hand

3. then both hands slowly.

I have also arranged a one hour lesson with Mabs next week just to talk about these worst fears. A sort of Room 101 lesson but not obviously anything to do with the TV show - more Orwellian.

dave brum wrote:Would changing teachers be something to mull over?

Don't be so bl00dy ridiculous, Mabs is perfect for you = patient, understanding and encouraging. A diamond!

Unsure - I've a feeling in my water next week her sharp steel toe capped Doctor Martens will be next to the delicate curvaceously rounded skin that I cannot see about the neurotic Emails I've sent her based on sight reading, she might even have seen the similarly neurotic verbal testicalities I've been posting on here of late....

Just spent an hour after dinner typing out three pages of things I want to talk about with Mabel. It's three pages long. Sight reading takes up over a page and Fanny Fosdyke also gets some prominence. If I can put these issues to bed, no, something stronger. If I can kill these issues and blast their remains into hyperspace, I shall be a happy piano learner and an even happier bloke.

Here's what I've wrote so far:

dave brum wrote:... the neurotic Emails I've sent her based on sight reading, she might even have seen the similarly neurotic verbal testicalities I've been posting on here of late....

You'd better take her a little bunch of flowers, boy.

You read my mind Gill, softens the blow and that. Was going to call at Waitrose beforehand anyway. Lesson has been rescheduled for Wednesday as my wife is working that day and having Thursday off instead.

I've been adding other criteria that I want to mention to her as well. There are now nearly four pages of worries and various symptoms of bad playing that have been documented. It's either do this or give up, negatively.

It's been two days since I changed repertoire pieces and I'm a little further in learning the new pieces. And I'm on the second page of Puppet's Complaint which I played perfectly for Mabel in December. I would have learned them and it'll be Thursday and time to change the buggers again. Those bloody dots - they really banjax me.

Actually, I've just found out about this which I haven't tried, so I tell a little white lie on my notes:

http://www.musicroom.com/se/id_no/01027 ... tAodsR0APw

I've wasted a fortune on SR books that don't work so I'm a little bit loth to want to spend any more money now.

Just been thinking how nice it would be if I could post something on here about how well I'm doing - if only. I'm a bit sick of making negative postings. I bet you're all a bit sick of them by now.

dave brum wrote: I'm a bit sick of making negative postings. I bet you're all a bit sick of them by now.

That's negative! So stop putting moany stuff on and get practising - without being hard on yourself!

dave brum wrote:Just been thinking how nice it would be if I could post something on here about how well I'm doing

That's not negative, it's a Positive wish!

Looks like it's going to be the kitchen sink I'll be taking to Mabel's tomorrow. I've got loads of things that will back up what I've said - flash cards, SR books (she can have them all) my hymn book in addition to all my theory and practical work.

I've still got a feeling I shall leave there tomorrow with a sore situpon, so I'd better take a couple of soft cushions to soften the impact of the walking stick marks on the car seat.

The big day has arrived! Four weeks and one day of waiting, arring and umming. One full hour with Mabel Mucklethwaite...

UPDATE just put the Drapolene in the fridge.....

What's drapolene?