This is an offshoot from the two other threads regarding the Alfred Books.

I have just finished the Alfred Adult All-In-One course Bk 1 and recently moved to Book 2. I am fully aware of the tendency of Alfred to leave the student with a weak LH due to the chordal approach. Fortunately, I have been working with my teacher on a supplementary book, the Frances Clark Library of Contemporary Literature Bk 1 so my LH is recovering. However, I would like to build true finger independence and was wondering what book/s could help me with that.

A teacher mentioned in the other thread that working on Baroque/Bach and Contemporary literature requires more finger independence than Classical/Romantic. What book or series do you recommend?

Or am I just wasting time with Alfred? My goal is to be able to play both pop (fakebook) and classical music and I thought Alfred would help with learning to play pop. Working with a graded book also gives me the feeling of progress so I haven't dropped it (though I am also working on pieces of various levels of difficulty with my teacher, which are all technically more advanced than Alfred).

I do wonder, why don't you ask your teacher?

edited to add: The reason I ask is that if you are paying a teacher to teach you, then they will have the ability to determine what is best for you since they know where you are at in your development. I can recommend many books, but your teacher is the best resource for this.

LOL...you're right. Why don't I just ask my teacher? It's just that got used to showing some sheet music to my teacher (actually the books are piled up on the piano) and then she starts making me play it, so I've always felt that I have a big part in deciding what pieces to play.

Well, there's nothing wrong with that, but often you can be so busy telling your teacher what you're going to do that you don't have time to listen to what *she* would have you do.

Adult students have a partnership with their teachers that is different than the 3-way partnership between teacher-child-parent. Adults should definitely give the teachers their goals and let them know what id giving them a hard time week to week. And then: listen. Let the teacher take over from there in detailing how you will overcome such problems, or how you will attain such goals.