The organist seated at the king of instruments with thousands of pipes rising all around him, his hands busy at the manuals and his feet patrolling the pedalboard, is a symbol of musical self-sufficiency yielding musical possibilities beyond that of any other mode of solo performance. In this book, David Yearsley presents an interpretation of the significance of the oldest and richest of European instruments, by investigating the German origins of the uniquely independent use of the feet in organ playing. Delving into a range of musical, literary and visual sources, Bach's Feet demonstrates the cultural importance of this physically demanding mode of music-making, from the blind German organists of the fifteenth century, through the central contribution of Bach's music and legacy, to the newly-pedaling organists of the British Empire and the sinister visions of Nazi propagandists.

Teach yourself to play any make of electric keyboard with the world's best selling easy to follow method Based on popular songs and with easy to follow text and clear diagrams, it assumes no previous knowledge of the keyboard or music. The CD contains full band backing tracks and demonstrations of all songs.

The thirty-two Piano Sonatas of Ludwig van Beethoven form one of the most important segments of piano literature. In this accessible, compact, and comprehensive guidebook, renowned performer and pedagogue Stewart Gordon presents the pianist with historical insights and practical instructional tools for interpreting the pieces. In the opening chapters of Beethoven's 32 Piano Sonatas, Gordon illuminates the essential historical context behind common performance problems, discussing Beethoven's own pianos and how they relate to compositional style and demands in the pieces, and addressing textual issues, performance practices, and nuances of the composer's manuscript inscriptions. In outlining patterns of structure, sonority, keyboard technique, and emotional meaning evident across Beethoven's compositional development, Gordon provides important background and technical information key to understanding his works in context. Part II of the book presents each sonata in an outline-chart format, giving the student and teacher ready access to essential information, interpretive choices, and technical challenges in the individual works, measure by measure, all in one handy reference source. In consideration of the broad diversity of today's Beethoven interpreters, Gordon avoids one-size-fits-all solutions or giving undue weight to his own tastes and preferences. Instead, he puts the choices in the hands of the performers, enabling them to create their own personal relationship with the music and a more powerful performance.

A group of resourceful kids start "solution-seekers.com," a website where "cybervisitors" can get answers to questions that trouble them. But when one questioner asks the true meaning of Christmas, the kids seek to unravel the mystery by journeying back through the prophecies of the Old Testament. What they find is a series of "S" words that reveal a "spectacular story!" With creative characters, humorous dialogue and great music, The "S" Files is a children's Christmas musical your kids will love performing.

(Faber Piano Adventures ). 11 songs that include I-IV-V7 chords in the keys of C, G and F, featuring: Can You Feel the Love Tonight? * Do-Re-Mi * (Meet) The Flintstones * She Loves You * Star Wars * and more.

Focusing on styles such as classic ragtime, early blues & boogie woogie, New Orleans jazz, stride and swing, this new book/CD pack in the Hal Leonard Keyboard Style Series teaches left- and right-hand techniques including chords, bass runs, patterns and more. Key players of these styles - Scott Joplin, Jimmy Yancey, Pete Johnson, Jelly Roll Morton, James P. Johnson, Fats Waller, Teddy Wilson and Art Tatum - are prominently referenced. Includes 14 full songs to play, and an accompanying CD!

Presenting a fresh approach to French organ music, David Ponsford analyses the repertory from the reign of Louis XIV by genre. The colourful French organ was so consistent in design that the very titles of pieces that were constituent parts of organ masses, Magnificats and suites prescribed the registrations: plein jeu, fugue, duo, recit, trio, fond d'orgue and grand jeu. Particular examples from published livres d'orgue and important manuscript collections are analysed chronologically, so that influences from Italian as well as French sacred and secular music can be traced. This analysis reveals the dynamic development of compositional styles in which each composer developed, modified or reacted against the exemplars of his predecessors. Composers discussed include Louis Couperin, Francois Couperin, Raison, Clerambault and Marchand. The reader will gain an enhanced understanding of performance practices such as notes inegales, fingering and ornamentation, and the influence of French composers on J. S. Bach.

Teaching Notes offers invaluable guidance for teachers on the 81 pieces included in the graded books of Piano Exam Pieces 2021 & 2022, Grades Initial-8. For each piece, you will find teaching ideas relating to three areas of learning - musical context, technical challenges, and performance and interpretation - in a clear and easy-to-use layout. Written by experienced piano teachers and ABRSM examiners, Teaching Notes also includes advice from ABRSM's Chief Examiner on selecting and interpreting pieces. Alongside practical solutions to technical challenges, it's full of creative ideas to support and inspire your teaching.

The most influential compositional movement of the past fifty years, spectralism was informed by digital technology but also extended the aesthetics of pianist-composers such as Franz Liszt, Alexander Scriabin and Claude Debussy. Students of Olivier Messiaen such as Tristan Murail and Gerard Grisey sought to create a cooperative committed to exploring the evolution of timbre in time as a basis for the musical experience. In The Spectral Piano, Marilyn Nonken shows how the spectral attitude was influenced by developments in technology but also continued a tradition of performative and compositional virtuosity. Nonken explores shared fascinations with the musical experience, which united spectralists with their Romantic and early Modern predecessors. Examining Murail's Territoires de l'oubli, Jonathan Harvey's Tombeau de Messiaen, Joshua Fineberg's Veils, and Edmund Campion's A Complete Wealth of Time, she reveals how spectral concerns relate not only to the past but also to contemporary developments in philosophical aesthetics.

A piece a week Piano Initial Grade for beginner players is ideal to be used alongside the Improve your sight-reading! piano books to support and improve the reading skills so fundamental to successful sight-reading. These fun, short pieces are specifically written to be learnt one per week. By continually reading accessible new repertoire, the crucial processing of information and hand-eye coordination are established and improved, developing confident sight-reading. The best-selling Improve your sight-reading! series, by renowned educationalist Paul Harris, is designed to develop vital sight-reading skills, enabling students to learn new pieces more quickly and play with other musicians.

Stravinsky's reinvention in the early 1920s, as both neoclassical composer and concert-pianist, is here placed at the centre of a fundamental reconsideration of his whole output - viewed from the unprecedented perspective of his relationship with the piano. Graham Griffiths assesses Stravinsky's musical upbringing in St Petersburg with emphasis on his education at the hands of two extraordinary teachers whom he later either ignored or denounced: Leokadiya Kashperova, for piano and Rimsky-Korsakov, for instrumentation. Their message, Griffiths argues, enabled Stravinsky to formulate from that intensely Russian experience an internationalist brand of neoclassicism founded upon the premises of objectivity and craft. Drawing directly on the composer's manuscripts, Griffiths addresses Stravinsky's lifelong fascination with counterpoint and with pianism's constructive processes. Stravinsky's Piano presents both of these as recurring features of the compositional attitudes that Stravinsky consistently applied to his works, whether Russian, neoclassical or serial, and regardless of idiom and genre.

Scale Explorer for Piano is a creative resource for students learning their scales and arpeggios. This book covers ABRSM's new syllabus requirements (from 2021) at Grade 5, and includes engaging activities that bring scales to life through short pieces, improvisation, composition and exercises. Key features *

(Faber Piano Adventures ). Designed to be used in conjunction with the other books in 3A, this book reinforces theory concepts through writing, sightreading, and ear-training activities.