 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: davidsampson
Date: 2008-08-26 20:56
Right now I can play a little bit of piano. That is to say, I know all the notes, and can play right hand melodies with simple left hand accompaniment. However, the only piano books we have are either ridiculously easy (I can play through all of these) or quite hard (Sonatas and concerti and the like). For those of you who picked up piano as an aid to music in general, what method books did you find that worked the best for you?
I also wonder, is there a book comparable to the Klose book or Arbans (for cornet/trumpet), a "bible" of the piano? One that assumes mild competency*, but works on pretty much anything you might need.
*Yes I know that theoretically you could start as a beginner on the Klose or Arbans, but the learning curve is so steep I think it would be almost impossible.
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Author: Katrina
Date: 2008-08-26 21:28
Hanon velocity studies are good for scale patterns...That's all I know about though...There MUST be more...
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Author: Adrianna
Date: 2008-08-26 21:37
I am not sure where you live, but here in Canada (my ISP is wrong) we have something called the Royal Conservatory or RCM, which is a music curriculum and exam process for all instruments. The curriculum is divided into grades from 1 thru 10 (10 being your teacher certificate). What is nice about it, is that all the msuic especially for piano is compiled into two handy books, one for the main repetoire and the other for studies. As well, each grade covers music from the Baroque era right up to modern. Anyways, you could look into ordering a couple of grades, maybe around 4 or 5. Hope that helps and good luck with your piano endeavors.
Adrianna
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Author: BobD
Date: 2008-08-26 21:46
The Czerny books used to be standard piano studies.
Bob Draznik
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Author: James Langdell
Date: 2008-08-26 22:06
For building up piano skills with satisfying repertoire, there's great value in the "Classics to Moderns" series edited by Denis Agay. The pieces are original works for keyboard by the composers, from early baroque to 20th century. The order of pieces in each book are roughly chronological by when they were composed, rather than in a conscious curriculum order. However, within each volume, the works are well chosed for a specific degree of difficulty. scending editions have red, blue, orange. and green covers.
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Author: stevensfo
Date: 2008-08-27 07:56
-- "The curriculum is divided into grades from 1 thru 10 (10 being your teacher certificate). " --
The ABRSM system in the UK is similar, though there are only 8 grades followed by the diploma. For each grade, there's a book published which contains a selection of the music available, from baroque, classical and contemporary - so quite a good selection.
Every few years, they change the music, so you can usually find the old grade books on Ebay very cheaply.
Steve
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Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2008-08-27 13:40
>>The Czerny books used to be standard piano studies.
>>
And there's a good reason why they're not any more. This anecdote has been told about several of the great pianists of the past (including Paderewski, Rubinstein and Horowitz). I have no idea whether it's a true story or only a joke:
Interviewer: Why did Czerny write all those etudes?
Pianist: Because he hated little children.
The Czerny studies ("The School of Velocity" and "The Art of Finger Dexterity") do have some value for an adult with the patience to put up with them. For exercises, I prefer Hanon's "The Virtuoso Pianist" (3 volumes; Schirmer puts all three in one cover).
Can't go wrong with J. S. Bach's 48 preludes and fugues of "The Well-Tempiered Keyboard." Some are technically difficult, but start at the beginning of the book. Ralph Kirkpatrick's edition of the Scarlatti sonatas is full of good, accessible material. Try Mozart's Sonata No. 1 (K. 300k) and Beethoven's Sonata in G, Op. 49, no. 2. For 20th century music, Kabalevsky's "24 Little Pieces for Children," Op. 39, is not just for kids, and after that, his "Six Preludes and Fugues," Op. 61 and his "Sonatina in C," Op. 13, No. 1, are terrific music that an intermediate student can play.
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
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Author: clar6580
Date: 2008-08-27 17:03
I am working with the Practical Method for Beginners right now by Czerny. It's very good. You may want to start there.
Kimberly
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Author: FDF
Date: 2008-08-27 23:17
david, i play some keyboard, and have for fifty years or so, I can read music, but for me the most fun is being able to play music in an improvisational manner. The key to this ability is knowing chords, chord structure, and scales with arpeggeos, and fundamental chord progression. Within that framework, you can develop your style of playing.
Thanks,
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Author: FDF
Date: 2008-08-27 23:17
opps, please delete.
Post Edited (2008-08-27 23:41)
Post Edited (2008-08-27 23:42)
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Author: Steve Epstein
Date: 2008-08-28 06:20
To expand on FDF's post, can you look at a chord chart from a fake book and use it to play accompaniment? In various styles, e.g., a few different jazz styles, polka boom-chick, etc? It's amazing how many "trained" piano players can read two staves of music in different clefs with stacked notes, yet don't know how to accompany when they see written over (or under) a 32 bar melody something like D, Bm, A7. They don't know what notes are in the chords or how to voice them for various types of popular music. Even better is the ability to do that w/o written music, to listen to a 32 bar tune and make up something sensible.
Steve Epstein
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The Clarinet Pages
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