Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum Let's sight read - material and tips

Here's a compilation of free music sheet that I have found useful for practicing sight reading.

http://makingmusicfun.net/htm/printit_piano_sheet_music_index.htm
http://www.freesheetpianomusic.com/
http://www.gmajormusictheory.org/Freebies/freebies.html
http://www.capotastomusic.com/piano-sheet-music.htm
http://www.8notes.com/piano_sheet_music.asp
http://www.music-for-music-teachers.com/beginner-piano-music.html

And here is a real gem (Download the pdf "Hymns made easy"):
http://www.lds.org/cm/display/0,17631,8763-1,00.html
It's 80 pages of hymns written in an easy arrangement.

Also I'd also like to share what has worked for me. I've been practicing sight reading now for about 2 years, that's also when I began teaching myself to play the piano. My role model is Tom Brier who is truly an inspiration:



Currently, I'm using the "Hymns made easy" book. I play a piece only once or twice such that no memorization takes place. After I've played the 80 pages I start again from page 1.

Indeed, I recently printed scores of MakingMusicFun and "Hymns made ​​easy" to practice sight-reading.

- Here is another collection of hymns (325 pages)
- 140 pages of hymns

I would also check out the LDS Children's Songbook, even if you aren't LDS. Most of the songs are in the easy to intermediate level and they are great for sight reading. Here is the link:

http://www.lds.org/cm/display/0,17631,4766-1,00.html

I'm not sure how to just print the whole songbook, but maybe someone can figure it out. You can also buy a book copy. It's $20. (or, if you have an LDS friend, just ask them to give you a copy and they'll probably do it).

I'm using that! Its pretty good and gets me a load of kudos with the in laws at the same time (they are LDS - i'm not)

While it's not my priority, I'm working on sight reading. I've been using Mikrokosmos recently, the Keith Snell repertoire books and a Methodist Hymnal.

The hymnal is very good. The routine is to analyze the harmonic structure, play the soprano, then the bass part separately, then fill in the chords. The goal is to get the chords and hand shapes coordinated.

Slowly but surely it is working.

Thanks for the links! If you know more material please post them.
Meanwhile, here are some things that helped me:

Tip #1: Use a metronome
It is often said that we must not stop when sight reading even if we make mistakes. If we stop then we will get into trouble when playing in a band or in a duet. Now, the steady beat of the metronome emulates the band. Try it out, it will be easier to keep going if you listen to the beat.
The funny thing is when I first started with the metronome I could not hear the beats. I would get off beat pretty quickly. I was even convinced that the metronome was wrong! Thus, I learned to actually listen to what I'm playing.
If I don't use the metronome (sometimes I do this in order not to get too dependent) I will tap my foot.

Tip #2: Look ahead by playing slowly
Looking ahead sounds impossible for beginners. How can we look ahead 1 or even 2 bars if we cannot decipher the notes in lightning speed and translate them into finger movements. The answer is: Play slowly. I set the metronome to 40 bpm where one beat is a quarter note. It's slow? Yes, but we've got to start somewhere.
Only then I was able to play the notes and look somewhere else. For example, when you play half notes you have plenty of time to look somewhere else. You don't have to fix your eyes on these long notes. That way you can look ahead. (Most of the time I can only look half a bar ahead. I guess the 1 to 2 bar region comes with experience).
Now, you will probably laugh about this misconception that I had: I thought that in order to read two staves at once I had to keep my eyes in between the two staves. Of course, this does not work. I noticed that now my eyes keep jumping in all directions: I jump ahead, then back again to the place I'm currently playing, then from bass to treble.

See also Building Blocks to Effective Sight Reading by Barbara Fast

It's really good. I was asked to play for the children at church (primary), and I accepted even though I'm a terrible sight reader and had never accompanied anyone. After about three months, though, my sight reading had improved tremendously, and it was just from playing from the Children's Songbook for about an hour a day.

Tip: When practicing sight-reading study the score first, but vary the time of the pre-play study from 30 seconds (as in a sight-reading exam such as ABRSM etc) to a full in-depth review (20 minutes or thereabouts) away from the piano.

You can use this Extreme Sight-reading Pre-study Checklist as a guide.

I find formally working through this check list helps what you can gleam from the score in shorter times.

Tip #3: Pre-scan the music
Before playing have a look at the piece you are going to play. I use the STARS method (link1, link2) which stands for:
S - key signature
T - time signature and tempo
A - accidentals
R - rhythm and repeats
S - signs (dynamics, etc.)
These things are important to check since you don't want to be caught off guard e.g. when the key signature suddenly changes or the bass clef is replaced with a treble clef.

Prescanning a piece everytime before you play it takes some discipline.

EJR, that's an excellent checklist. I've stumbled upon your other blogpost too:
Sight-reading: YouTube Tutorials, Notes and Thoughts which contains alot of tips.

Besides, how is your sight reading practice going?

And if anyone knows of more videos showing sight readers please post them. I've only found the ones by Tom Brier.

Hi Veelo,

"how is your sight reading practice going?"

It's currently 'on hold' at the moment

Lately I've been focussed on technique. However, I've been downloading tons of graded materials and loading them onto a cheap Android tablet for sight-reading (your links were very useful).

So I'm about to hit it again big time!

Hey there, I just wanted to say thank you for the links!

Very useful resources and tips. Thanks, everyone!

I read somewhere about a guy that learned piano and sight-reading by taking every piece of music he could find and going for it. Not sure if that was a true story, but he claimed after stacks of music he was fluid with sight-reading.

After 2 years of playing, I can read music and play it. Super-slowly. It isn't a problem of reading the notes, but getting hands in place. If I play a piece 6x or so, it's then able to be anticipated and ironed out, if it isn't a very complex piece. Every year I get better and better at sight reading, so it really does take practice; I can imagine after 10 years of this study it would be rather easy to sight-read and play all those pieces on "Making Music Fun" without pausing or stumbling.

I suspect if you bashed your head against every object you could find eventually you would find you could break through a wall. Or end up unconscious.

For those who find sight reading comes easy (and this is one of those areas where I do believe that some natural inclinations to way s of working - call it talent if you must - can make some people just run with it) that approach may work. For the rest of us, nothing beats working with simple material you can play rather than struggling with stuff you can't.

I belong to that group of people.

Although one of the tricks is to practice reading material that are above your sight-reading level, so you force to practice making decisions about which stuff to ignore, which is also valuable.

For example: I can't sight read 4 voice chorals, but I try to play only the bass and soprano and try to add 3th or 4th voice here and there (where I can).

Some recommended books on several posts of this forum:

- Introduction to Classics to Moderns (40 pieces, 32 pages)
- Joy of First Classics 1 and 2 (60 pieces, 80 pages each)
- Easy Classics to Moderns (142 pieces, 160 pages)

I just purchased a copy of Selected Works by Gurlitt that looks like great sight reading material.

Joy of First Classics is very good.

Thank you for the links and recommendations! Please post more

Meanwhile, here is an interesting thesis on sight reading:

A survey of the development of sight-reading skills in instructional piano methods for average-age beginners and a sample primer-level sight-reading curriculum
by Dirkse, Scott, M.M., UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH CAROLINA, 2009

Chapter 4 (page 47) with an actual sight reading curriculum is a must read!

Thanks for the link; I'll have to study it a little. Glancing at chapter 4 it seems they emphasize keyboard topography. I believe that is my weakest area ... I have very little spacial acuity - at least down the accuracy of a single key.

I'm using the "levels" at this website as a guide. They give plenty of suggestions for books at each sight-reading level.
http://www.soundfeelings.com/products/music_instruction/sight-reading_books.htm

I'm using Level 2. Now I know that I can expect a good sight-reading level of music from "big note" piano books. From the list I bought the "100 Best Loved Piano Solos" book and the "Fun to Play Christmas Songs". I also bought a big-note/easy piano "The Disney Collection", which is slightly harder, but not by much.

I feel confident that there are a good number more books out there that are suggested on the website if I don't feel ready to move up for a while. But I've seen a good improvement in my sight-reading.

I also have "The Joy of First Classics", "The Joy of First Classics 2", "Easy Classics to Moderns" and "More Easy Classics to Moderns". But I feel I'm not quite up to those. Right now I'm very comfortable with the level I'm working at, even if it's not always perfect. (It's sight-reading, what do you expect?)

I'm sight-reading 3 pieces a day, one from each of the big-note books I bought.
______________________________

I have a proposal if anyone would be interested. We could post videos here of our sight-reading, like a sight-reading piano bar -- or make a new thread where we can all post videos of our sight-reading.