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Well, I suddenly got slowed down on "Why am I Blue." I pretty much have the notes down, but my timing is way off, with major hesitations between nearly all the bars. If I remember correctly, I don't think I ever got it fully up to par last year before I moved on to the next piece. I'm going to try to do better this time around.

Bsw, Good luck with the Can-Can. The Marine's Hymn has only 2 lines to learn, but it still manages to offer a bit of a challenge. Or at least it did for me.

Blackjack, I saw your post in the Alfred's Book 2 thread. I hope you get some answers, because I'd like to know as well. Right now, though, I'm seriously thinking about switching over to one of the Faber methods once I finish book 1.

Hi, everyone! I started playing back in April, wanting to teach myself until I can get a teacher after Christmas. I was handed this book by the woman who sold me my piano and have been going through it. I'm on Beautiful Brown Eyes now, which I'm really struggling with. I think it's all those different chords and different rhythms for the LH and RH. I've been dissecting it bit by bit and that definitely has helped, but I'm still finding it pretty hard!

Linda, yes I'm interested to hear the remarks that the folks in the Level 2 thread have to say. I think I will likely stay with it because I sort of feel like I'm in a relationship with Alfred's now and want to keep to give it a chance. Or perhaps it's more like the Stockholm Syndrome Anyway I'm sure my teacher would supplement the material if it turned out to be too boring or not enough interesting pieces. Did you notice the level #2 thread doesn't seem to get a lot of interaction compared to level #1 thread?

As for your blues piece keep at it I'm sure you'll have it in no time. I'm just so impressed with how quickly everything came back for you. I know for me it would be a much steeper curve if I had taken such a long break.

Today, I passed Over the Rainbow!! super happy

This week I will work on cleaning up Amazing Grace and will start on At Last. My teacher also assigned me a simplified Rag Time piece by Irving Berlin to give me a bit of a change.

I'm going to have lots to work on!

Happy 4th of July to everyone.

Hi ladysarahii, Welcome to Piano World.

Don't be alarmed that you're struggling with Beautiful Brown Eyes. You're at a point in the book where the pieces are becoming more complicated and therefore more challenging. So these pieces are going to need more practice and polishing time to play well.

When you're playing the broken chords, are you moving your hand from one chord shape to the next? Or, for example, when you go from the G chord to the D7 chord are you playing the F sharp first, then forming the shape for the second portion of the broken chord? I find it helpful to move into postion as if it's a block chord. I hope that made sense. Hopefully somebody more knowledgeable will come along to offer some help.

Congrats on passing Over the Rainbow! Yeah, it does sound like you have a lot to work on. But you seem up to the challenge. And thanks for the encouragement with my blues piece. I'll keep at it.

Reading your Stockholm Syndrome comment made me laugh. I admit, I feel guilty for even thinking about moving away from the Alfred method books. You're right about pieces growing on you. I've had that happen on more than one occasion.

Maybe if you go on to Alfred's Book 2 there'll be more activity in that thread, eh? Who knows, I haven't totally made up my mind yet, so maybe I'll be joining you there. We'll see.

Since using the metronome at a relatively slow BPM, I can now play the songs from Jingle Bells to the two versions of Saints Go Marching more accurately, and consistently than before the metronome. I'm not going to move further until I review with my teacher on Tuesday. Until Tuesday I may bump up the metronome a few beats, after executing a piece well at a given BPM...just to feel what it's like to go a bit faster, while staying accurate.

I'm also using a few theory books at the moment, the Alfred's book, the Complete Idiot's guide, and a workbook. I know - maybe too many at once. But I actually find the theory part interesting. I'm struggling with fully understanding intervals and the minor scales (when you raise/flatten notes with the minor scale...how you count). I find the Idiot's book doesn't spend enough on it (or I'm too much of an "idiot" - lol, but I get the rest of the info to now relatively easy...so not too bad)

Thanks for the welcome! No, I've been putting my hand into position to play the first note, then moving it to play the rest. I do have a problem with my fingers flying up as I play (trying to quit that habit) but when I tried the way you suggested it did work better. I went from completely overwhelmed to playing a very shaky version of it straight through. It's getting better! Thanks!

I picked up Alfred's Sacred Book 1 and I really like that one, too. I'm really enjoying playing When I Survey That Wondrous Cross as a quick, easy warm-up right now.

Well I'm back after a few days away from the piano, I have been able to clean up Merrily Go along and have Rockets down pretty well. I'm still cleaning Rockets and starting work on What Can I Share? I feel my rhythm is improving as well across all pieces but still seems to be the last thing to nail down on a particular piece.

Yay me! I finally got all the hesitations out of "Why Am I Blue?" which of course makes it sound so much better. I've started in on "Good People" and already have the notes down, so hopefully I can get it polished within a day or two.

Noonie, You seem to have things under control with the metronome. Good luck with your music theory. I have [i]Edly's Music Theory for Practical People[/i] that I bought last year. I found it kind of overwhelming. Perhaps it's time to give it another try.

Ladysarahii, That's great news! In this case, a "very shaky version" sounds like excellent progress to me. There are no deadlines here, so just take your time with it.

Longhorngary, Welcome back. Looks like you're making steady progress. I remember that Rockets song because playing one and two octaves higher was a bit uncomfortable on my arthritic back.

I also find the theory books a bit overwhelming at times. However, I can't always play so I like to read. And a book with exercises where you write things down helps to reinforce. I'm trying to not memorize songs because I instinctively know the notes, rather I want to know the notes and chords and be able to play through a new song slowly/easily because I know the theory,...then I can use that to build on rhythm/timing.

Passed on The Can Can! Amazing as I was not that thrilled on the way I played but he said I knew the melody just need more work on technique, keeping wrist up. Hitting keys lightly. Needs more work

Hope everyone is having a great week?

Congrats on passing on The Can-Can! That looks hard. Well, what am I saying-- they all look hard at this point.

Things are going well. I got distracted by my Alfred's Sacred Book so I worked on that for most of my practice time today. Then I went back to Beautiful Brown Eyes and it didn't go so good... I partly blame it on the fact that my 20 month old came by and wanted to 'play' so I was at a weird angle. Also, the hymn that I had been playing was in C position and for some reason switching positions really confuses my brain. I might take a break from Beautiful Brown Eyes and get back to it when I feel a bit more refreshed.

Ladysarahii
Yes each new piece brings a new challenge. Part of the learning process. A 20 month old can be very distracting. You will get Beautiful Brown Eyes. Hang in there!

Starting to tackle "When the Saints Go Marching In", These are more than a little rough. I need to incorporate the metronome like Noonie. May take a while to knock these out but I'm enjoying the learning.

Looking at the progress reports and seems like everyone is doing fine. Me too! I finished up with "Good People" and "Little Brown Jug."

I'm glad I gave GP some extra TLC. I never really liked this piece - especially the call and response section, but now that I've gotten it to sound fairly decent, I guess it's not so bad.

I had fun with LBJ. It's such a happy tune. I was curious what the lyrics were, so I did a search and found this on wikipedia.org: "The song's lyrics are about a man and his wife and their hard life due to alcoholism." Huh.

Anyway, next up for me is the Mexican hand-clapping song. I'm fairly certain I never got this one up to speed before, so I'm going to challenge myself to get it to a moderately-fast tempo, as specified.

I started with the metronome on 70 BPM, and I warmed up with songs on previous pages, starting with Jingle Bells, as well as doing some of the exercises (extra time on the exercises with C, G7 and F chords for both hands). Good luck - you'll get it!

I had my second music lesson yesterday. I felt so much better this time. We got through both Saints Marching In, though we focused on a few techniques that we didn't bother with last time (legato, non-legato...which I didn't understand from the explanations in Alfred's book, but now understand after reviewing with my teacher). Now on to the G position!

Hi Everyone!

Finally have time to drop by here. Looks like there's quite alot of posts going on here. Thats great! Hehe...Currently I'm at Alouette. For once I played a song just twice - my teacher told me during my lesson last week that there were no mistakes! It wasn't perfect but I got all the notes right and rhythm was ok. Wahaha...I'm more than glad to hear that! Today I have piano lesson, hoping to absorb more stuff. I'm gonna bring a song's score to get my teacher to teach me too. Hope I can find a suitable and not too lengthy one.

Here's my YouTube link:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7ZxO_7iSLNgNxupGe17DeyTE02bOo1XK

I just upload a couple of videos, hope to get some support from you guys! Hahahaa...

Last weekend my BFF finally came over to play some beautiful songs. Oh actually it was more of me choosing the scores and passing on to her to play it. I just wanna feel motivated...wahahah. For once my house was flooded with beautiful piano music...I loved it. I sooo wanna learn how to play 'See You Again' and One Summer's Day by Joe Hisaishi. My BBF even forced me to try to play 'One Summer's Day'...I was sooo nervous! Hahahaha...felt so silly. But it was a super lovely time. I did learn a small chunk...hehehe

Noonie, I love playing When The Saints Come Marchin in. When i was learning it I finally felt that I could play a proper song with both hands. Hahaha...Keep it up Longhorngary! Piano playingis an enjoyable time for me indeed.

Great video HuiChinny, very smooth playing. The video would probably be better if you put the camera the other way so the video takes up more of the screen. Also you can embed the video in the page if you use the insert media <youtube> button when submitting your reply.

I've been trying to record a take of Over the Rainbow but I manage to always screw it up! >:[

nice one Hui, I only saw the waltz video you had. i'm up to where you are exactly. I'm trying to perfect the dynamics on that piece, which is quite hard on my shitty piano which I think has only 2 levels and the sensor that detects between hard and soft isn't so easy to feel (imagine using a computer mouse on ultra high speed and acceleration such that you want to click X on the window, you can never hit the spot!) your tempo is very sweet too, mine feels wonky.

i've gotten ex1 and ex2 on Hanon very clean now, I can do 4 octaves up and down a few times before I get really tired. While when I was starting out, my extensor digitorum (i had to google it but Im pretty sure its this muscle, gets very sore and i'd have to stop. So I'm starting to work on tempo. My right hand can do it extremely fast but left is still wonky, so i've been doing-left-only work for now. But I think i'm ready to move to ex3 on hanon, which sounds very similar to ex2 anyway, hopefully by next week when I see my tutor she'll sort me out with properly working through a scale with some flats, then i'll do Hanon on them. I dont want to work through Fmaj or Gmaj hanon until i know exactly what i'm doing.

i noticed that even in alfreds they show you the first two exercises of hanon.

Hui: Nice video. I have started doing a short video of my pieces, for my eyes only, to see my progress. It is interesting. You are progressing.
Lionus, I like the Hanon exercises but must admit I only do 1 and 2.