Category: Announcements

Announcements, repertoire / methods, Reviews

Book Review: Especially For Adults by Dennis Alexander

Joy Morin

Book Review: Especially For Adults Book I, by Dennis Alexander.

I just discovered this book of fabulous Early Intermediate to Intermediate Level piano solos.  I bought this book for a student, and it has been a real hit so far!  I am very pleased with this purchase.

This book would make an excellent supplement for a high-school or older student, no matter what method book they are using.  The pieces are appealing to the ear and rewarding to work on.  They would also make great recital pieces.

Titles:

  • Day’s End
  • Feelin’ Fine
  • Flamenco Fever!
  • (Theme from) Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2
  • Lost in Time
  • On Ol’ Broadway!
  • Plaisir d’amour (The Joy of Love)
  • Polovetsian Dance (from Prince Igor)
  • Reflections
  • Shelby’s Waltz
  • Sneaky Kinda Rag

My personal favorites from this book are Polovetsian Dance (a modern twist on the familiar orchestral theme from Prince Igor) and Reflections.  All the pieces are great, though, and without being too difficult.  The book covers a wide range of musical styles and moods.

Dennis Alexander also has a Book II and a Book III as well – I have not seen them yet, but am looking foward to trying them out!

My rating: 5 stars (out of 5 stars)

Announcements, Resources, Reviews

Book Review: The A to Z of Foreign Musical Terms

Joy Morin

Book Review:

Ammer, Christine.  The A to Z of Foreign Musical Terms: From Adagio to Zierlich a Dictionary for Performers and Students. Boston: ECS Publishing, 1989.

Ever try looking up a musical term, only to find that the word or phrase you are looking for is not listed in your musical dictionary?  This has happened to me fairly often…until I bought this book, that is.  Somehow, this slim book has so far always managed to contain definitions for all the terms I’ve needed to look up!

I ordered this book from Amazon.com when a voice professor at my college recommended it to me.  It’s a great resource for students, vocalists, solo pianists, and collaborative pianists – and at about $11, you can’t beat the price.

My rating: 5 stars (out of 5 stars)

Announcements, improving as a teacher, Printables, Teaching Piano, Technology

Celebrating One Year!

Joy Morin

After browsing through the colorinmypiano.com archives and — alas! — it seems that we’ve missed our own anniversary!

Here’s a rundown of the history of the colorinmypiano.com blog:

  • It was on February 28, 2009 that I first conceived of this blog and wrote my first post: a welcome and brief statement of purpose.  I found my inspiration largely from Natalie Wickham’s Music Matters Blog and Susan Paradis’ Piano Teacher Resources.  My blog was initially a free wordpress blog, titled “Piano Teaching Blog” (or something similar).  At this point, I was running a successful piano studio of about 20 students out of my parent’s home, and finishing up my Bachelor’s degree in piano performance.
  • In May of 2009, I graduated with my Bachelor’s degree.  Over the summer, my husband and I moved so we could attend graduate school the next year.  Unfortunately, this meant I had to “give away” all my piano students and find new ones.  =)
  • On July 9, 2009, I decided that I was enjoying blogging enough to go full swing: I came up with the title “Color In My Piano,” bought my own domain name and a year’s worth of web hosting, and gave the site a whole new look. Continue reading “Celebrating One Year!” →
Announcements, Early Childhood Music

Early Childhood Music Classes

Joy Morin

Lately, I’ve been considering offering pre-piano music classes for children and their parents — someday, when I have a private studio in my home again (Right now, I teach piano privately through my university’s community music school.).  My goal in providing these classes someday is to better prepare young children (think ages 0-5, especially) for private piano lessons.  So, this semester, I enrolled in an Early Childhood Music class to learn about the various methodologies (such as Orff, Kodaly, Gordon, Feierabend, etc.) for teaching music to young children.

I’m excited to think about starting up these classes someday.  Here’s some things I’m been thinking about…

Things to consider:

  1. Location/space – large, open room.
  2. Parents’ presence – required or not?
  3. Materials – songbooks, musical instruments, colored scarves, rugs, cd player, etc.
  4. Class size – six to ten, perhaps?
  5. Ages – 0-18 mo., 18 mo.-3 yrs, 3-5 yrs.
  6. Class duration – 30, 45, 50, or 55 minutes.
  7. Sessions – 7- or 14-week sessions.
  8. Goals – music literacy; musical experience; aural development; building the parents’ & children’s repertoire of music to share in the home; music as expression; building of pre-piano skills; etc.

Types of Activities:

  • Songs with motions
  • Listening & responding with movement (classical, folk, jazz, pop, etc.)
  • Fingerplays
  • Chants
  • Musical games
  • Other activities

I think these classes will be fun!  And I’m hoping that introducing  such classes will give my beginner piano students a head start once they begin private lessons.  Has anyone offered similar classes in their piano studios before?  I’d love to hear about it.

Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/89186997@N00/ / CC BY 2.0

Announcements, Technology

New Facebook integration

Joy Morin

Exciting news: you can now follow the Color In My Piano blog via Facebook!  Click the new button on the left, Find Us On Facebook, to view our page on Facebook.  Become a fan and receive blog updates right in your Facebook news feed!

In addition, now when you leave comments on posts at colorinmypiano.com, you can leave them using your facebook account.  Colorinmypiano.com will even display your current facebook avatar (photo) beside your comment.  What fun!

Announcements, improving as a teacher

Things I Learned from a Yeol Eum Son Masterclass

Joy Morin

Last week, my university held a master class by Yeol Eum Son, the silver winner of the 2009 Van Cliburn competition.  I played a Chopin Etude, op.10 no.6.  She gave me a number of specific suggestions which were very helpful, but there were two general concepts I took from the experience:

1. Posture: keep your chest open. I’ve been told to sit up straight of course, and I’ve even been told not to sit too straight (a common problem among slender pianists, especially female).  I’ve also been told to keep my shoulders down and relaxed, which is something I struggle with.  Tension in the shoulders, can affect the arms and wrists negatively.

I’ve also accompanied enough vocalists to know that keeping the chest open is extremely important to help with breath support and avoid causing the throat to do the work.  But I never realized that pianists should be doing this too.  Watching her play, I realized how free and open her chest seemed, and as a result, how relaxed her shoulders and arms were.  I can’t quite explain it in words — see it for yourself it the video here:

(Her playing is so beautiful in this video, I could listen to it over and over and never tire of it!) Continue reading “Things I Learned from a Yeol Eum Son Masterclass” →

Announcements, improving as a teacher, Technique, Technology

Keyboards vs. Acoustic Pianos

Joy Morin

Check out these pictures at dvice.com, featuring modern keyboard designs by Yamaha!  I particularly like the one shown in the screenshot at right.

Would I ever buy a keyboard such as this?  No, probably not.  If I had the money to spend, I’d buy an acoustic piano, not a keyboard.  Acoustic pianos are still far superior to keyboards, even considering the great improvements that have been made to keyboards over the years.  They just don’t compare, in my book.

However, the popularity of keyboards seems to be increasing.  I’ve experienced an increasing number of experiences with parents who wish to buy keyboards for their beginner students instead of pianos.  And I can understand why: they are often cheaper than buying both new and used pianos, are far easier to move, and do not have it tuned every six months.  The advantages of buying a keyboard are obvious, but there are some major not-so-obvious disadvantages. Continue reading “Keyboards vs. Acoustic Pianos” →

Announcements, improving as a teacher

Upcoming Poster Session @ Mich. Music Conference

Joy Morin

Remember that improvisation paper for school that I’m been mentioning here and there?  Well, I’ve been accepted to present my research findings at the poster session on January 22 as part of the 2009 Michigan Music Conference in Grand Rapids, Michigan!  I don’t know if any of you Michiganders out there are planning on attending the conference, but if you are, please drop by during the meet-the-author session at 10:30 and say hello!

What follows is my abstract, which gives you a sneak peak into what the upcoming series about improvisation will discuss (starting tomorrow!): Continue reading “Upcoming Poster Session @ Mich. Music Conference” →

Announcements

Best of 2009 @ colorinmypiano.com

Joy Morin

The new year is here!  Here’s some highlights from 2009:

Announcements, improving as a teacher, Practicing

Practicing Efficiently

Joy Morin

Hello all!  After a enjoyable and much-needed Christmas break, I’m officially back to blogging.  I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and are enjoying the new year.

Over break, I had limited access to a piano (I don’t currently own one – I both teach and practice using the pianos on campus).  It felt good to be back at it over the last few days.  Today while I was practicing (Liszt’s Waldesrauschen, among other things), I was thinking about concentration and its role in learning new music.  Why is it that on some days, I accomplish a great deal during practice sessions, and on other days, I feel as if I just wasted the last hour as I practiced?   Continue reading “Practicing Efficiently” →