1silkyferret, does the "toy" sound as loud as the real thing? Where did you put it?

No sore elbows here, but when I had rotator cuff problems, advil and icing it for about 15-20 minutes helped. Or maybe you can google "tennis elbow" and see if there are any suggestions for self treatment.

The klunks and odd noises from the wood batons are louder than the tone bars. The action on this thing is downright wierd. I mean real wierd.
The cat toy is now in the living room by the window. we have a sofa in front of it. and there is plenty of room between the bench and the back of the sofa.
Found out yesterday that some old simple xmas stuff sounds real pretty on the carillon,my teacher gave me this fat music book to pick a xmas song to play.
I will try the home remedies. I am used to the idea of the pains going a way but these have just gotton worse.
My boyfriend is staring at it. who knows maybe he might decide to try this insanity (yah right). I need to do some work on it but it has moved a few states and the fact that it is in as good of shape that it is in is a miracle. The frame is iron.
How is your playing coming. Mine still sucketh big time!!!!!

Some days it's not too bad. On Thanksgiving I took turns with my 11 year old granddaughter playing Christmas carols. Neither of us was great, but we had a good time.

I would imagine that Christmas music would be great on the carillon.

Good luck with your new toy.

Hello All,

Just thought I'd add my progress. After getting a bit stuck on "Dueling Harmonics" (p.31 in the All-in-One Course) I'm now on page 37 (Mary Ann). Anyone else where I am? Anyone else have difficulty with "Dueling Harmonics?"

By the way, Mark, these Alfred threads were great ideas, so thanks!

I might as well add too that I'm enjoying this stuff!

Ang

Hi again everyone! Hope everyone is doing nicely as the holidays close in.

I was hoping for some advice. I've been working through book 1 and have found the beginning pages very easy (I have previous treble clef knowledge so that helped...thankfully I remembered more than I expected!) but when I got to bass clefs I have run into a bit of a snag. For those of you that have done it - is it better to learn the lessons 100% and then move on or keep just practice it [the troublesome part] daily and still work forward? I've been trying to stick with it to learn them but it's getting so boring! Should I start memorizing (I've even considered flashcards to try and help get them down) or try and balance my practice more so I won't get so bored? Any advice you can give would be greatly appreciated!

Oh, yeah, angelojf, I had trouble with the "dueling harmonics" also. I still have trouble reading those two note together patterns, which of course appear in most of the songs in the book. The good thing is that after you have figured them out, you remember what they are for that particular piece. I liked "Mary Ann".

Timeturner, I usually move on when the song is more or less recognizeable and I usually have two or three in various stages of finishing. When I get to a piece that gives me a lot of trouble, I tell myself that I'm stopping there for a while - review only, no new stuff. It doesn't take long before I get bored and I'm ready for a new one.

Thanks, mom3gram. I think I'll move on and keep practicing the bass too. Hopefully, it will eventually click

Hi everyone! Thought I'd add in my progress here too...

After getting book 1 almost everything until page 105 was like a review for me. The pieces were not that difficult and I gained more understanding about chords which were previously 'just there' for me. So now I've reached 'Got Those Blues!' and I feel I'll be learning more new stuff onwards and I'm very excited!

I also got a volume on Sonatinas so I have something to work with other than Alfred's. I'm done with the first one and it's on my youtube account.

Hi Henrique,

I'm currently working from the Alfred All-In-One, level 1 book, and my CD came with that book upon the purchase, so I don't know of a particular source where you can purchase just the CDs seperately.

Perhaps you may have already done it, but you can also try looking on Amazon.com or Google searches for these books and see if they would offer them as seperate items. In the mean time, other ABF members' recordings located on the first post of this thread and/or YouTube videos can also be of help.

Good luck,

Key Notes

I purchased just the cd for book 1 from sheetmusicplus.com

They also sell book 2 cd.

The price was something like $8 something

I hope that helps.

KaylaX

Just a note. The ABF recordings sound alot better than the cd!!!!!!

I finally nailed "On Top of Old Smokey". While I was learning, and after I had probably played it at least 25 times within the hearing range of my 37 year old son, he said to me "Are you trying to play "On Top of Spaghetti?"

Now that it sounds pretty good, I've started "Can-Can". My daughter and family are staying with me for Christmas, and she was puzzled and said that I must be working on a different "Can-Can" than she is familiar with. I told her that when I can hit the right notes with the right timing, it would sound exactly like the song she knows. Of course, she doesn't believe it, but my son agreed - "Mom's just playing it at the wrong speed. It will sound right when she can speed it up". Well, that and not hitting so many wrong notes. :-)

Hi Everyone, I'd like to introduce myself. My name is Rodger and I'm going to take a serious stab at learning to play the piano. It looks like I found a great place for moral support. I recently purchased a Yamaha P140 and love playing it. I also recently started on Alfred's Book 1 and am working on the first harmonic intervals and starting the tune Marry Ann. I've been playing guitar all my life and improvise a lot on it, so I have been doing "music," but in a pretty unstructured way. I've been reading the forum a lot over the last week or two and it's got me highly motivated. Now, I just have to stay that way!

Rodger

Welcome Rodger! We have some very nice people in these threads as well as in Piano world. Enjoy your piano journey.

Mark...

Merry Christmas everyone. Been awhile since I posted in the Alfred thread but I'm posting cause I'm on my last song in the first book. I swear I don't know how people get through the books in 6-7 months. Took me over a year. And then it amazes me how well they play. How do some of you do it? I can play but not that good and maybe another year I'll upload a song. No amount of goading could get me to upload one now even though I feel ok about my progress.

I finally got a new teacher after about 6 months without one which hampered my progress but I'm really happy with her. She teaches learning a song hands together from the start which is faster for me but she also prefers teaching from
Fabers so I'll be going to Fabers second book. So I'll be reading the thread from time to time but I'll be in a different book. Good playing to everyone and may your progress be quick and satisfying.

Congratulations, to complete the course is something to be proud of,
I too am amazed at how quick some progress, I have been doing the course about 8 months, I am thinking by the time I get to finish the course I will be a year + but that's OK

When I completed book one, I didn't play everything that well. Same with book 2. In fact I still play Amazing Grace, Entertainer, and Scarborough Fair to perfect them. My teacher just wanted me to learn certain technical things and move on. Not prefecting everything. I'm progressing but far for being really good. All in time.

And my teacher tells me all the time..."You don't play great where you are at, but where you have been"

Way to go mom3gram!

I'm enjoying Scarborough Fair at the moment. I can't believe that I'm actually learning not just how and when to apply the sustained foot pedal, but are even now learning how to apply "overlapping" pedal techniques. I remembered that not too long ago when I first started out that I was pretty petrified of even using any of the pedals at all. And to think, I've always been used to and enjoy driving manual transmission cars.

Merry Christmas to you and yours!

Key Notes

Welcome Rodger, from one guitar player to another!
Keep us updated on how you are doing, and make sure you post any questions!

Angelo

Welcome Rodger. I also love guitar music eventhough I don't know how to play it. You certainly have selected a wonderful forum to learn and to share your musical experiences with.

Enjoy!

Key Notes

Hi timeturner,

Just another beginner's friendly advise but I tend to practice my troubled spots until I can get them up to the intended speed and tempos, as well as blend them as smoothly as possible with the rest of the other segments before moving on.

Hope this helps and have fun!

Key Notes

Definitely to Mark... for starting these wonderful Alfred network of support threads.

How's Mary Ann coming along? It's great that you are having so much fun learning.

Cheers,

Key Notes

That's fabulous ninja8701! Congratulations!!!

Key Notes

Wonderful words of wisdom. Thanks Mark...

Key Notes

Thanks, Key Notes. I will definetly plan on doing that when I finally hit a song snippet. I've just been so worried about trying to get my left hand knowledge up to where my right hand is that I haven't progressed very far at all. I'm even at the point of deciding whether or not to get bass clef flashcards to help my knowledge in that area. I know a lot of people are against them but since I'd be using them just specifically to memorize that part of the clef it will hopefully help me.

Thanks again for the great advice and Merry Christmas everyone!

Key Notes,

May all the good will and cheer you share come back to you many times over, and the blessings of the season fill you with peace and love.

Best wishes,

Lisztener

Not at all, you're very welcome Timeturner. Since we all learn things differently and in different ways, it's good that you'll do whatever it takes in order for you to learn the materials. I would also suggest focusing and spending more time on reading and playing the bass clefs (left hand) more often than the trebles (right hand), even if it's going to be at a very, very slow pace to help maybe catch it up with the right a bit.

Good luck to you.

Key Notes

Thank you Lisztener. Best wishes to you and yours as well.

Key Notes

Thanks for the welcome. I think my guitar playing has definitely helped the dexterity of my fingers and in being able to pick out melodies by ear. I really wish I would have spent more time (any time!) in learning how to read music, though! But I did play percussion from 5th grade through high school, so reading rhythmic patterns is something I've had some practice at.

Also, my daughter got me a Christmas Song Fake book for Christmas, where the melody is written with chord charts above, no bass cleff. One of my goals is to be able to play from a lead sheet and figure out my own rhythm parts. I do still jam with some friends on the guitar and really would like to add some piano into the mix. Anyway, I'm going to do my best to make it through this course without getting distracted by other instruments, or other piano methods. That's one of my big problems -- staying the course when it comes to music. I'm always wanting to experiment and learn by ear, but that has really limited my guitar playing so I want to do it right with the piano. I hope this forum helps me stay focused!

Rodger

Hello everyone! I am quite happy that I stumbled upon this forum. What a wealth of information! Since I am in this thread, it should be noted that I am also working my way through Book 1 of the Alfred's series. Needless to say I am having a ton of fun and wish I had started to play music so much earlier in life. No time like the present!

Currently, I am working on Cafe Vienna and Lullaby. I will say that I did not like Blow the Man Down, at least not at first, it definitely becomes much more fun to play once you have it mostly together.

Happy Holidays everyone!

Ryan

Welcome to the forum Ryan and the Alfred's thread.