My goal for students in my studio is for them to become as proficient and musical as they can. I do not use method books past the Prep level because there is too much good pedagogical literature to be stuck in dreary methods. I want my students to enjoy what they work on and have found over the years that if they are playing exciting and musical pieces from the first, that they become more discriminating as they mature. This does not mean that they can always choose what they are working on, but are given a choice of pieces they would like to polish to performance level. I also don’t have a lot of formal recitals but prefer to have performance classes where the pressure of performing is not as great. My students have many opportunities to perform outside of the studio and are encouraged but never forced to perform. Because of my overlapping lesson structure, my students are never playing in an empty studio, but have the distractions of one or more students at various workstations. This helps them overcome the performance anxiety felt by many musicians.