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#11: What Happens When Piano Students Become Active Music Makers? With Composer, Elissa Milne

May 27, 2026

BLOG: What if the way we've been teaching piano is actually getting in the way of real musicianship?

Most piano teachers care deeply about getting it right. The right notes and rhythm.

But what if that very focus on getting it right is getting in the way of something more important?

That's the question at the heart of this conversation with Elissa Milne, and it's one you won't stop thinking about.

Who is Elissa Milne?

Elissa Milne is one of Australia's most beloved and internationally recognised composers.

She's the brilliant mind behind Little Peppers, Pepperbox Jazz, and other “Pepper” publications! Her albums have a range of pieces that piano teachers and students around the world have been playing and loving for decades.

Paul and I had the privilege of hearing Elissa take the stage at Top Music Live in Sydney recently, for the first time in ten years. The room was electric.

Afterwards, she generously sat down with me for a conversation that is funny, thought-provoking, and one of my favourites yet.

Here's what stayed with me.

The Data Entry Problem

Sometimes with so much focus on recital prep or exam prep we can be so focussed on the level of perfection required that our students can start to treat the piano like a keyboard on a computer, where accuracy is everything.

But accuracy isn't real music.

We all know that as long as we have the correct rhythm a piece can be recognisable.

A Case for Mucking Around

Elissa is a passionate advocate for exploration before accuracy.

Not learning the whole piece first and then experimenting.

Starting with a fragment. A motif. A gesture.

And mucking around with it.

Octaves up. Octaves down. Different dynamics. Different characters. Different endings.

Because when students have explored a fragment (really played with it, owned it, made it theirs) they arrive at the piece with a confidence and a musical understanding that note-by-note learning simply can't build.

"Music that we teach with, should be the start of the conversation, the start of the exploration, not the end."

Shakespearean Analogy will make you think…

Elissa explains…

“We ask piano students to faithfully reproduce the intentions of a composer. To become a vessel.

But think about what we expect of actors performing Shakespeare

Nobody expects them to channel Shakespeare. Nobody expects them to disappear into the text and remove themselves entirely. We expect them to take the text and say something about the world today. Consider the Baz Luhrmann adaptation of Romeo and Juliet.”

So why is it that traditionally music students are asked to do the opposite?

Elissa’s compositions offer an easy way to give our student this kind of agency. There are so many small gems of motifs that enable students to bring themselves to the music, to have opinions about it, to make choices within it, their musicianship changes.

They can stop being data entry operators and start being musicians. Of course this isn’t a one and done exercise, it's something we build on week to week as we try to break the stranglehold that the printed music has over them and encourage them to listen to the music. And explore.

The Harmonic Hologram

One of the most fascinating moments in this conversation is when Elissa introduces the concept of the harmonic hologram.

It's a term she uses to describe what happens when two close chords with completely different notes flick back and forth. The BTS song, Swim, is a perfect example. E flat major to D minor, back and forth, nothing else needed.

This is such a contemporary sound that students relate to. Something that feels simultaneously familiar and fresh. And as an improvisation exercise?

It's contemporary, accessible, and endlessly musical. It’s something students can explore endlessly and never exhaust.

What This Means for Your Teaching

Elissa's ideas aren't abstract.

They're a practical invitation to loosen the grip on perfection, just enough to let the music breathe.

Ask your student to play a fragment ten different ways before they play it the right way.
Respond to a wrong note with curiosity instead of correction.
Let exploration be the lesson, not the reward at the end of it.

Because when students make choices, they make music.

And making music - real music, expressive music, music that belongs to them - is the whole point. It’s how they truly connect to music in a way that makes them never want to leave.

Listen to Episode 11

This conversation will change how you think about how you approach a piece. Rather than note perfect and exploration later. Flip it!

Elisa's Publications

🎁 And if you haven't grabbed this yet — our free guide, The Real Secret to Keeping Piano Students Engaged, is full of practical strategies to keep your students motivated, progressing, and loving their lessons.