I can play several intermediate pieces, but when it comes to sight-reading I'm in the very early stages, even though I've been working on it for a year now.

The idea of improving my sight-reading is a bit of an obsession of mine, and I do it between 15 and 45 minutes a day (more or less), but after a year of this, should I be better than I am? I don't know.

The advice I believe the most in is this: Do many, many pieces at a level you're comfortable at before increasing the difficulty.

I can't find fifty books at each grade level, which I would love to find, but I did manage to find some good collections of pieces in bulk, at the same level within each book -- the books compiled and edited by Denes Agay.

I now have the book "Easy Classics to Moderns" and I'm ecstatic about it. The pieces are great and at a good level. I could easily learn them, but as for sight-reading, I'm just not as accurate as I should be. I need to start at a lower level.

I considered Agay's "An Introduction to Classics to Moderns", which includes "forty very easy original keyboard pieces". However, there was no preview available for me to test the pieces. Instead I played through the preview pieces in "The Joy of First Classics" and I felt they were at a much better level for me than "Easy Classics to Moderns".

So this is my plan. First, I'm going to go on a book-buying spree. $100 budget.

The Joy of First Classics (80 pages)
The Joy of First Classics 2 (80 pages)

An Introduction to Classics to Moderns (32 pages)

(Owned) Easy Classics to Moderns (160 pages)
More Easy Classics to Moderns (160 pages)

My hope is that after sight-reading 192 pages of comfortable material, I might be ready to move on to the slightly more difficult "Classics to Moderns" books. Then, after sight-reading 320 pages at that level, I would hope to be able to move on to more difficult things, like Agay's intermediate level book, so on and so forth.

Sight-reading will take up anywhere from 3 minutes to 45 minutes daily.

Call me an idiot, but this is all I have to go on after a year of practice.

What are your thoughts on this approach?

If you are anything like me, you will breeze through the easier stuff and then need 20 books worth of the "next level".

But, in general, I say keep plugging on and it will get better. I have to keep "forcing" myself to look ahead more (definitely working for simpler pieces) and not stop for re-dos.

My current set of sight reading material is a couple of exercises a day from level three of Paul Harris's "Improve your Sight Reading" plus a piece from "Easy Classics to Moderns". The latter is pretty tricky sight reading material for my level but the pieces are so lovely it's hard to resist.

I think I'm going to pick up those "Joy of first Classics" because they should be ones I can use to really check I am playing them at first sight, with expression, etc. and not just stumbling.

Hey, Andy!

I used the Paul Harris books, too, but I breezed through them. Not necessarily well, but somewhere in book 7 I realised I wasn't as accurate as I'd like to be and I needed a better grounding in the earlier levels.

Let's see . . . it must have taken me about 10 months to get from the start of book 1 to halfway through book 7. They are great books, and I'll be using them to give my beginner students some foundation in sight-reading/music reading.

I just thought that with 40 pages each there wasn't quite enough at each level for me to be truly comfortable, and that might be why I was struggling. But then again, by the time I stopped, I was trying to read what they call "early advanced" sight-reading.

I'm really excited about the Joy of First Classics books as well. I think it'll do me good to have the experience of proper accurate reading as opposed to stumbling, and I think through that my pattern recognition could improve. Just a theory.

Just to add my input, I use the Paul Harris Improve books for the grade I'm aiming for. I then use the specimen tests by ABRSM. I then use the Paul Harris books again but the previous edition (pre-2009 I think or maybe before then) and then use the specimen tests by ABRSM but again the previous edition. This is 4 books per grade. I also think that the earlier sight reading tests for ABRSM are harder than the more recent so there's a bit of an increase in difficulty throughout the process.

I'm using the Classcs to Moderns books for sight-reading too. Introduction was just right. Easy is more challenging as sight-reading, but will be good for me I think. Today I had a big success: I made errors, but continued on in perfect time.

Ukbuk: Sounds like a pretty good approach as well.

That's great, PianoStudent! Well done. It's definitely a skill to keep the beat and not try to correct everything. After all, it is sight-reading! (Which means when you're playing in front of people, they'll notice if you stop to correct something but they might not notice if you just keep playing.)

I've managed to find the books on Book Depository, so I won't have to pay the shipping fee. Just have to find the $50 now.

I bought the...
Introduction to Classics to Moderns
Easy Classics to Moderns, and
More Easy Classics to Modern ... from the book depository last week.

The Introduction to Classics to Moderns arrived today; the other two books had arrived yesterday and Friday. I was eager to look at the Introduction of Classics to Moderns after reading this thread to compare all 3.

I am very much a beginner but can see how much easier the Intro to Classics to Moderns is compared to the other two books. I just wish it had as many pieces in it as the other ones (32p. against 160p.) I'm very grateful though, to the person who first suggested the book in another thread, cause I love it!

Maechre - I hope the Introduction to Classics to Moderns isn't going to be too easy for you?? I managed to do a few from the book tonight. They were each only 2 lines long, but the point is I'm a super-beginner, and could do them (with mistakes I should add) - so maybe you will find them too simple?

If you like, I can scan some of the pages as a pdf. - maybe the contents and a few pages so you can get a preview?

When you all talk about using the books for sight reading, could you explain what you mean?

Do you literally take the book to your piano, open up to a random page and start to play it? Do you do a quick read through of it before you start to play it?

Apart from sight reading, do any of you do 'music reading' for lack of a better term? That is take some music and read it when you are not at the piano as a way of improving your ability to read/understand music? If you do this, do you see an improvement when you are sight reading? Does it help your overall ability to play, or do you find learning pieces at the piano more beneficial?

nikky, I sight-read two pages a day, starting at the beginning and reading two pages each day. I do spend a little time looking over the piece before playing it. I don't practice reading away from the piano.

Hey, Nikky. Thanks for taking a look.



Hmmm. Maybe. If they are too easy, at least the book would provide useful material for my beginner student (if this whole teaching thing turns out).



As for me, when I'm talking about sight-reading, this is what I'm doing.
1. Looking at key signature.
2. Looking at time signature.
3. Looking at the first and last notes (to find the tonality - major/minor.)
3a. Playing the scale.
4. Looking for more difficult sections so I'm ready for them.
5. This is also the time I notice articulation (staccato, accents etc.), phrasing, repeats all those little things.
(6.) I'm not sure if I always do, but I should look over it generally and sort of sing it in my head to get an idea of what it might sound like.

If I do all that and then play the piece through, that's what I call sight-reading - whether it's good or bad sight-reading, haha!

As far as "opening up to a random page", I just don't do that personally. Unless it's a pop or rock book, I guess, but I wouldn't try sight-reading those yet. What I do is work sequentially through the book each day, playing one or two pages, and then turning the page and coming back to practise with a new piece the next day.

(I don't get caught up in how many I play each day, but it's not many. One minimum, two often. If I'm feeling good maybe three, or maybe I'll just fiddle around a bit after practising.)

I never read music away from the piano. I'd be interested to hear from people who do, though.

Before you spend much money -- check out the library! I have gotten many books for reading from libe.

You are me three years ago. I've been working on this for four years now, and I've described my experiences and give tips in my blog (see signature -- not selling anything, BTW).

My best advice is to find a teacher that is good at sight-reading and teaching sight-reading. Not easily done, and that may not be what you want to hear, but I think I could have accomplished in 2 years what took me 4 if I'd found my teacher earlier.

Another tip is: hymnals.

Here's what did NOT work for me: "Just keep at it and eventually you will get it."

There will be a lot of ups and downs, and if you're like me the progress will be slower than you expect.

Hey, Al. I found your blog a year ago when my sight-reading obsession began, and it's very inspirational. I always look forward to a new progress update.

The teacher point is a good one, and one I'll definitely pursue as soon as I have some decent money.

My hope is that rather than that, when I start my Advanced Diploma of Music this year (in two weeks! ) I can speak to the piano teachers about it and at least get a little more guidance.

The Agay graded books are great for sight-reading.

I also find John Kember's Piano Sight-Reading volumes (from Schott) useful. I am working my way through volume 2, which contains 150 *short* pieces, grouped into 16 themes, such as 'position changes in the right hand' (theme 4), 'simple position changes in both hands' (theme 6) and 'introducing triads' (theme 11). Each theme has a number (5 to 8) short pieces, so you can practice the same activity with a series of new-to-you pieces.

I also find it useful to look at sheet music away from the piano, while listening. For example, while listening to a CD, or to someone else playing. So far I've done this with Bach's Well Tempered Clavier (both volumes) and with quite a few pieces by Froberger. It can - depending on the piece - be quite challenging to keep up with exactly where you are, and also, because you are not playing, it is perhaps easier to look ahead a bit and get into the habit of doing that.

I've decided to strike "Introduction to Classics to Moderns" from my list of to-buys. I don't think I'll need it.

I've been working through "Classics to Moderns" book 1 and I just think it's fantastic. I believe I'm getting much better, but I still think I could do even better with a more solid grounding which I'd recieve from working through "The Joy of First Classics" books 1 and 2.

So those two books and the second Classics to Moderns book are on my list for now. I may even buy some of the other Joy of... books as I scrape money together.

I've bought the Joy of First Classics books and the second Easy Classics to Moderns book from The Book Depository. Can't wait for them to arrive!

I just got a few new piano duet books at the used book store. I play one of the parts, recording it into my digital piano, then play it back and accompany it with the other part. This is good for making sure one doesn't stop or hesitate.

This is good practice for playing duets with my teacher, since playing with two bass or treble clefs sometimes freaks my brain out.

I'll emphasize something I mentioned in my blog: you can get better with one type of music, and still have problems with a different type. I do much better with hymns than with the types of simple pieces in classics to moderns.

I suppose classical music might become my forte. Thankfully, popular music like that from games and movies isn't dissimilar to classical, although it's a bit harder to anticipate.

The duet books are a great idea. I might get some myself for use with future students.