My three boys started taking lessons with Pokie in the Fall of 2013. Fast forward 6.5 years, we have been taking zoom lessons from California since mid March and the progress has been astounding. My older son who is about to attend University no longer takes lessons but is always trying out new tunes on the piano and my two younger boys love their piano lessons and are starting to play with great musicality and depth. Pokie really understands how to teach children and adults. He is also a wonderful pug consultant!!

Both my daughter and I study with Pokie. He is a wonderful teacher and has helped us both enjoy playing and challenge ourselves.

Playing piano always seemed so awesome, yet unattainable. Finally, when my daughter turned 6, I decided she and I will learn together. We tried several teachers, but with mixed results. Luckily our neighbor introduced us to Pokie and piano instantly became a family hobby. My daughter and I have very different learning styles, yet Pokie is able to adop his style to teach us both. He is ever so patient with my now 7 year old. Insider tip – Pokie’s dog Freckles is the cutest pug in the world and her visits are the strongest incentive for the young aspiring pianists.

Pokie has been a brilliant piano teacher for my 7-year old son. He is highly patient, encouraging, and engaging, and makes learning fun and interesting for a young child. At the same time, Pokie is a consummate professional and strikes the right balance of structure and method to keep my son moving forward. He always makes time to share feedback at the end of lessons, and has been wonderful at adapting the amount of material covered as we go — incorporating more challenging pieces when he feels my son is ready, and slowing down the pace whenever needed. Pokie also makes piano learning more accessible and rewarding for my son by incorporating familiar/contemporary pieces among the method books. Under Pokie’s tutelage and guidance, my son has grown to play beautiful music, learned to read music notation, and established a consistent and achievable practice routine. We are so pleased with our child’s progress over the past 1.5 years and consider ourselves very lucky to have found Pokie! We cannot recommend him highly enough!

Pokie has been a very special and sincere piano teacher for our Daughter for 7 years now. We moved from Bronxville, NY to Central Jersey, NJ 3 years ago and realized that distance will become a reason to discontinue our in person lessons. We started our lesson with some other piano teachers in our area but those were not so successful. It didn’t take us long to understand that it was difficult to find a better teacher than Pokie. We decided to continue with Pokie with online lessons ever since (2 years plus now). My daughter has steadily moved toward being a better musician and has developed love for music as well. Naischa Performed in few recitals and not only that, she got high scores in her RCM exams, her preparation with her teacher online didn’t deter her learning at all. Pokie is an exceptional teacher, sometimes I am busy but he totally takes charge and keeps his student practicing. Online lessons have worked well for us indeed and this way my daughter can continue learning music. I must say she is able to compose her music and creates her own music sometimes! All thanks to Pokie.

My two sons started piano lessons with Pokie 2 years ago. Prior to Pokie, they both had 2 years of piano experience; private lessons as well as group classes in Lucy Moses Kaufman-Center. After this initial exposure to piano, they showed minimum progress and even less interest in continuing lessons. Pokie has changed their attitude toward music lessons dramatically; he has provided a structured learning environment without sacrificing patience. He has improved their technique, music theory and finger placement. Furthermore, he has gone through great lengths to ensure successful lesson follow through by even providing video tips and intra-lesson commentary on self-recorded audio/video clips. With his constant encouragement, he has bolstered not only their musical abilities, but also their self-confidence. One of my sons eagerly anticipates each school talent show as a forum to demonstrate his developing musical talents.

My children ages 13, 8 and 11 had never played the piano when Pokie took them on as students. Pokie was able to fully engage them right from the start. He is extremely kind, patient and engaging. He makes every lesson fun for them allowing them to progress quickly and they look forward to the next lesson. They have made so much progress in the short time they have been playing the piano and I attribute it 100% to Pokie’s outstanding abilities as an instructor.

Pokie is a wonderful music teacher. He is patient, focused, dedicated to the student’s progress and enjoyment of music. Pokie is teaching my daughter, my son and even myself and we could not be happier. We highly recommend him.