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Yes, landorrano, as the mother of a three-year-old I'd like to concur: Sesame St has the best music for toddlers in the media, imo. Far, far better than any other alternative I can get, I can access pretty much anything and everything that's in the mainstream as well as a fair bit that's not.

On the topic of the contents - these books definitely have a mix of styles and composers - they are not all about Russian Folk Music for goodness sake!! BUT they were devised some many decades ago, so they are not *contemporary* sounding to children born in the 21st century.

On the other hand, in the mid-twentieth century Soviet composers absolutely dominated the educational piano music field, with few brilliant composers turning their mind to writing "children's" music in the West. So these books are an excellent summary of some great composing from that mid-twentieth century period, as well as including all kinds of classic teaching repertoire.

Betty, I do agree - the books move super fast, but probably a lot more slowly than the method my mum learned from in the 1950s in New Zealand where on her first lesson she was taught to read crotchets (quarter notes), minims (half notes), semibreves (whole notes), quavers (eighth notes) AND semiquavers (sixteenth notes) as well as learning to play the C Major Scale!!!!!!!!! At the time, this could well have been the best method out there by a LONG shot.

Part I Book 2 starts with pieces that would be considered Initial in the Trinity College London exam system, or Pre-Preliminary here in Australia, or Pre-Grade 1 in the ABRSM system. In method book terms this Book 2 starts at about the place students are somewhere in the third book of any standard American method (it's at about the start of Alfred Premier Lesson Book 2A, for instance). But of course, it moves more rapidly overall. Many teachers think methods move too slowly, however, so this could actually be a plus!

So maybe this is your answer girls:

Any good?

Um, no, that's a sad travesty. As is the Elmo's Monster Maker iPhone app, btw. The actual content of the Sesame St tv program is great, but the merchandising? hmmmmm......

I still wonder about the merits of composed vs anon for children. There's something so much more powerful about a piece that just exists - the timelessness. Beethoven knew that well.

Wow!

hahaha - yes, because the stuff that just exists is somehow more pure having not come from humans but rather descending from on high holus-bolus for the purpose of communicating greater wisdom than is possible through the music conceived by mortals.

Yes! Yes! Though more likely the purity lies in it having been shaped by countless mortals. Anything else'd be worn out and grubby! What a weird substance.

And unsullied by writing, that's a quality not to be sneered at.

Ah yes, but expertly tweaked.

keyboardklutz, do you like/use the European Piano Method? Or is the inclusion of folk songs from most of Western Europe too multicultural? I would think it is the closest thing to your ideal, even though it does include specially written material as well....

And Betty, I'd be interested to know what you thought of the pacing in the European Piano Method - it's also much faster than say the methods from Alfreds, Piano Adventures, Hal Leonard and so forth. But now I'm diverging very far from the topic....

I've got it or seen it somewhere. I found it too multicultural. As I said earlier the student needs a grounding in their own culture first otherwise the other cultures don't even sound other!

soooo funny - it seems intensely parochial from the perspective of Australia, but I suspected you would find it cast its net too wide!! I honestly think that for countries where no culture is native (bar the indigenous cultures which are quarantined for all intents and purposes from the everyday life of most citizens) your perspective is all but incomprehensible. Here we drink cappuccinos, or green tea as the moment demands, eat laksas, kebabs and couscous in more or less equal measure, train to row dragon boats and dance capoeira, and somewhere between the drink and the food and the community events you would think we would find ourselves singing the songs of each other, and yet this country is significant for its lack of public song........ All the music we teach feels no more native than a youtube clip....

You're right. Public song is all but gone!

I'm going to pop in really quick and say that I do like the Russian Piano School, but I am not sure I'd use it exclusively with my kids. I like pulling from all sorts of sources and Music Tree does get boring after a while, so supplementary material is always welcome (I've given Mikrokosmos to some students and definitely plan on using it with my son whenever he's big enough). I will note that I've used pieces in the Russian Piano School part 1 as sightreading examples for my piano 1 students at university.

I like the folk music style and the pieces are memorable, and isn't that what we want? We want the children to know the music and love the music so that they'll be motivated to play?

Elissa,

I again went to sheetmusicplus and looked up all 3 volumes. There was only one music example in two of the volumes, and no example in one of the volumes, neither were there a table of contents.

In reading the editors intentions there were several pedogogy points that I can agree with, this appeared in Volume 1, but overall I can't get an impression about it. Obviously it has been around for a while.

If I have time, I will google the author/editor and Shotts Music just out of interest.

One big disadvantage to using music from other countries, to me, would be lacking the capacity to read the titles of the music.

I really wouldn't be able to make intelligent musical comment on these books without having hands on experience with the entire set of books.

Betty

I have studied in Book 2 which is the third of the series. It is divided into 3 parts: "Pieces", which are about 1-2 pages by a variety of composers; many but not all are Russian (Gliere, Grechaninov, Kabalevsky, Dvarionas but also Bach and Haydn). The second part consists of movements from sonatinas and here it is standard fare (Beethoven, Clementi..). The third part consists of Etudes (Czerny, Goedike, Gurlitt, Schytte, LeCouppey..
At the end of the book, there are 6 highly condensed pages of all the scales (incl. harmonic and melodic) and their corresponding triads and arpeggios, all with fingerings.
If one goes by the "russian' method (at least as I was introduced to it; perhaps it is not a standard method), you would get assigned a scale, an etude and a "piece" and you would play them in that order at the lesson. You would also work on a longer piece (eg sonatina) over time..
The collection has a definitive advantage in that the music is very interesting and diverse. But it can be intense if the above regimen is followed. The book is not illustrated and the pieces are crammed one after the other. It may not appeal to the younger students..
Following this, I was placed on a regular regimen of Bach, Etudes and repertoire (and scales / arpeggios continue to rotate with exquisitely torturous variations...)

As a Russian person, who had my beginning musical education in Russia since the age of 4, I can confidently say that these books are the best.
Yes, they may not be as fancy or "fun" like some of the American method books, but these books are not dumbed down and encoarage students to work harder.
It is true that they may be a bit difficult for complete beginners, so I would encoarage to start with pre-reading notations. There are wonderful method books available in Canada, you can find them on www.vittapiano.com, written by a Russian piano teacher who resides in Canada and has her own successful piano studio.
Her method books are geared towards young beginners, using stories and imaginative pictures and exercises to help build the technique. Then you can start using the Boosey and Hawk's Russian Piano Method books.

"If one goes by the "russian' method (at least as I was introduced to it; perhaps it is not a standard method), you would get assigned a scale, an etude and a "piece" and you would play them in that order at the lesson. You would also work on a longer piece (eg sonatina) over time.. "

Isn't that how every piano lesson goes?

I don't like the implications of this statement.