Dr Bernard Tan is a passionate piano teacher. Teaching his first students when he was still a teenager has given him a breadth of knowledge and experience in guiding pianists in the making of art in piano music. One of his highlights is guiding a pianist in his 70s to perform a full-length piano recital in the United Kingdom.

Bernard's teaching emphasises on technique as a foundation for expressive piano playing. He adopts a pedagogy of relying on the natural mechanisms of the body, arm, hands and fingers in producing the desired sounds on the piano, hence reducing the risk of injuries while allowing freedom for expression. This is evident in his playing, which results in a remark for having "an admirable physiological setup" by pianist Robin Bowman.

Being a professional collaborative pianist, Dr. Tan also teaches pianists the art of collaboration with singers and instrumentalists as a pianist. His excellence in piano collaboration has gained trusts from his performing partners, and his performance was "marked by technical excellence and fluency, original approach to interpretation and highly developed sense of ensemble playing", a remark made by Russian concert pianist Mikhail Kazekevich.