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

Just wanted to check in here and say I've not really gotten my practice in as much as I'd like in the last two days, but just reviewed a bit this morning and played Jingle Bells without error and worked on LH and RH C, G7, F chords and played Largo and Merrily we Roll along and feel like I'm getting a bit more comfortable with bass clef and fingerings etc. Slowly, slowly but feeling right.

Enjoy your time at the keyboard everyone!

Well done Kenny...Jingle bells was a bit tricky at first but once you get it and start working your way through the book you'll look back at it and wonder what was so hard about it...:D...but that's true for all the songs. Anyways...I was wondering, I bought the Alfred's Basic Adult All-In-One book Levels 1-3...still on level 1 though...but I was wondering if there are any other books in this series that are good...such as the Greatest hits book or even the Christmas hits book...Anyone have them and recommend them? I saw the "Christmas hits" book and they really didn't have many popular Christmas songs so I passed on that. But then I saw Alfred's Christmas Piano book but they didn't say what songs were in it...I was wondering if anyone has this book and if it includes popular Christmas songs. Oh yeah...how's the Greatest hits, Level 1 book?

Hey everyone...I came across this site the other day...it gives free sheet music..easy ones too So I thought I'd share it with everyone. They have different difficulty levels... I find the "First Pieces", "Primer", and "Level 1" pretty easy. Level 2 gets a little more difficult but some of the songs there are easy to learn too with some practice. Enjoy!

Whoops! I forgot to put the site in my last post...ha ha
Here it is...
http://www.gmajormusictheory.org/Freebies/freebiesFP.html
Enjoy!

Hey romolo, thanks. That looks like a great site.

I just spent a bit more time there. I love how they have different levels of the same song (jingle bells or The Saints) for instance. This really let's you choose the right level and challenge yourself.

I like the Greatest Hits book, as well as the Pop Songbook. They are mostly familiar songs, although harder to play than the pieces in the lesson book.

The Christmas Hits book contains only "Pop" Christmas songs - for the traditonal Christmas music, try:

http://www.amazon.com/Alfreds-Basic...mp;s=books&qid=1239363505&sr=1-2

And in that free music site, look into Keyboard Classics. There is a "first pieces" section there that has a few pieces that are not too difficult.

Thanks mom3gram....that's the Christmas book I was thinking of getting...the other one didn't seem to have a lot of popular Christmas songs...so I think I'll go with this one and the Greatest Hits book. I'm glad you guys like the site too...:)

Oh yeah...if anyone has that book that mom3gram mentioned (Alfred's Basic Adult All-in-One Course: Christmas Piano Book) could you please list the songs that are in it. I'd really appreciate that. Thanks in advance.

romolo, if you go to that link click on the image you can go to the table of contents and see the listing of songs.

I looked at that link again (for the Christmas book) and I think that is for the Level 2 book. There is a Level 1, but I don't see it on Amazon. You can look for it on Sheetmusicplus.com.

I see the songs now...thanks Kenny
I'm guessing this is the level 1 book...
http://www.amazon.com/Alfreds-Basic...mp;s=books&qid=1239391232&sr=1-1
And how about the "Greatest Hits" book...is that good?

It's not the same book, but it should be very similar. I actually haven't looked at either Christmas book in person, just online. I had intended to give you the link to the one I have in mind, but I can't seem to copy and paste links easily anymore. It looks just like the Level 2 one on Amazon, but the coloring on the cover is slightly different. I plan on purchasing it somewhere down the line a little closer to Christmas.

I have the "Greatest Hits", I like the song selection, but I've only casually attempted a few of the songs. They are harder than the lesson book and would take more effort to learn than I have time for right now with all the other things I'm practicing. I also like the looks of the "Alltime Favorites", which has a great song list of some classical, some folk, and some pop tunes. That one is on my wish list.

I am just starting to be able to play pieces from these books, and they will probably be at my level for quite a while, so I will be getting into them more as I go along.

So far, I have successfully learned:
Over the Rainbow (very easy) - Alfred Adult Pop Songbook
You are my Sunshine (somewhat easy) - " " "
Love Makes the World Go Round - (harder) - " "
Love Me Tender (somewhat easy) - "Greatest Hits"
Puff the Magic Dragon (somewhat easy)- " "
Beauty and the Beast (have only attempted twice but doesn't seem too difficult) - "Greatest Hits"

I would recommend any of these books as supplemental material.

Thanks mom3gram...I think I'll order the Greatest hits book and the Christmas book for now. I recommend "O Christmas Tree" from that site I gave earlier...really easy to learn. I'm working on others from there too and my level 1 book of course. I just completed "Cafe Vienna". It was pretty easy, easier than "Blow the Man Down" for sure. I'm on to "Brahms's Lullaby" now. I hope it's easy

http://www.makingmusicfun.net/htm/printit_piano_sheet_music_index.htm

Another great site with easy songs to learn. Just thought I'd share...:)

And they even have Clarinet music! with piano accompaniment!

Thanks again romolo!

Brahm's Lullaby is a good piece. I was finally happy with it yesterday, so that was 3 days it took me (was nice and easy to memorize). I thought it was not too easy, like so many arrangements are, but not too difficult either, a nice beginner's arrangement without being oversimplified.

The following pieces in my book were a lot easier though and I played them at sight fairly well yesterday, so will practice them again today.
They are; Rock it away, ( a very easy blues piece)
Joy to the World,
Cockles and Mussels and Walkin' Down the Basses.
Hope to start on I'm a winner tonight page 66 of my book.


Thanks for the links Romolo.

I think I'll buy the Greatest Hits books to start on when I reach book two, so hopefully they will provide easier supplementary pieces when the main book gets challenging.

My goal for the weekend is to hopefully get "...Saints..."
playable. I'm really not that far off at this point. It does have some quite interesting rhythm which is a bit challenging for me in getting my hands to work independently.

I do like the way this Alfred's book/course takes on the teaching of hand independence right away which seems to come a bit later in the Bastien series (but it seems to get into the chords/scales quicker). Each has it's advantage so I'm really trying to use a bit of everything to learn with.

You'll get "Saints" in no time Kenny...and then it will seem so easy
I just started Lullaby...it's hard. I got "Cafe Vienna" down perfectly really quickly which lifted my spirits but then "Lullaby" brought them back down again...ha ha. I just hate playing those dotted and eighth notes with the right hand while playing regular quarter notes with the left hand. It gets confusing just like in "Blow the Man Down". But I'm working on it.

I got all the way through book 1 and moved onto book 2 and did the first few pieces there. I didn't learn the pieces to any kind of performance level though, I was mainly rushing through them and trying not to memorize them so I could work on sight reading a bit more.

Now I'm back in book one and working on every piece to a solid level. So far I have made it to Chiapanecas without too much difficulty but I find this piece a bit trickier. I think in the latter half of the book my sight reading and playing skills aren't good enough so I have to start memorizing just the harder sections of the song in order to play them well.

I also found two areas I need to work on more, quick chords like the ending to Chiapanecas and repeating sections where you jump form one part of the music to another, I always tend to stop there.

I also think I need to stop listening to piano pieces on youtube, it just makes me impatient to rush again so I can play them ;-)

Wonderful Wrenn!

I've been working on "When the Saints..." this weekend and am pretty close with the RH version and have begun working on the LH version as well. Will work more on it today.