Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum Alfred's Basic and ALL in One Adult Piano Course Book #1

So, did we run out of things to talk about? LOL

What is everyone working on now that's giving you trouble?

No real troubles here. Just working on The Entertainer and He's Got the Whole World in His Hand. Hopefully I'll have these done next week...2 weeks maximum. I want to finish the book and then go back through it again and make sure I have everything under my belt before starting book #2.

Anyone here just starting Alfred book? Where are you in the book and how is it going?

I'm going back and getting O Sole Mio down. I started taking lessons this week and my new teacher told me that I should be using the fingerings that the book is showing me. I had forgotten about that..and I thought they were only suggestions (DUH!!). I am now practicing with correct fingerings...for O Sole Mio, Greensleeves, Jericho, the Moses song, and Scarborough Fair. She gave me PLENTY OF HOMEWORK!!

New song for this week: 1st song in the All Time Favorites book by Alfred level 1. (I forget the name, but it's a lovely little German folk song).

Am enjoying my new piano, but work on my keyboard when hubby is trying to listen to tv!

Welcome to any newbies here!

Nancy

GracieCat -- I think many of us have fallen silent wondering why we don't get a free grand piano, too...

My teacher is off for a number of weeks, and I am trying to get as far through the book as possible while she's gone. (I have about 15 songs that I haven't started yet, so it's a tall order.)

I am noticing that my greatest difficulties occur when one note is repeated in one hand, and the other hand has a changing pattern (right now bars 3-6 of Can Can are causing the same frustration that I first remember from Beautiful Brown Eyes). I don't know why I find such passages so problematic...

For reasons I am not sure I even comprehend, I can't stand playing Lullaby, and it is my most hated song so far. I can't bring myself to play this properly, and don't understand why I am so sloppy with it. If there was one piece I could skip, that would be it.

(I absolutely love the wretched Blow the Man Down, especially playing it with a church organ/harpsichord mix that sounds a little like a calliope. My teacher complains about how I don't play it legato, but I think it sounds better hammered out... I don't think that sailors worry too much about playing legato, anyway.)

I have noticed, especially when playing in front of my teacher, of how many false starts I make. Not only do I make frequent mistakes, I often start playing the first few notes with one of my hands out of place (or on my lap), or playing a few measures to remember how it goes, and then starting again from the top. To cure myself of this, I wrote a list of all of the songs that I re-play and give myself a check mark only those times I play without any errors or stuttering at the beginning. (I am less concerned about making minor errors in the middle of the piece.)

I'm on Amazing Grace... didn't get passed this week 'cause my pedaling was off. I was pedaling before the note instead of after. Hopefully it won't be too hard to break myself of the habit. There's a few parts I stumble over, but I should be able to get over that if I play though it a few more times. I don't know if we'll continue with the Alfred's Basic, but I should know in a week, if I ever get Amazing Grace right

nancymae - the fingerings actually help you out a lot in other places. My teacher has me playing easier parts of classical pieces, and today she pointed out to me that playing my own fingerings in one part of a piece I'm learning is causing me to trip up and stumble. I also tried my own fingerings for the arpeggiated part of Amazing Grace, and it makes my whole wrist flop over.

GracieCat - He's Got the WHole World isn't too bad - just remember you're basically doing the same thing over and over, in different keys, and you should fly right through it. The Entertainer tripped my up because I kept playing it as what I though it was and not what it actually was. But it's not too bad, either.

Pianomaly- I feel your pain on hating a song you have to get through. I actually had that problem with When the Saints Go Marching In (Me, of course, being the only person in New Orleans sick of the Saints). I tried blowing through both versions and kept screwing up and having to redo it. Oh, the torture.

Aimee

I had a lot of new stuff to work on between lessons this time and we have had company for the past 2 weeks. She goes home next Tuesday but we have another visitor coming this Friday for 10 days. It seems like it has been slow going but I am making progress.

The Alberti Bass version of Greensleeves is almost there, just need to get it up to speed.

Go Down Moses is ready for teachers approval.

Scarborough Fair is in good shape except for the pedaling which is proving to be challenging.

Raisins and Almonds is also in good shape except for the pedaling.

He's Got the Whole World gave me fits trying to coordinate my hands. I couldn't figure out why I couldn't get it down and had to find a creative way to overcome the problem. I ended up making a copy of the pages and color coding the notes that were played by themselves vs played on the same beat as a chord. Once I did that for the first key it was easy. I hope that when this comes up again it gets easier to get without having to resort to cheating like this.

I don't like the pounding chords on this one either GracieCat!

I also have been looking for a supplemental piece to play and think I have settled on Memories from the Greatest Hits book. It has a bass line similar to Scarborough Fair and the Alberti Bass combined so it seems like a good fit. The melody is easy too.
I find myself humming it all the time now though.

Pianomaly--I have that problem too..about the false starts when playing in front of someone...or my digital recorder too! Please let us know how you combat or cure that...and I will do the same. I think just playing in front of someone more will help. I'm going to have my hubby sit next to me while I play, maybe his presence will make me more used to people listening to me. He usually is in the room, but it's different if someone is looking right at you (or the red "record" light is on!)

I had a devil of a time with Can Can and now it's a real rocker for me. I slowed it waaaaaayyyy down but kept the rhythm going that slow, and that seemed to work. Also playing the same measure you are having problems with will help as well.

Aimee...I feel your pain about the Saints. I am in Green Bay Packer country and there could be a world war and our news leads off with....football! I got to the Saint's song during the Super Bowl Season, so I actually enjoyed playing it during that time...it helped me learn it so I could play it during that week! But I understand totally! Good luck with Amazing Grace..those triplets look hard!

Doug, I don't think writing on your music is cheating. I started off by writing down the bass notes on each piece until I got them down. Now I don't need that crutch any more. You won't either! There are plenty of artists that write on their music to help them through passages!

NO piano for me this weekend...going down to Milwaukee to visit my ailing Mom. What am I going to do!! (go to a book store and buy more music probably) :-)

Have a great weekend everyone!

Nancy

False starts. I started doing that as well when I had lessons. My teacher quickly put her foot down on that. If I'd stop she'd make me restart where I stopped. She'd say, "You already played the beginning, start from here." And she'd point.

Another thing she had me do was to just start randomly somewhere in the song. She just point and I was to play just one measure. She'd point again and I'd play that measure and on and on.

Force yourself to start anywhere in the music and play just one measure. Stop. Skip to another random measure and play that one. Skip to another measure etc... I find it kind of hard because I don't know what finger to start the measure with. But regardless, it helps me with actually reading the music (by looking at the intervals and note values)instead of just memorizing it.

Pianomaly, you'll get both hands to come together. Just keep practicing and go slowly. Play only the left hand while you hum or sing the right. Then play the right hand and hum the left hand.

Hi Doug,

As someone who collects books and hates the idea of writing in them, I have found it very difficult to write in my sheet music.

But at a recent lesson, as I explained to my teacher the difficulties I was having in a couple of my new pieces, she flipped through my method book remarking on how I hadn't made any notes in it. I pointed out a little letter "D" I had written somewhere to remind me not to make an error (that I kept making), and she complained that I hadn't written it big enough.

It reminded me of students I used to have, complaining of difficulty they had solving some calculus problem, and when I asked them to show me how far they'd got, they hadn't written anything down, and I felt that they hadn't even started. (And asked myself if they really had any difficulty, or were just being lazy and wanted an answer from me.)

So at least for my teacher, if you try to tell her that you are struggling with a piece, you better have written notes to yourself all over it... Someone else suggested you should never sit down to practice without a paper and pencil. I still don't do it enough, but I think it helps. It's always interesting to go back and see what sort of difficulties you used to have playing a piece.

Pianomaly

I also didn't even think of making a mark in one of my books until I started lessons. One of the first things my teacher did was mark up a piece where I was playing the rhythm wrong. After that it was open season!

I frequently write in it to help with difficulties. I mark up rhythms, color code dynamics, flag problem areas, etc. I even write in the dates when I start a piece, when I consider I am playing it OK and then again when I have been passed on it.

I used to have to write in many of the bass clef notes but I don't have to do that any more so it seems to have helped with my note reading.

I frequently look back through at our notes.

If I need to really mark it up I make a copy of it and write on the copy. As soon as I can I go back to the unmarked (or minimally marked) version so I am not dependent on the markings.

Nancy - the triplets were terrifying, and I kept putting more emphasis on one of the notes (can't remember which now). What saved me was using the metronome. I found the sound of it annoying at first (and I couldn't stand the dinging sound at the beginning of each measure), but I am coming around.

No problem for me to write in my book.

Funny you mentioned math. Reminds me of my young son. He'll sit there and stare at the ceiling as he "tries" to work the problem in his head. It drove me nuts. Show your work so you know what you're doing! LOL

You'll be passing me soon. It takes me more than a month for me to get the Book 2 pieces down, and most people only take a week or so. I guess I'll be seeing you in the Book 2 thread soon. :-)

I'm pretty sure I haven't done any of the book 2 pieces in a week - more like a month!

My instructor suggested I buy Alfred's Basic Adult Piano Course Book #1. I purchased it yesterday. I will weigh in with my opinions of it's content within a few days. At this point I can only say, THE COVER ART IS HIDEOUS!

Don't judge a book by its cover

If you open it and keep it open on your music stand, you may never need to look at the cover again...

Happy playing,
AC

mom3gram, it'll be a long time before I catch you. I've been pushing really hard to get to the end of the book. I don't intend to keep pushing like that when I get to book #2. There will be a lot of us going you in the #2 thread soon.

@ the cover art.

Will be nice for more of you to join us in book two thread. I've been enjoying the first two weeks I've spent with the book.
It begins with some really easy, fun pieces.

I'm never going to make it to the end of the book.

Bang, Bang, Bang, Bang is all I hear in the left hand when playing He's Got the Whole World In His Hand. Bang, Bang, Bang, Bang

I'll keep going with it since it's introducing key signature changes within a song. I'm not sure it's all that great for practicing syncopation though. It's not hard to bang the same notes on the beat in one hand and just play a simple melody in the other. Basically it just awful and musically unappealing. And yes, I know I'm complaining...

I did learn a new song this weekend. A few more days until it's polished and even at that it won't be up to speed because of the last line. Here's the link if anyone is interested in an easy enough piece. Measures 13 & 14 are a little tricky, but I just go slow. There is at least another page, but I don't have them.