Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum Can you assign me pieces/exercises?

Presentation

I start from scratch and I have no money for a teacher (really, I'm not just mean).

I would like to know if this forum can assign me some pieces/exercises and maybe even give me some feedback (I can easily record and upload).
If I'm left alone I:
* wouldn't know where to start, and I'll pick hard pieces, going nowhere;
* wouldn't know what short term goals to set;
* will give up more easily.

I'm just asking if this is possible or not, so don't bang me.

Happy playing.

The Alfred's Adult Piano Book 1 thread in this forum might be a good way to go - it's a method book, but people work thru it with other people doing the same thing. You can upload your pieces to that thread, or to the monthly piano bar and others will comment. That way you have assigned pieces in an order that will help you learn and build a good base so that you can do more fun pieces as you go. I think the Alfred's also have supplemental books so that you have lots of pieces at each level so you don't get bored.

You could also join the MOYD group here. It stands for Master of Your Domain, and you sign up to try to get to the piano every single day. And if you can't one day, you have to go to the thread and confess But that's the only penalty. The reward, however, is that you play every day, for at least a little while, and everyone in the thread applauds! What more could a piano player ask for?

And then there's the Achievement of the Week thread, where you get to brag about what you've done for the week, and you get even more applause!

And the above mentioned piano bar. There's a place to upload your pieces. Or there's quarterly recitals (the next one is mid-May) that can give you a motivation to do a little harder piece every three months.

So if you take advantage of any of those, or all of them, there's lots of places to get help with motivation here.

Cathy

Thanks for the reply.


I'll check it out!


I already "spotted" that topic a while ago, I'll probably use it.

If you are looking for classical music method book, check out Fundamental Keys. http://fundamentalkeys.com/book.html. It will start you out finding notes on the piano to taking you all the way through to about grade 3 piano. The video lessons are awesome.

Screw what I said.
Playing stuff I don't like is just not going to work.
I'll just keep practicing on some easy pieces that I like, hopefully I can learn something from them anyway.
Playing "happy birthday" will just make me hate the piano.

What do you like?

Well let's continue here:
http://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/2060816/33.html

I spent a couple of years doing just this. I learnt a couple of quite advanced pieces that I really like, and some smaller also quite advanced pieces. By advanced I mean that they were not beginner pieces, and so took a long long time to learn to play musically, and in tempo with dynamics.

Then, I realised 'I could not play piano'. I had no foundation, and minimal theory. Learning new pieces was taking almost just as long.

To cut the story short, you need to learn some basics, timing, technique, theory, dÅ·namics, hand independence, reading and ear.

Of course you could follow both paths, which is what I do now.

What level of playing are you at? How advanced/easy a piece can you play?

Everyone has to eat their vegetables, if they want to grow up big and strong.

If happy birthday is no good, then try to embellish it with trills, arpeggios, etc...
Make an exercise out of simple pieces

Or try something simple like Ode to Joy but add syncopation,jazz it up if you will.

Couldn't have said it better.
It takes a lot of arrogance to dismiss progressive learning methods so quickly. Since you already know what you like and don't like, why are you asking us to assign you pieces? You wouldn't want to play most of them.

By the way, I learned tons of very nice pieces by following the Alfred's method. I am currently on Swan Lake and Scheherazade.

255. At the very beginning, some of the songs in method books are probably not on anyone's list of top songs to play. But the method's lay down a foundation of skills that will help get you to a point that you can play songs you really want to play. If you take the approach that you are paying your dues by working through a method, you may be surprised at how fast you can progress to the point where you can take on better material. And you'll be much better equipped to do it.

In my opinion jumping ahead of skill level to songs that are above ones ability becomes frustrating because of how long it takes to work through them. I tried that at the beginning and it did not work well. Take a look at some of the methods at your local music store, you might find something that you can live with and enjoy. A few months worth of hard work and you will be miles ahead.

Thank you. And that should be a reminder to all of us to eat plenty of greens every day! Mmm, good. I like peas and green beans myself.

Theory is another "vegetable" a student must "eat" to succeed.

Yes, music study is definitely a full course meal.

It is understandable that some beginners don't want to play songs like Happy Birthday. What is important to realize is that an easy piece does not necessarily mean that it sounds like a children's song. A technically easy song can still sound sophisticated and can take a lot of time to master. At least that's the realization I got early on.

The Classics to Moderns series from Denes Agay has been a great source for me. It contains only original, non-simplified songs and is organized by grades.
I also use The Piano Handbook by Carl Humphries which contains some very nice pieces plus all the piano theory. A good reference.

I read your post here, Cathy,

I never knew what these things meant or were, so thanks for explaining that for everybody.

--> You could also join the MOYD group here. It stands for Master of Your Domain, and you sign up to try to get to the piano every single day. And if you can't one day, you have to go to the thread and confess laugh But that's the only penalty. The reward, however, is that you play every day, for at least a little while, and everyone in the thread applauds! What more could a piano player ask for?

And then there's the Achievement of the Week thread, where you get to brag about what you've done for the week, and you get even more applause!

And the above mentioned piano bar. There's a place to upload your pieces. Or there's quarterly recitals (the next one is mid-May) that can give you a motivation to do a little harder piece every three months.


So if you take advantage of any of those, or all of them, there's lots of places to get help with motivation here.

Wow, just to sit down at any piano and play anything is awesome. And it is not just the moment, it is the journey.