Books for Learning the Piano

Learning to play the piano is fun and rewarding and there are so many styles of music to choose from, including Classical, Jazz and New Age Music!

A decent piano is an important prerequisite, as it is crucial to practise regularly if progress is to be made. As a guide, young beginners should aim to do at least 20 minutes daily, although 30 minutes a day is the ideal. More advanced pupils should aim to do up to an hour a day.

There are many books available for beginners, including "Me and my piano" from the Watermann and Harewood series and Bastien "Primer A Pieces" for very young beginners. The Abracadabra Books are excellent supplementary books for pupils who enjoy improvising and doing anything remotely creative. Ideally, all pupils should have some technical excercises to add to their daily routine and should devote about 5 to 10 minutes as a means of warming up at the piano. The Dozen A Day books are excellent by Edna Mae Burnam and can also be useful for reading practice.

Beyond beginner level, there are Czerny exercises which are tuneful and can be used from grade 2 up to grade 8 level. There is rewarding repertoire to be enjoyed, including the Pamela Wedgewood Upgrade books and Christopher Norton jazz pieces.

Those wishing to work towards exams can be entered for the Assocaiated Board of the Royal Schools of Music exams and Trinity Guildhall exams. It is important that anyone learning a musical instrument should be prepared to sing and learn to pitch their voices as well as learning to play famous melodies "by ear". Aural work is crucial, as this is a requirement for all examination boards and learning to hear a tune accurately aids the reading of the notes.