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

Absolutely! That would be great if either you or Mark can do it.

Hi John...in regard to my approach to Alfred, In book one I can say I played every piece. Most very well. Some not perfect though. 3 months self teaching 4 months with my teacher.

Book two took about 9 months with my teacher. I played them all. Some pretty good, a few very average. Some that I really didn't like not too well. But did work them all. Still in fact cleaning up the tail end of book two while in book 3.

I still go back and work pieces in book one and of course two.

Book three is a blast. Scary at first but the sounds are much more interesting.

And John based on your recording, you have nothing to worry about. Your playing is outstanding in my humble opinion. I wish I played as smooth as you and could record as well as you...so keep it up my brother, you sir are on your way.

I expect book 3 to take at least a year. There are some full orginal classic pieces at the end that will be major projects...

And just to add, even if it takes a couple or even a few years to work Alfred or any other method, when your done you will be a decent player. You need to have the mindset that it will be a life's work and the method is elementary school. Were going to have lots of fun in high school and college...

You will look back and remember fondly at your Alfred days...

Key Notes - as a "retired gentleman of leisure" I have more than my fair share of available practice time (imagine that ) and I'm using as much of it as I can (over and above my top prioriy, which is taking care of my wife's "honey-do' list) to make up for all the lost time when I was working too much and not playing at all.

I typically practice in 3 separate sessions (morning, mid-afternoon & early evening) per day totaling from 4-6 hours. During the morning session (the longest) I work from the Alfred Book. During the afternoon session I work mostly from a collection of intermediate level Christmas Carols (intermediate level to "push" my technique and Carols because I want to have some nice one's memorized by next Christmas). During the evening session I mostly work in the supplement from Alfred called "Sacrad Hymns for Piano, Levels 1 & 2" - excellent arrangements), although this is going to change soon to a Collection of Rogers & Hammerstein songs (intermediate level also and my main interest).

I don't miss too many days of practice except when my wife & I go on vacation - and I take a vacation from practice (which is helpful), but I'm always anxious to get back to it.

As far as being a "machine" - as I told Mark, if I am one I'm pretty old, broken down & rusty and in constant need of lubrication .

Thanks for asking. JF

Mark - thanks for the kind words. I'm really looking forward to Book 3 and beyond! And I agree - it isn't how long it took you to get thru Alfred, but how well you did it!

Do you think a separate thread in the ABF to take of survey of Alfred students is a good idea?

Regards, JF

you definitely have your priorities straight. One of my motto has always been, if you work hard, you should be able to play hard too.

I typically practice in 3 separate sessions (morning, mid-afternoon & early evening) per day totaling from 4-6 hours. During the morning session (the longest) I work from the Alfred Book. During the afternoon session I work mostly from a collection of intermediate level Christmas Carols (intermediate level to "push" my technique and Carols because I want to have some nice one's memorized by next Christmas). During the evening session I mostly work in the supplement from Alfred called "Sacrad Hymns for Piano, Levels 1 & 2" - excellent arrangements), although this is going to change soon to a Collection of Rogers & Hammerstein songs (intermediate level also and my main interest).[/QUOTE]

Nice regiment and repertoire.

I don't miss too many days of practice except when my wife & I go on vacation - and I take a vacation from practice (which is helpful), but I'm always anxious to get back to it.[/QUOTE]

Lovely.

As far as being a "machine" - as I told Mark, if I am one I'm pretty old, broken down & rusty and in constant need of lubrication .
[/QUOTE]

Wonderful thoughts and reminder.

I can't wait to get to book 3 from what you've described. Hopefully I won't give up somewhere along the way.

I don't think there will be much of a response based on the response right here. But if you like, go ahead and give it a try.

Thanks John Frank for your info! I appreciate all the help I can get at this point because I wish for it to be a successful journey...it doesn't take much to trip me up...lol..Thanks again!

Regarding the question of how long people have spent in the various Alfred method books, I think it’s important to keep in mind that other people’s progress really has little bearing on one’s own experience. There are just far too many variables, some of which have already been pointed out.

If this were the “Children’s Beginner Forum” then things might be on a slightly more even playing field. But as adults we have a whole life’s worth of experiences and conditions that can affect how we progress. Did we grow up in a household where an adult or a sibling played piano? Have we had any previous experience with the instrument? Have we, or do we now, play another instrument? Have we had any other formal education in music, either in grade school, high school, or beyond? Did we start out already knowing how to read music? Are we learning with or without the aid of a teacher? How much time do we have to practice on a daily basis? Are we practicing each piece to perfection, or “getting the gist of it” and moving on? Are we building a repertoire of pieces that we can sit down and play for friends and family from memory, or are we building the skills we need to start building such a repertoire latter on? Is the type of music we are now perusing something that is well known to us, or is it something new? Has learning to play the piano been a life long goal, or something that we’ve only recently discovered? The list goes on and on and I’m sure I’ve left out more important topics then I’ve included.

That said, it’s still interesting to learn how others have been progressing, but don’t let this information alter how you feel about the progress that you have been making. If you are enjoying the journey, then why not stick around and see where it may take you?

Undone

jukeboxjim, You brought up many great points which is why this will be an unscientific survey not to be used to literally compare yourself with one another, but more as a gauging range within the level that you are at, since some of us are new to using these method books such as myself.

I'm sure that we won't get everyone's input and the ones that does may or may not give complete answers, but considering all of these factors, as you also admitted, "it's still interesting to learn how others have been progressing."

JF, Up to you but if you were to set them up, perhaps you can have a seperate thread for each of the Alfred's method books, 1, 2 & 3 practice/finish time frames (?).

Cheers,

Key Notes

Ok, so I was playing around a bit using lilypond notation software as well as the demo version of Pianoteq and generated this using the arrangement of Amazing Grace at the end of Book One. Unfortunately, lilypond generates funky midi files (which are really only meant for listening to be sure you typed in the notes correctly) and uses volume to adjust for dynamics instead of key velocity. While this sounds somewhat ok with a normal midi player, pianoteq uses the key velocity to manage dynamics. So I found a python module that dealt with midi files and just tied into the controller 7 messages (volume) and edited the note_on events to use the volume as the velocity and set all volume messages to 127 (the file timing got messed up if I removed the events). The other side effect of running through the python script seems that in a few places the pedals got a bit mixed up. Oh well.

If anyone wants a file of anything else in book 1 just let me know and I'll try to work on it. I won't distribute the midi file itself nor the lilypond source files for the music.

Amazing Grace midi via Pianoteq using the Bech. preset

Remember, don't comment on the playing, because I didn't play it.

Here's the code I used in python to modify the velocity messages in the midi file (pretty easy thanks to the premade python module to handle the midi file itself. I used the module found here: http://www.mxm.dk/products/public/pythonmidi

Key Notes - I may take your good advice (as usual) and do so in the near future, but right now I have another topic I want to pursue. Stay tuned.

Regards, JF

Update on my progress. I am polishing Auld Lang Syne, Jericho, and The Stranger. Just started Greensleeves and Go Down Moses this past weekend, but they seem to be progressing well.

Oh, I'm so glad that you are playing. I was worried that you would actually take the advice in the teachers' forum to heart and wait until you got a teacher. Sounds like you are doing well. I enjoyed reading about you and Jillian piano shopping.

Oops, I appologize jukeboxjim for accidentally missed addressing you in my replied to Undone.

Key Notes

Hi AWTPP, It's wonderful to know that you didn't give up on yourself and your dreams.

When I first started I already had the mind set that I will enjoy and appreciate whatever I can learn to play on the piano, because no matter how bad it is, it's still a lot better than never giving myself that chance at all.

Thanks for sharing your progress, and happy playing to you.

Key Notes

Quite flattering, but not necessary.

Have a fabulous day!

Key Notes

Yeah, I was a little taken aback by the suggestion to put away the piano for the time being. You might notice, though that there were other teachers who chimed in with other points of view. There was some real encouragement in that thread to counteract some of the less enthusiastic responses.

At any rate, I'm still at it. I think what I am going to do is continue what I've been doing for the last month. Get the pieces to the point where they are acceptable, even if not perfect, then move on. I do also intend to take a month or so to "finish" some of the imperfect pieces, before moving on to Book Two.

We're also supposed to close on the house we're building this summer, which should also coincide with my next piano purchase. I will put off starting Book Two until all that is complete.

One other thing about that thread... I DO intend to secure an instructor after we move. I was warned that my new instructor may or may not want to use Alfred's... and they may also want to begin me in Grade (or Phase, or Book, or what have you) One of whatever method they use, if any. I'm coachable. I'll do what I'm told. But I may still use Alfred's Book Two as a supplement.

In the meantime, I'm on my own. Or more correctly, you are my instructors and fellow classmates. If I could just figure a way to get a decent recording posted...

youtube is a great way to post videos but it takes a video camera and then you upload the video of you playing