I asked my 7 year old student last night if there was any other pieces of music he'd like to learn to play. There was nothing he could think of.

Can anyone suggest any "fun" music books he could learn to play? He said that he loved playing a simplified "Ode to Joy"
last year so maybe something like that? My child isn't 7 years old yet, so I have no idea what they age group likes.

I have 2 other students who were very specific on what they want to learn at their next lesson (which is nice, because I know how to keep them enthused).

Thanks!
Gisele

I find that kids that age love to learn/play the "Indian" stuff. The steady tempo and the intervals makes it sound really cool, but they're not that hard to learn.

Bastien has a book called "Indian Life".

Music out of the Piano Adventures Popular Repertoire Primer? It has catchy songs like "catch a falling star", "I've got rhythm" and "in the jungle". Pretty easy to play, and they can sing the pieces first to get it in their head before trying to play it.

I wrote out a simplified version of "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" that my 7 year old male student played in my spring recital. He even dressed in his baseball uniform! His mother said he played it for anyone who would listen.

My students seem to universally love "Ode to Joy." I think it feels like a real piece to them, they are fascinated by the idea of playing Beethoven, and many of them are familiar with the tune. I think that means he would enjoy something he recognizes that makes him feel like he is really playing something, but it doesn't necessarily have to be from the "Dead White Guy" composers.

You don't mention what level your student plays. Two books that my younger students seem to like a lot are the Faber & Faber Piano Adventures Primer Level Gold Star Performance, and the Level 1 Performance Book - especially "Showboat" and "Jack and the Beanstalk." All my young students get the Level 1 Performance book, but for the Primer Gold Star book, I just use it to find recital songs for young students. I usually pick a couple I think they would enjoy, play them through, and let them have the final choice.

Sometimes I ask students what they have on their Ipods. (Yes, even most of my younger students have Ipods.) That gives me a good clue as to what sort of music they like.

There are these series of easy pop books. I have youngsters who love things like the theme from 'Donny Darko' and tunes like 'Cry Me a River'. Often it's an incentive for them to read.

FJH has a duet book by Melody Bober called 'Hats Off to You', featuring 6 songs that coincide with particular hats: sombrero, baseball cap, pirate hat, cowboy hat, clown, and secret agent hat. The pieces are fun and you get to change hats. My students love this book.

Hi!

Always a challenge to find something kids find fun.

Jane Hergo has a book - Five Finger Frolics - which my younger students tend to like. All the pieces have both thumbs on Middle C so it really helps with their sight reading. And yes, there's an Indian song, but also one for Halloween called Scary Night and others that have various moods. Really fun.
But if your student wants familiar songs, depending on his level, the Five FInger Series is good for very basic melody only playing and have a whole range from TV Tunes to Movies to Broadway, etc. One for a bit more advanced level, but not terribly difficult is Kids Rule with themes from Star Wars, Harry Potter, The Wizard of Oz, and other films.

I also always love Bach's Minuet in G. My little guys love to play that!

Joan

I dug around a titch and found this on another thread, which shouldn't present a kid with too much difficulty, plus be pretty, fun, and recognizable.

The Faber Popular Repertoire and the Pretime to Bigtime Series have a number of pieces students enjoy, some of mine really enjoy "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" (I think there are two versions the Fabers publish, one in the Level 1 Pop. Rep. and the other I think in the 2A popular, and some of the girls really like "I'm always chasing rainbows (this is in the Jazz one, not sure if it's Level 1 or 2A Pretime to Bigtime).

Hal Leonard also happens to have a nice collection of very easy arrangements of popular songs.

Meri

Shame on you! You must say "Native-American".

Seriously, there is a little "Indian Dance" in one of the early Aaron books that I like. By that, I mean that it works, and kids like it.

It got changed to—and I am NOT making this up—to "Rock On!", or something similar.

I also think that for very small kids anything that goes WOMP womp womp womp, WOMP womp womp womp is great for encouraging steady rhythm.

That's funny Gary because I actually thought of that when I posted it. I wondered to myself why no one has changed it yet. lol

I guess they're working on it



Yup they love that!

I personally find that the younger students really enjoy playing duets with me...so I have a few of my 4 and 5yr olds in books that are solely simplified piano duets...