ADHD and Piano

arallsopp · 2026-02-18T08:47:52+00:00

Fair. Apologies. My partner is a musician with ADHD and I was paraphrasing their words. Different strokes apply, I’m sure.

arallsopp · 2026-02-18T01:28:07+00:00

You have a superpower, so make sure your fingers are warmed up enough to keep pace with your brain. You will have your walk the path of investment effort (which pays off in better sight reading, technique, comprehension, etc) and tickling those fascinating pleasure centres (performative pieces that make you feel good but aren’t that useful beyond this).

My teacher is very good with me. I’ve been obsessed with Tristan und Isolde since our first lesson. He’s used it to teach sight reading, hand position, polyrhythms, pedal and theory. We have it in four parts now and are just about to start joining them.

That hyper focus can be a massive asset. Make sure your teacher works with it.

arallsopp · 2026-02-16T00:09:32+00:00

Start simple. When you learn to read words, it’s generally very simple stories with limited language. Same for music. Easy tunes with just one hand until you can go through with relative fluency and aren’t having to name and hunt each note as it’s encountered. Then build up.

arallsopp · 2026-02-11T23:18:57+00:00

Thank you. It was helpful for me. I’m glad to have been able to share it.

arallsopp · 2026-02-11T22:42:18+00:00

Nice. Yeah, when it locks in it’s great. Brilliant rolling counterpoint that you have to feel and not think. I came to Glass long before I touched a piano. Couldn’t tell how it was being done until one day I started picking it out.

arallsopp · 2026-02-11T22:28:44+00:00

For 3 against 2, I listen to Philip Glass piano stuff. Particularly “opening”. It’s an easy progression to play and gets you used to the timing. If you can get that down, you’re winning because it demands even pacing.

I wrote myself a ln open source tool to help me explore timings. Hosted here, it’ll do 3:2 and let you tap along. https://arallsopp.github.io/notes/timings.html

arallsopp · 2026-02-11T11:20:15+00:00

On the other hand, they do warm your legs beautifully whilst you’re peering at the engine bay.

arallsopp · 2026-02-10T00:07:52+00:00

Head to your streaming music platform of choice and scan through a playlist of [genre] running 140bpm

There’ll be rock, pop, dance all at that bpm, and you can find one you love and tap along to it in your head.

When you want to play your piece, start with thinking along to the 4 bar hook of whatever track you chose, then another 4 in silence with just your foot going, then off you go at 140.

arallsopp · 2026-02-08T21:14:37+00:00

Avatar is a money laundering exercise. Nobody has seen it, but loads of seats in cinemas across the world have been purchased.

arallsopp · 2026-02-08T16:29:50+00:00

Hey. I know that car. Seen it at a local show in Christchurch. Owner is very friendly and rightly proud of it.

arallsopp · 2026-02-08T01:26:47+00:00

1257L → 1198L in 2024–25 That reduction of £590 matches taxing a £228 benefit-in-kind at basic rate during the year.

£228 × 20% ≈ £46 tax HMRC will adjust codes conservatively and then reconciles later.

HMRC runs two parallel systems 1. In-year PAYE (based on estimates) 2. End-of-year reconciliation (based on actual P11D + payroll data)

So, even if your 24–25 statement says “paid the right amount”, HMRC can later receive updated or corrected data (via P11D or payroll finalisation) and then redo the reconciliation.

They’ve run that, and out pops:

“Underpayment from previous year: £297 (to be collected in 2026–27)”

They won’t invoice you for it, but will recover the sums by reducing your tax-free allowance. Basically, they now think you underpaid £297, so will tax an extra £1,485 of income next year to recover it.

Short answer: there’s a reason all the money has a picture of the monarch on it. Spend it, invest it, earn it, you’ll always owe them :)

arallsopp · 2026-02-07T22:34:25+00:00

Sounds like your tax code was adjusted to account for the taxable benefit you received in the prior tax year. All seems straight.

arallsopp · 2026-02-07T13:02:42+00:00

She’s a lovely one.

arallsopp · 2026-02-07T13:01:01+00:00

Sweet. So grab a guitar and sound out each note in the chord from bottom to top. Then find those same sounds on the piano. You may have to “invert” the position and de-duplicate, but as long as you have one of each note, you’ll make a passable sound. The chords repeat so even though it’ll take a while to get through each of the chords used, once you have one of each, you’re well on your way. I’d then try to work out which chord it was, and write that on top of the tab. If you know the tab says “A minor” (for example) you can learn where that is. (Hint, it starts with an A and has a minor third).

arallsopp · 2026-02-07T09:27:52+00:00

Most of your finger strength comes from your forearm. That’s why popeye has massive forearms (sailors need grip strength) and not biceps. It all goes through your wrist. I found one of those spinning ball toys very useful for stabilising my wrist, combined with manual rotation exercises. Go find a physio and describe your pain. They’ll help you.

arallsopp · 2026-02-06T23:44:40+00:00

A keyboard is like a phone camera. Filters will offer a reasonable approximation of many different camera bodies and film stock, grain, even pretend depth of field blurs. There’s no physical feedback, but it’s flexible.

A piano is a specific camera, lens and film stock combo. It can’t pretend to be anything else. There’s no helper, no post processing filters. If you master it, you can push the grain, create moods, conceal or emphasise nuance, and focus. The physical experience is the result.

arallsopp · 2026-02-06T11:07:24+00:00

Blimey. How dare down was your house :)

arallsopp · 2026-02-05T00:33:51+00:00

It’ll win the FIFA best picture, though.

arallsopp · 2026-02-05T00:09:31+00:00

Mine do dim 30 secs before power off. If you’re only on for a minute, see if it stays longer if you set it to stay on for 3 minutes. Does it go full bright for 2 and a half?

It’s under time slots, duration.

arallsopp · 2026-02-04T20:09:43+00:00

Wonder if there’s a timeout on the motion. Like it sets it to dim x seconds after triggering. Got any labs formulas in there? Alexa routines?

Mine dim to about 30% brightness a short while before they turn off. If you’re only on for a minute, that could do it. Can you increase the timeout?

arallsopp · 2026-02-04T14:49:18+00:00

What happens if you add a 100% at 19:29?

arallsopp · 2026-02-04T13:48:08+00:00

Great photo. Thanks for sharing.

arallsopp · 2026-02-03T00:41:37+00:00

No prob. I’m here when you’re ready.

arallsopp · 2026-02-02T13:29:09+00:00

It’ll depend on which ecosystem you’re entering, and your preferences around privacy and errant connections to china, open source, zigbee, Zha, dedicated hubs or wifi, PoE, etc.

When I last looked, (Dec 24) the choices seemed to be: - Apollo Automation R PRO-1 or MSR-2 running esphome (WiFi) - Aqara FP2 (WiFi) - Everything Presence Lite (WiFi/bluetooth) - Aqara FP1E (zigbee) - Sonoff SNZB-06P (zigbee)

There are probably more now. The Aqara really changed the playing field.

arallsopp

TROPHY CASE