Piano/Keyboard Methods/Series

(Faber Piano Adventures ). Book 1 covers fundamental rhythms, all the notes of the grand staff, C position, G position. Contents include: Aloha Oe * Amazing Grace * Bagpipes * Bus Stop Boogie * Camptown Races * Chant of the Monk * Chant of the Monks * Chinese Dragon * Chord Crossings * Dreamscape * Eine Kleine Nachtmusik * English Minuet * Fife and Drums * Forest Drums * French Minuet.

(Faber Piano Adventures ). Accelerated Theory Book 2 is divided into fifteen units, correlating with the fifteen units of Lesson Book 2. Each unit provides valuable reinforcement of basic theory concepts through writing, sightreading, and ear-training activities.

"The Piano Improvisation Handbook" offers a comprehensive overview of the practical skills and theoretical issues involved in mastering all forms of piano improvisation. It explores a wide range of styles, including classical, jazz, rock and blues. Whereas other books on improvisation typically offer little more than models for imitation and exercises for practising, this one adopts an approach specifically designed to encourage and enable independent creative exploration. The book contains a series of graded tutorial sections with musical examples on CD, as well as an extensive introductory section detailing the history of keyboard and piano improvisation, an appendix listing useful scales, chords, voicings and progressions across all keys, a bibliography and a discography. In addition to sections outlining how melody, harmony, rhythm, texture and form work in improvised piano music, there are sections devoted to explaining how ideas can be developed into continuous music and to exploring the process of finding a personal style. A key feature is the distinctive stress the author puts on the interconnectedness of jazz and classical music where improvisation is concerned. This book is best suited to those with at least some prior experience of learning the piano. However, the rudiments of both music theory and piano technique are covered in such a way that it can also serve as an effective basis for a self-sufficient course in creative piano playing.

(Piano Adventures Supplementary). While nearly every pianist's training includes the renowned exercises of Charles-Louis Hanon, the power and weight of the modern grand requires an updated approach. This unique edition introduces vital pianistic warm-ups and routines that ensure correct gesture and relaxation. The pedagogical sequence omits inefficient and potentially damaging exercises and presents a long-needed pathway for dexterity and gesture that newly advances the virtuoso pianist. * Includes selected exercises from Hanon's The Virtuoso Pianist, Parts 1 and 2 * New transformative warm-ups develop gesture, dexterity, and virtuosity * For students in Levels 3A, 3B, and above

A page-turning novel that is also an exploration of the great philosophical concepts of Western thought, Jostein Gaarder's Sophie's World has fired the imagination of readers all over the world, with more than twenty million copies in print. One day fourteen-year-old Sophie Amundsen comes home from school to find in her mailbox two notes, with one question on each: "Who are you?" and "Where does the world come from?" From that irresistible beginning, Sophie becomes obsessed with questions that take her far beyond what she knows of her Norwegian village. Through those letters, she enrolls in a kind of correspondence course, covering Socrates to Sartre, with a mysterious philosopher, while receiving letters addressed to another girl. Who is Hilde? And why does her mail keep turning up? To unravel this riddle, Sophie must use the philosophy she is learning—but the truth turns out to be far more complicated than she could have imagined.

Piano/Keyboard Methods/Series

(Faber Piano Adventures ). Technique & Artistry Book 2 combines "Technique Secrets" from levels 2A and 2B with new exercises and "Artistry Magic" pieces that correlate with Accelerated Piano Adventures Lesson Book 2. These elegantly simple "technique secrets" build a solid technical foundation for the older beginner and are used as daily warm-ups throughout the book. Students are guided to produce a variety of pianistic motions always with the purpose of creating artistic sounds.