(If you'd like to see the previous books in the series, click the "Dozen A Day" label to the right -->)
I really appreciate how these books gradually move forward, introducing things like I and V7 chords, the C, G, and D major scales and the chromatic scale in the earlier books. By the time a student gets to book three, the exercises are beefy. You can look inside here.
The technique reinforced in this book includes: scales in thirds, octave leaps, crossing 2 over 1 (third), arpeggios, 3 note chord inversions (harmonic), seven chord melodic and harmonic inversions, large leaps, using all 5 fingers to play chords, harmonic 6th in both hands, contrary scale, scale in 6th, different finger combinations (like playing a 5th with 5 and 2, then 4 and 1), thirty-second notes, chromatic scale in thirds, reaching ninths, holding chords while playing other notes in the same hand, quintuplet notes, major and minor feel, scales with eighth notes, triplets, and sixteenth notes; parallel octaves in the same hand, grace notes, chromatic scale.
I would recommend this book only for serious piano students. While it is still set up for students to be successful, with short exercises and whimsical stick figures, these exercises require disciplined practice. Ideally, all exercises need to be practiced to be successful, but there are several in here that will take longer than the ones in the previous books because of the demands on the hands. This will be true especially of those students with small hands. Personally, my hands are not that big. I can reach an octave comfortably, but that's about it. I have short fingers, and I noticed several of these exercises were challenging. Granted, I'm not usually playing 4 note chords, so someone used to playing such literature would find these easier.
My overall impression is that these continue to introduce more challenging technical concepts in a fun and engaging way.
This is available at Sheet Music Plus for $4.99
No comments:
Post a Comment