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

A slight detail to add. Except for pedaling the first note of a piece when it starts with pedal. In those cases it often sounds better (on an acoustic) to pedal before the note is played. Playing with the pedal warms up the sound and if all the other notes are pedalled it makes them sound more the same. But I don't want to confuse things too much!

Not at all, that is another good point.

I also start the first note with the pedal already down. I'm not 100% sure if I've ever asked that specific question to my teacher, but I'm guessing that is correct because she does not miss anything!

Not confusing at all. Once she'd got me 'synchronising' fingers and foot, the next thing was exactly this, pedal momentarily before the first note. And as fizikisto observes, it's as much about lifting off the pedal, which was the second big lesson I learned about pedalling. Now I know why she left it at least eighteen months before letting me set foot on one!

Burgmuller's 'Angelic Harmonies' is now beginning to sound very different with pedal applied here and there, and there's a quite haunting little piece, 'At Sunset' (Manfred Schmitz, Regenbogen Preludes #7), which is easy to learn and you can be quite self-indulgent in the pedal with it.

Thanks for pointing that out, Arghh. I realize you're saying this applies to acoustic pianos, but I'm making note of this tidbit and will try it out on the first song I come to with pedaling on the first note. Scanning ahead in my Alfred's book that would be "O Sole Mio!" which I'm about 6 songs away from.

Right now I've got 5 pieces that I'm finishing up on. Tomorrow I'll start on "Why am I Blue?" I've listened to some youtube versions of this song and I'm less than excited about the way it sounds, to the point where I considered just skipping it. However, after looking at it more closely, I see this piece has syncopated notes, sharps, naturals, flats, finger crossovers, legato phrases, tied notes, crescendos, a diminuendo, a fermata, and a bit of pedaling. That sounds like a challenge to me. I accept!

Edit: What does "Moderately slow blues tempo" mean? Does blues tempo mean swing the notes? And is moderately slow slower than slow or faster than slow?

The reason I asked is because all the youtube videos I saw seemed rather fast. As far as I know moderately means 'less than' so I decided to go with a little slower than slow. Easier said than done, though, because I catch myself picking up speed and having to slow it back down. Oh, and I tried adding some swing and I think I've got the general idea of it. Anyway, I'm fairly happy with the way it sounds. Except I'll keep working on trying to even out the tempo.

In the meantime I'm going to go ahead and start on the next piece, "Good People." Yet another one with a 'moderately slow' tempo. The new concept with this piece is the call and response measures. Suddenly I'm reminded of playing Marco Polo in the water as a kid. Fun times. Well, maybe not so much for anyone nearby trying to relax and hearing "Marco" - "Polo" yelled out repeatedly. Anyway... I digress.

Here's a shout out to my fellow Alfred's learners out there in cyberspace: Heelllllooooo! Can you hear me now?!?

Hi Linda;

I think the phrase "moderately slow blues tempo" does not infer swing style per say. I know that of the 6 blues pieces I've studied so far, only for two of them was swing style suggested.

I am currently working on a blues piece, and the tempo was suggested at between 88-112 BPM, so there is a lot of latitude here.

Hi Brian,

Actually, I'm not so sure that I am playing it with swing. I think mostly I was trying to get into the groove as best I could, considering blues music isn't really my thing. I didn't use a metronome with this piece so I don't know at what rate it is, but yeah, that is a lot of latitude. I was thinking about using one for this next blues piece, though, so thanks for that. I decided to attempt a recording of my rendition. Here it is: "Why am I Blue" (Please excuse the red-dot induced fumbles.)

Hi Linda,
Wow! this is really a great progress you are doing. I like the piece you played a lot :-) Really very nice

I'm currently practising one piece that I think it might be the same level. With time, I begin to like the Blues more (well, I already love it! hihihi). The thing is, it is not easy! I mean it is different from others and I have the feelings that there is more freedom on how you play it. I also have the feeling that there is no beginner in Blues, it is just jumping from absolute beginner to intermediate player which takes a long time of course (well, just my feeling, nothing factual!).

There are only three scales in the book of Blues I have, which are divided to two kinds, ten notes and six notes. I don't know why only three! I need to read more about the Blues I think, but too much Blues is not good for my heart! Anyway, I must finish Alfred's book level 1 first, which I'm in the middle now, before I know my head from my toes but I feel tired after just one hour practising, and my playing begins to degrade and the mistakes would multiply.

there is a version of Why Am I Blue on page 1 of this post. The tempo there is similar to your version and also at the low end of "Moderato', moderately slow. So I think you have achieved the desired tempo.

I do think there is an expectation the students of Alfred are working with a teacher who could explain it better. But the direction of a piece points you in the right direction but is not always definitive giving rise to a number of various interpretations.

E.g. from Alfred book 2 Chopin Etude, Opus 10, No 3 - description for tempo is "Not too slowly", From Debussy's Girl With the Flaxen Hair - "very calm and sweetly expressive". So not only are we given the tempo but told how to play it by the composer. However it is vague enough for a bit of interpretation.

My favourite that I have found so far is Satie's Gnossienne No.1. Not only is there no time signature or bar/measure lines he gives directions for specific sections which include: Shining, Questioning, On the tip of the tongue, Wonder about yourself, step by step. I tell my teacher he was the first hippie.

"Good People" is one of my favorites in the book and I still play it.

On the subject of pedaling, tonight's lesson proved I was timing it wrong. I was pressing down on the note where a change was indicated rather than lifting on that note and pressing down right after. It cleared up the muddiness but having done it wrong, it is difficult to time it right. Habits die hard, at least the bad ones do!

I must be a great student as I do every thing wrong at least once lol.

Me too Mike!!!

I picked a good time to jump back in here with all this talk of pedaling. I'm so glad I'm not the only one who has been struggling with this too.

Thank you, EnGee, glad you liked it. I agree with you about not finding the blues very easy to play. I'm actually struggling a bit with my current blues piece, "Good People." I've got it mostly roughed out, but not really sounding like much at the moment. I'm more and more liking this idea that you and others have expressed about there being "more freedom on how you play it." As for the hour long practice sessions, don't wear yourself out over it. I'd suggest breaking it up into more manageable chunks. After all, it all adds up!

Earlofmar, thanks for offering feedback on the tempo. I had to laugh at the various tempo/expression directions you shared. Those would drive me nuts. A recent piece that I enjoyed working on, "Blues for Wynton Marsalis" has a tempo of Lazy. I can do lazy, no problem. On a side note, I think that's the first time I actually felt fully relaxed while playing.

Mike, it sounds like you're talking about overlapping pedal? It'll be a while before I get to that lesson in the book. So far there haven't been that many pieces with pedaling. I'm not sure if that's good or bad at this stage of learning. Maybe I should seek out some easy side pieces with pedaling just to get more practice with it.

Linda - it will come soon enough. . It's not that hard, but best to have someone show you as this is timing issue not easily shown except by a live person. At least I didn't get the concept until shown.

I was also told to spend time on "The Entertainer" this week as it can be a challenge.

Mike: A live person would most certainly be my preference! Haha. Unfortunately, I can't afford a teacher at the moment. Hope you're making good progress with "The Entertainer."

I'm still working on "Good People," mostly trying to figure out how to make the call and response section sound better. And I've started in on "Little Brown Jug." I'm hoping someone can help me with an articulation/dynamics question:

If a measure is forte and all the notes in the treble clef are accented, does that mean play those treble notes louder than forte while playing the chord in the bass clef at the normal accompaniment forte level? So in effect I'd be increasing the contrast in volume between the left and right hand? Or does it mean something else? Is there another way to play accented notes with "special EMPHASIS!" other than just making them louder?

Yes. That's correct.



Yes there is. In some situations you can create emphasis by playing notes a little longer. You basically steal a tiny bit of time from the other notes and give it to the note you want to emphasize. This can be for notes that need special emphasis, or to simply better define the pulse of the music (ONE-two-three ONE-two-three). Imagine playing a harpsichord instead of a piano. The strings are plucked rather than struck, so the keys are not velocity sensitive (hitting the keys harder doesn't make the harpsichord louder). In that case you have to use something other than volume to create emphasis. That's one way you can do it.

Thanks so much, fizikisto! That helps a lot. Now I can get back to my practicing.

Hey everyone, how's it going?

I've finished with "Good People", for now at least. Just not entirely happy with the call and response section, so I may come back to this piece later on.

Last week I began learning "Little Brown Jug" which I'm enjoying. I'm currently working on polishing it and getting it up to a moderately fast tempo.

Yesterday I started in on "Chiapanecas" and so far I'm liking this one as well. Maybe I'm just happy to be finishing up with all those blues pieces.

Aside from that I've been trying to do some assorted exercises at least a few minutes each day. I am very slowly making progress with the C major scale. I can finally ascend 2 octaves with HT in a fairly confident manner, but still a little wobbly on the way back down. Probably the world's slowest scale learner, ever!

I think we have some preconditioned notion that scales are straight forward and easy to become good at. However my own experience is they can be difficult (some more so than others) and energy intensive. However given a good practice regime you will see improvement over time.

Hello

I'm progressing slower than before and my learning time has shrank from 1 hour to 30-45 minutes. I think because the exercises are getting harder and also I begin to take a note for the details more than before and all that makes me tired quickly. Well, in spite of my slow progress, I'm learning a lot in reality!

I get back from time to time to my DAWs and virtual synths to test myself and I'm already noticing a difference in the ability of composing and playing But I don't want to start any project yet, till I finish the three books of Alfred and my two e-media tutorials with some dozen of Recital pieces (which I hope it would take some 2-3 years).

@Linda: I think you are near the end of Alfred's book lvl 1, am I right? I think I still have at least 6 months with it yet.

The pedal topic was very informative and useful to know. Thanks everyone for your posts

Alfred's requires only one octave of C major, Linda, and only one hand at a time. It is teaching the musical aspect of the scale here, not the mechanical aspect of playing it as a daily exercise.

More experience and a rounder technique is required before tackling two octaves or hands together. You need to know and be familiar with when the pivot is the third finger and when it's the fourth. Black key scales are better for this. B major is the easiest for the right hand alone, Db major for the left hand alone and E major easiest for hands together, especially in contrary motion.

Most people use scales as technical drills. This implies that the mechanism is already trained and the coordination and concentration are the main effort. For most people it takes around two years for the mechanism to be trained well enough. Until then a wider range of repertory material is far superior for developing your playing skills and technique.

I believe that playing scales as drills this early will hinder your development. A better supplement for now, especially if you're going in a classical direction, which scale playing implies, is Beyer's Op. 101 and finish it before tackling scales as exercises.