During one particular lesson before Christmas with one of my late elementary level piano students, we picked Silent Night (in C) to sing and harmonise it with primary chords.
Trying to make it as simple and intuitive as possible, I gave her a simple rule to work out what chord fits best for each phrase in the song, starting with an open 5th on C (C major chord without the 3rd), using the thumb and little finger in the right hand.
(She prefers playing chord accompaniment with both hands rather than playing a melody with chords).
Rule that I gave her was:
When you hear a chord needing to change, move either your little finger up a step or your thumb down a step, keeping the other finger where it is.
By the second attempt, she worked out which chord fits best with each phrase in the song.
She was very happy with the results. I was told by her dad later on, during the Christmas break when she came downstairs in the morning, she just sat down at the piano and sang Silent Night with the right chords, and filled the room with joy. Hearing that was a lovely Christmas gift from her to me too. Listening to live music is always uplifting, however simple the tune is 🙂
When the new term started yesterday, she played/sang it (with a bit of vibrato!) again for me with much confidence. After that, we worked on adding the bass notes (although, we briefly did this before Christmas, she needed time to get really comfortable with the right hand chords first). Based on her basic knowledge on major and minor chords, I asked her to play the root note of each chord as a bass note for the left hand. Surpriginly, she naturally used the 3rd (instead of the root) for some of the C major chords (similarly to the one used in Sea Birds she just finished learning from the Children’s Songs; I think she was reusing the idea there).
She managed to self-accompanied whilst singing the tune as follows:
Finally, I revealed these 3 major chords in a major key is called primary chords and are the base for many tunes that you know. Now, we’re going to find more tunes that work with primary chords and explore different ways of accompanying!
Originally written for voice and piano by an Icelandic composer (also a doctor!), Sigvaldi Kaldalóns (1881-1946). I first heard this piano solo version arranged by Icelandic pianist Víkingur Ólafsson. So sweetly romantic and enchanting this piece is.
Here’s my simple arrangement I wrote for my early intermediate students for developing further understanding of chords and harmonisation as well as making their own musical decision to bring what’s on the score to come alive (hence all the musical details are not written in).
I love creating miniatures things, including music. This mini grand piano gift box idea had been in my mind for some years and have finally managed to turn the concept into a physical good. Ideal for wedding favours, party favours, mini gift for piano students, etc.
It’s always a challenge for me to go from the practice room to the performing stage. As I have relatively recently discovered that I may be slightly dyslexic, which seems to be the cause of, under certain level of stress and anxiety, messing up my coordination, especially reading (notes can look differently sometimes, so I literally write a note name or chord name down on places in the score where that seems to happen) relating to muscle control on my fingers.
After a long break from playing in the public due to the Covid, I knew it’d be even more stressful. Also, this time, the concert was solo piano, all on my own. I haven’t done this since my recital at the end of my study at the IU (Indiana University, USA) in 1994. To bring myself up to live performance ready, I decided to do some recording sessions near the time. It’s very strange, as soon as I hit the record button, accidents start happening!!!
So, it was a good way of re-training myself what it’d feel like to be back on the stage again. Breathing control is another thing I wouldn’t think too much about when practising. During the recording sessions, I tried to pay more attention to it whilst playing (some years ago, I studied all sorts of breathing methods – Indian, Chinese, etc. through which I’ve learned to calm my nerves down and keep the blood circulation going so my fingers won’t end up suffering tingling/numbing sensation which leads to losing fine control of finger work).
This concert turned out to be a very personal one. Originally, I was going to share the concert with another player but the circumstance changed three months before the concert, so I had to reconstruct the programme to extend another 20 minutes. Luckily, I was in the middle of experimenting with my new soundscape improvisation project and the idea of creating a space where music can be just a background to an imaginary world came into my mind. Hence the concept of “Sound Gallery” where ‘the audience experiencing the music as if walking through a museum’ was born! The thought of this experimental presentation gave me certain excitement which led me to give myself a new challenge – to play a piece with an improvisational section.
Craig Armstrong has long been an inspiration in my creative output; his sense of time and space through music, harmonic languages, voicing, etc. His film score Balcony Scenefrom the film soundtrack to Romeo + Juliet is, for me, the most captivating, deeply spiritual and heavenly piece of music (especially when the orchestra takes over the piano solo), which is I’d like to be played at my own funeral when the time comes. My first encounter with Craig Armstrong music was his Weather Storm played as a background music to one of the BBC’s TV documentary series, Coast, when showing the inside of Gouliot Caves in Sark. Later on, I heard the composer playing a short piano solo version in which some parts are improvisational. For this concert, I decided to play my own take on this solo version. Once the opening piece for “Sound Gallery” was in place, constructing the rest of the programme came more or less naturally, thankfully. Very English in a way that it involves weather as a running theme, I say!
Here’s the complete programme of my lunchtime concert at Downing Place URC on 31st August 2022:
Part I Graham Lynch The Chimeras V: Apollo and the Muses VI: Black Cat in the Evening Garden VII: Circus Flags (world premier)
Johann Sebastian Bach, arr. by Leopold Godowsky Andante (Aria) from Violin Sonata No.2, BWV1003
Edmund Rubbra Sonatina, op.19 (first live performance)
PART II: Sound Gallery Weather Storm ….. Craig Armstrong Prelude No. 15, op.28 (originally Db major)* ….. Fryderyk Chopin Prelude No.14, op.28 (originally Eb minor)* ….. Fryderyk Chopin Aria from Goldberg Variations BWV988 ….. Johann Sebastian Bach Feuillet d’Album [Album Leaf] ….. Emmanuel Chabrier Prelude No.24, op.28 ….. Fryderyk Chopin
Encore: II. Etude from 13 Pieces for Piano, op.76 by Jean Sibelius
*The piece was transposed to a different key to make the transition from one piece to another work seamlessly as a whole.
I’m something of an advocate of Graham Lynch’s music. His music is very imaginative, expressive and highly intellectual but not without emotional content which makes me very happy as a pianist. It was truly a privilege to give a world premier performance of his three news pieces from his ongoing The Chimeras project. And to finally meet him at the concert was an exceptionally happy moment.
My first encounter with Rubbra’s music other than his educational music was his Sonata for Oboe in C, op.100. Through this discovery, I came across his Sonatina, op.19 from the CD recording (2001) made by Michael Dussec. Unfortunately, the first two movements remain unpublished. Michael Dussec kindly directed me to one of his sons, Adrian Yardley who generously provided the handwritten score for the occasion. I feel very honoured to be part of promoting the rather long neglected composer, Edmund Rubbra. His music is characterised by contrapuntal texture, rich harmonies and free style writing, which has attracted me very much. Playing his sonatina in complete was for some reasons a deeply spiritual experience. Hopefully, the sonatina will be published in complete in the near future.
Back to my original title of this blog, practice vs live performance recordings… Although practice recordings are always with fewer mishaps, I can’t replace the live performance even with unexpected accidents because I always find room for spontaneity when adrenalin kicks in, and that’s the part that I do enjoy most in live performances. So, I decided to share both here. Solo piano concerts, to be truthful, aren’t what I enjoy very much (both going or performing), so I hardly give ones. Since it was indeed a rare occasion for me, I made special efforts to make it more inviting. I have a feeling that this could well be the last ‘live’ solo concert I’d given!
Part I
Practice recording sessions at home
Live performance at the Downing Place URC, Cambridge UK
Part II
Practice recording sessions at home
Live performance at the Downing Place URC, Cambridge UK
After the concert on 31st August 2022 Left to right: Yukie Smith, Adrian Yardley and Graham Lynch
Recording from the rehearsal on Thursday (18th August) for the upcoming lunchtime concert at the Downing Place United Reformed Church, Cambridge UK
Admission free with retiring collection
Programme: Part I
Apollo and the Muses; Black Cat in the Evening Garden; Circus Flags by Grahama Lynch (premier performance)
Aria (Andante) from Violin Sonata No.2 by J.S. Bach=Godowsky
Sonatina, op.19 by Edmund Rubbra (first live performance)
PartII This part of the concert will be a somewhat experimental presentation. I have called it ‘Sound Gallery” where I play a collection of short pieces in succession without a break. The idea is that the audience will experience the music as if walking through a museum, but what they hear is going to be what they see.
Weather Storm by Craig Armstrong (some parts are improvisational)
Preludes No.15 & No.14 by F. Chopin*
Aria from Goldberg Variation by J.S. Bach
Album Leaf by E. Chabrier
Prelude No.24 by F. Chopin
*The pieces are transposed to another key to make them work seamlessly as a whole.
My new project! Looking at some beautiful photography, I just realised how much what I see has an effect on my creative output on piano. So, I’ve decided to explore this path for a while.
As an experiment, I just hit a record button on my iPad – no proper setup for recording piano like I ususally do, I didn’t want to miss the moment where this music is happening in my heard. Audio is not good quality but I kind of liked this ‘boxed’ sound, which seems suited for this project. It’s quick and simple too.
For this project, everything is improvisational, so whatever the image translated in my mind comes out as music. Improvisation is not my strong forte but the notes seems to come naturally through my fingers when I see beautiful images. I look forward to seeing where it will take me.
Workbook for Pianoseries are a collection of worksheets to support beginner’s piano lessons. They have been developed over the past years during the lessons with my young students, aged 4 to 10+. It covers the most necessary basics from keyboard orientation to how music/music notation works through various activities in relation to piano learning.
In my teaching, my young students start piano learning without a tutor book, which means the pieces are mostly taught by rote/ear at the beginning whilst I prepare the ground for note reading separately. But this period is very time-limited (depending on individual ability, of course). If students wait too long before start reading notation, they tend to become a hesitant reader. If they start reading notation before you develop a healthy ear-eye-hand coordination, they tend to become a slow reader/learner. So, finding the right time to merge ‘playing by rote/ear’ and ‘learning to play from notation’ is quite important and challenging. Not following a tutor book gives me a freedom to choose when to do this and also what to give as student’s musical interests shift from one kind to the other over the period.
Workbook for Piano series work as a bridge between ‘developing piano skills’ and ‘developing reading skills’. So that the transition from ‘playing by rote/ear’ to ‘learning to play from notation’ goes seamlessly.
The books are written in such way that a teacher can elaborate further on a certain topic rather than finishing one page and moving onto the next. Some pages would need preparation activities depending on the age of a student. For example, Heartbeat in Musicon page 7 fromWorkbook for Piano 1, students would need to feel the heartbeat and experience how it’s linked to the (heart)beat in music. Teachers can do all sorts of listening games (including moving/nodding to the music) and tapping games to draw students’ attention to a steady beat (including silent beat!) that exists in music.
Teachers can also dip into any section of the book depending what elements/concepts that students need working on or what students are interested in. Previously finished pages can be used again to explore through creative activities. This way students have a chance to turn knowledge into concept, which reinforces their learning. Here’s one example of a creative use for a finished worksheet (p.69 from Workbook for Piano 1):
My 8 year old student has written a little tune (titled Sound of a River), using one of his finished rhythm compositions in 3/4. He added his own left hand accompaniment applying what he’s learned fromChildren’s Song for Developing Hand Coordination, for piano.
Workbook for Piano 2 focuses more on ‘preparing for note reading’ through children’s songs and some original pieces I’ve written for this particular purposes. The book also contains many opportunities to ‘complete the song’ by writing student’s own idea into the empty bars. Through these activities, students will l earn to recognise the patterns in music, which greatly contribute to developing time-saving reading skills. The book also covers the concepts of key and tonality in the most simplest way possible and finishes off with reading exercise pieces, which are all in a piano duet form.
Workbook for Piano 3 is under the developing. The main focus will be on composing projects through many interactive activities.
Through my piano room window, I saw one last autumn leaf hanging on there. I managed to capture it last night before it finally fell off this afternoon on a rainy windy day.
It simply inspired me to play something to it. Precious moment 🙂
I have several piano students who are constantly driven by their creative forces. They just can’t satisfy their musical appetite by just learning what’s written on the paper. Their sound system in their brain is linked to the ocean of sound they’ve been absorbing on a daily basis listening to the music they enjoy. Soon, they start experimenting with the notes they’ve just learned, saying that sounds like this part of this and that tune.
For a while, I’ve been giving a thought about how I can go about using this creative energy to get them into the world of composing and arranging. I thought I’d share some experiments I’ve done with my students.
Case 1 (elementary): One of the easiest tunes with which my 7 years old student had a creative experiment was called Slimy and Smooth. It’s from Note Reading Made FunBook 1written by Julia and Kevin Olson. All of the pieces in the book are 8-bar long and arranged for piano duet. I always find that the creative process begins with messing about with things put in front of you. This creative experiment was triggered by my student playing the notes in a wrong order and discovering that it actually sounds nice! So, here it goes. Simple melody using 5 notes, using repetition and sequence mixed with variation:
Case 2 (mid elementary): One day, I introduced a little tune based on a simple rhythm to my 9 year old student to learn it by ear (she kindly gave this tune a title, Wandering Melody):
Once she learned the right hand, I introduced a simple left hand pattern to sing along the right hand melody that she’s just learned. When she heard this simple descending accompaniment creating changing harmonies, she got hooked:
Learning both hands took a little getting used to but she persisted until she got it right.
“Now, it’s time to have fun with it”, I said. “You’re going to creating your own version of right hand melody to the same left hand accompaniment”.
Off she went spending a lot of time having fun with it for a week. Out of many versions she created, she showed me the one that she really liked with a big smile on her face. She went beyond what I asked her to do – instead of changing the right hand melody, she changed the left hand pattern. She found a minor version using a chromatic scale. But then she said, “The ending doesn’t sound like an ending… I don’t know what to do…”, so I helped her out a bit to bring back a bit of original idea into her version of the tune for a happy ending. Here’s the final version:
This idea led me thinking that I should think about start using the pieces that are based on a repetitive chord progression so that my students can experiment with it and create their own version of the pieces they’ve learned.
Case 3 (late elementary): I first tested this idea with my 8 year old student who is constantly creating his own piano tunes. The piece I’ve chosen for this experiment (considering his taste for pop music) is Knight’s Castle (Alte Ritterburg) written by Oxana Krut (Ukuranian composer) based on a repetitive chord progression. Melodies are mostly made of sequences, so it’s easy to learn purely by ear. He’s learned the piece almost instantly. So, I gave him a challenge to create his version of melodies without changing the left hand accompaniment. He gave me a big smile and he sent me a recording the next day:
Case 4 (late elementary): This idea can be applied to students who are not normally exposed to creative music making. Here’s one of my teenage students who had his first experience of creating a melody variation using the same piece as above, Knight’s Castle by Oxana Krut.
As he creates his own melody, he started transcribing the note so that he won’t forget:
Here’s the final version:
Here’s what he wrote to me about the experience:
“Playing my own version of the piece gave me a special kind of pleasure. Because I’d contributed to what was already a lovely piece of music and gave it a new quality that was uniquely mine and reflected what I found most beautiful in it.“
Case 5 (late elementary – early intermediate): I saw another opportunity to use a melody variation idea when one of my adult students were getting ready to embark on some elaborate rhythmic patterns in 3/8 and 6/8. Based on No.52 from Beyer’s Elementary Method op.101, I gave him a modernised version of the piece in D minor.
Modified version of Beyer’s No.52:
Then I introduced two new rhythmic patterns that frequently appears in 3/8 and 6/8. After he’s learned the above piece, I gave him a challenge to create a melody variation using these rhythms shown as below:
My student kindly recorded the result for me:
A little modal twist at the end was a sweet surprise!
Case 6 (early intermediate): Here’s another piece by Oxana Krut, In the Boat, which I’m experimenting with one of my 9 years old students to teach about phrases to create a musical sentence. During the Skype lesson the other day, we’ve managed to improvise 4-bar musical conversation based on the chord progression from the piece:
Case 7 (early intermediate): Little pieces by Oxana Krut offer such freedom and flexibility with full of useful composing tools so that the players can be easily challenged to experiment to create their own version of the pieces. Based on my findings, I’ve also tested on a couple of adult students of mine (late elementary to early intermediate levels) – I’m discovering that the minor keys seem to offer more choices in note selection for the learners. Perhaps maybe, the minor keys have more diatonic chords than major keys, hence more colours and moods you can play with:
Autumn Song (Herbstlied) In this recording, my adult student is mixing his melody variation with the original. Dotted rhythm was a good challenge he gave himself here (the recording shows the second half of the piece):
Nostalgia Another adult student of mine recorded one for me. She has a good sense of melodic shape using sequences throughout the piece:
By going through such creative process as this, students are discovering to “see” and “understand” the written pieces from the composer’s point of view. This is naturally contributing towards more sympathetic approach in musical shaping when they learn new written pieces. My students are definitely enjoying the opportunity to tap into their creative drive that they didn’t know they had. Some of my adult students comments are:
‘I didn’t think I would like it initially but I really enjoyed this exercise, and would like to explore composing a little more…‘
‘I’m enjoying so much doing this, I’m so free!‘
___________________________________________________ The pieces used here are from the books below:
One of my teenage students has been playing the piano since he was 9 years old but had only been interested in playing and composing pop songs until May last year when he started to take GCSE music study at school more seriously. And he’s decided to get better at music theory and he’d like to achieve grade 8 in piano. After a serious talk about what he’s expected in the piano grade exams, we came up with a sensible plan, in which he’d aim for grade 5 offered by the Trinity exam board (rather than ABRSM) to start with. That way he has freer choices in music selection and he can take ‘musical knowledge’ option instead of ‘sight reading’ for the supporting tests, which would allow him to spend some time in learning how to sight-read efficiently for the next grade up (either Trinity or ABRSM). Now, here’re the various challenges he’s been facing and tackling so far:
The first challenge – play as written! As a pop music player, he’d been free to play any arrangement he liked and to change here and there as he liked. The first thing that I had to have him understand in preparing for the grade exam was this is absolutely NOT something that he’s allowed to do in the exam, he has to play the notes as written! That’s a tough discipline for someone who has had a freedom to choose his own notes and patterns to play. So, I’ve given him a challenge of learning two short pieces of early intermediate level pieces as written, neither classical nor pop, but jazz. And I said to him, if he managed to learn these two pieces, then we’d officially start preparing for the grade 5 pieces. So, he learned Down Home Funk by Tim Richards and Swing Deco from a collection of my compositions. A slow start but he’s managed to keep going and pulled it off eventually.
Whilst he was studying the above two pieces, we also started working on music theory (not GCSE music theory but ABRSM music theory), using Alfred’s Essentials of Music Theory Book 1-3as an gentle introduction to music theory (the reason for choosing this series being that they include aural training programmes and also my student also plays the drum, so he’s used to American terms when it comes to note values and metres). After completing the books, we did some free theory test papers available on the ABRSM website to introduce him to the ABRSM music theory test form, with the use of First Steps in Music Theory, Grades 1 to 5 by Eric Taylor as a reference when necessary. We’re now going through Samantha Coates’ How to Blitz! ABRSM Theory Grade 5, preparing for the grade 5 theory exam.
The second challenge – reading During the first challenge period, we’ve also started working on improving his reading skill as part of sight-reading practice. As he was a very reluctant reader when he was into pop song playing (a strong ‘by ear’ player though), his note reading skill had been significantly lagged behind. But once he realised that he’d need to develop a proper note reading skill for the exam, he’s started to show his willingness to learn pieces even when they’re not his cup of tea. For this particular training, we’re using Louis Köhler’s Practical Piano Method for the Pianoforte, op.249 – similar to Beyer’s and Czerny’s equivalent. It’s a great material for teaching pattern learning and basic harmony. And it also includes some finger exercises that encourage pattern reading. We’re at No.28 currently, he’s showing a gradual improvement in grasping figurations and is getting less reluctant to learning pieces from notation.
Finally, learning the Trinity Grade 5 pieces… Now Let’s Handle by Michael Proksch After having deconstructed the piece to find out how the music is put together (melody line, pedal point, bass line and chord over a repetitive chord progression), he’s managed to learn the notes in a week. In the second week of learning Now Let’s Handel he’s discovered the fun way of playing in time and showed it to me:
[Recorded during the Skype lesson.]
We’re now in the process of shaping it up to make it more musical with complimentary phrasings.
Blues for Beth by Mike Cornick He’s a strong ‘by ear’ player as I mentioned before. Hence, his rhythmic precision sometimes suffers, hence reading dotted rhythms was proven to be tricky. But since he started drum study, his perception of a steady beat seems to have improved and his ability to follow the metronomic beat seems to have become easier, hence he can now practise with a metronome (before, he couldn’t). As a practice strategy, he’s learned only the right hand melody notes first without embellishment (grace/crush note & top harmony) to get a good sense of linear movement, in time with a metronome. Adding embellishment notes and other chord notes later is much simpler than learning all the notes together from the start. The left hand has less notes than the right hand but rhythmically is more challenging because of so much space created by the rests between the patterns, hence a metronome practice was absolutely necessary!
Once he got a sense of how the music should feel like, he managed to put the hands together in the following week. Now, we’re working on various articulations to achieve a stylish performance of the piece.
Circus Theme by Fishel Pustilnik This is the most challenging piece for someone who has never played big leaps in the left hand. So, rather than going straight into learning it, I thought it’d be useful for him to try some improvisation exercise using a couple of triads in the left hand playing 2 octave leaps – more than what Circus Theme asks you to do! – to help him acquire technique/coordination for playing stride bass in the left hand. For the right hand improvisation, it’s good to start with a two or three-note motif chosen from a 5-notes scale, then repeat the motif with variations (either rhythmically or melodically) inserting some rests in between, so he won’t cram too many notes on one phrase. This way, he can focus on keeping the rhythm within a set metre and also he can focus on the left hand movement. Here’s what he’s achieved:
[Recorded during the Skype lesson.]
As you can see, he applied a concept of borrowed chord in his improvisation too, similar to what appears in Circus Theme (Neaopolitan 6 chord, B flat major chord). A great effort, I say!
Before getting back to learning Circus Theme, I gave him one extra challenge; to improvise using the right hand rhythms from the piece, and with a stride bass as written. He said it was easy to learn the left hand patterns because it had smaller leap than the one he was practising in his improvisation exercise.
There’re still lots of things to do to prepare leading up to the piano exam but I think he’s on the right track and I could see his positive attitude growing stronger and stronger, which is definitely contributing to his rapid progress. It’s very uplifting to see this happening knowing that he’s once quit his piano for a while when he went through a difficult time. I hope to add more progress reports in the coming months.
Happy reaching for the goal!
—update—
Due to Covid-19, music exams went online. As he was learning all the pieces at the steady pace, I’ve decided that he’d be ready to go for it this summer since he won’t have to prepare for other supporting tests. I’d rather he’ll move on learning new skills through new pieces over the summer holiday than get stuck with the same pieces longer than necessary. It turned that it was a good decision to do so. He’s managed to increase his focus for the following few weeks and submitted the video recording in the early August this year. He’s just learned that he’s passed his first ever grade exam with distinction! Here’s a snipet of his final results:
He’s now learning Chopin’s Waltz in A minor for a leisure and working on improvisation skill to give this piece a gypsy jazz twist 🙂 He’d decided he’d like to improve his playing skill without exam for a while now.
—update 2—
He just showed me his discovery during out Skype session yesterday (22OCT20). He sang to me Gloria Gayor I’ll Survive to his playing Now Let’s Handel! The composer said “I’m happy to hear this because that’s exactly what I want to achieve with my compositions. Creative use of music.” 🙂
Piano Notebook 