Everything Piano | Piano Sheet Music

Posts Tagged ‘Classical’

After more than 50 posts on this blog, I noticed that I was getting the most comments on the topic of easy piano sheet music. I definitely want to put in an effort to try and make more posts about easy piano and easy sheet music.

Since I am always searching for advanced pieces, I sometimes forget how frustrating it can be for some people who search for easier pieces, only to find medium to hard pieces.

If you haven’t yet checked out 8notes.com, I would advise you too. They are one of the top free piano sheet music sites on the Internet, with thousands of easy arrangements and compositions.

In addition, I have reviewed the following five easy piano sheet music books, and they all receive my approval. In fact, many of them exceed my expectations. All of them have received at least a four or five start rating from customer reviews. If you’re looking for a great easy piano book, you can definitely find everything you need with these five books.

The Best Songs Ever – 6^th Edition (Easy Piano) by Various Artists

This easy piano book offers you 71 all-time favourite hits from various pop, Broadway, and movie genres. It includes easy piano notation, lyrics, and chord names. Here’s what someone said about this book: “I bought this for my 12 year old daughter and it is perfect. Easy music yet the arrangements sound great! We both love it. I can actually play the songs with very little formal piano training.”—Deb Taylor from PA

100 Best Loved Piano Solos – Big Note Easy Piano arranged by Robert Schultz

100 Best Loved Piano Solos include mostly pop, TV, movie, rock, and country songs with big note notation (for easy reading) and includes fingering. Brian from Spain said, “It’s what I’m looking for since I’m learning with my son again the basics. It’s good to see a variety of types of music to keep it fun.”

VH1’s 100 Greatest Songs of Rock & Roll – Easy Piano by Various Artists

This book features a collection of the best and most influential rocks songs of all time. With 100 different pieces, you get easy piano notation, lyrics, and chord names with each piece. Here’s what KP from Key West said: “Great rock classics! My 14 year old is now much more excited about playing the piano- thank you!”

21 Great Classics – Easy Piano arranged by Phillip Keveren

This piano book is great for the beginner classical pianist. Pieces included come from the Baroque and Classical Period, with fingering and introductory text. “This is a wonderful collection of classical music for the beginner! I was able to sit down and play many of the pieces after not having played for 35 years! I love this book.”—Maxine from OH

35 Christmas Songs And Carols – Easy Piano by Various Artists

Christmas is just around the corner! Just in time for you start practicing so that you can impress everyone with your holiday piano pieces. The book includes vocal melodies, piano accompaniments, lyrics, fingering, and big note notation. Teresa from NC said: “This is a wonderful book for songs to play when you are just beginning like I am. Easy to read, easy to use.”

And there you have it, folks, some of the best easy piano books with the greatest variety in music. I strongly urge you to check these out!

Elise’s Musical Tip For The Day:

If you are looking for some really simple sheet music, you can still use advanced pieces! Some arrangements (especially from the pop and contemporary genre) have an extra staff line for vocal melodies above the grand staff. These notes are meant to be sung, but you can play them as well! Just focus on those top melody notes and you can play them on the piano. I do this all them for little exercises and sometimes to improve my sight reading.

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I’ve been playing the piano for 15 years now, and I’ve also spent a lot of time searching all over the internet for specific sheet music that I can find for free. For a lot of musicians, I think this is a pretty common trend. Usually, we know it’s somewhere out there on the internet (even though it probably shouldn’t be because of copyright protection), but we just have trouble finding it.

For this reason, I’m the works of creating a nice, big, long list of popular and classical piano pieces, along with the corresponding hyperlink that will take you directly to the free piano sheet music. I’ve found a terrific resource that has hundreds and hundreds of free sheet music, and I thought that I should probably share this with everyone.

I’m still working on it, so it’s not quite done yet, but I’m estimating that the list will include approximately 250 to 300 piano pieces. I think that’s a lot. When I’m done, I’ll probably put it in PDF file format and then, when my official website is all done, you’ll be able to just type in your name and email address and the list will be sent directly to you email. Instant access to hundreds of free piano sheets!

I think this is a pretty good idea, and I’m pretty proud of myself for coming up with this. I really hope that it will help a lot of piano players out, and save a lot of time from searching for hours all over the internet for free piano sheet music.

Once I’m done, the place to sign up for my free piano sheet music list is going to be located at www.elisemoreau.com/free-piano-sheet-music. (Don’t try going there right now because the page does not exist right now.) I’m also going to create a link caption on this blog that links directly to there.

So, when will this be done? I’m hoping within the next week, and even possibly the next few days.

Elise’s Musical Tip For The Day:

Stop searching for free piano sheet music, because I have found a solution! And check back here for my update of when my free piano sheet music list will be up!

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After a pretty in depth topic on the arpeggiated chords during my last post, I thought I’d offer something of value to those of you who are just starting out on your journey through learning to play the piano.

Learning to play piano can seem easy if you have a lot of determination and a pretty high level of commitment.

To get started, try and pick up some easy piano lesson books, songs, or resources online. Try to get comfortable with touching the keys and train your fingers to become more flexible to stretch and move across the keyboard. Since easy piano lessons usually teach the basics using only three or four chords, repetitive songs and practice can get you comfortable to the keys, chords, and overall melody that is produced.

Some great examples of beginner songs and easy piano include “Mary Had A Little Lamb.” A three-note tune, this song encourages the player to become familiar with the keys and move their hands dexterously. Other songs like, “Jingle Bells,” Row, Row, Row Your Boat,” “Ode To Joy,” and “Chopsticks” are ideal easy piano songs for beginners. I recommend Favorite Classical Themes – Easy Piano by Various Artists.

These pieces may seem childish and even boring, especially to beginner adults, but believe me, mastering simple songs like these are the building blocks to advancing in learning piano. Instead of thinking of them as songs, think of them as exercises. You’re trying to familiarize yourself with the notes and hand movements, not play a simple song just for the sake of playing a simple song.

If you feel too restricted by these easy piano songs, contemporary songs can also be added to your learning experience. These may offer some more variety to beginner piano players. Songs like “My Heart Will Go On,” “Somewhere Out There,” and “Unchained Melody” are great for learning easy piano.

Finally, one of my personal favourite books to learn from when starting out learning piano is Disney! – Easy Piano by Various Artists.

Elise’s Musical Tip For The Day:

Even though I am an advanced piano player, I still regularly consult my Disney! – Easy Piano book and improvise with notes and chords to make the piece my own so it doesn’t sound so simple. This is a great way to learn, and once you get past the beginner stage, I would really encourage you to keep all of your beginner books so you can try this as well. It’s like writing your own music, but using the simple notes and chords given as a guide to make your own. It’s a great feeling, and really fun at the same time!

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If you have some intermediate to advanced classical training in piano, I’m sure you have experienced the wonderful little squiggly lines on the left side of some notes, representing the musical ornament of an “arpeggio.”

Although sounding beautiful when performed effectively, depending on where the notes lie and how many notes there are, it can be difficult to execute.

For those of you who don’t exactly know what an arpeggio is, I will explain it as best I can. Arpeggio is Italian for a broken chord, in which the notes are played in sequential order one after the other as opposed to pressing them all at the same time.

Executing an arpeggiated chord requires the musician to play the sounds of the chord individually to differentiate each note.

I have practiced arpeggios for years during my piano lessons, which is an essential part of technical practice for classical examinations. Only until the higher grades did I notice that I came across several arpeggiated chords in several pieces I was looking to play.

As an example, here is an exert from the second page of Debussy’s Clair De Lune. If you listen to the piece, you can distinctly here the sequential movement of the fingers playing each note separately in a beautiful sweeping motion.

This is a difficult section for me because there are a lot of notes to be played in the left hand, using all five fingers for the second and third chord. The position of my fingers and wrist feels awkward, and not only that, but being able to press each note separately without rushing too much or tripping over my fingers is a completely different story.

And so, technical work in piano comes to bite me in the butt yet again.

Elise’s Musical Tip For The Day:

If you need to practice an arpeggiated chord, you really need to take your time. Figure out all the notes and the fingering that feels most comfortable. This will help you establish the best position for your fingers. Practice it as slow as possible, pressing each note one by one. It’s tedious work and it will probably feel awkward for a while, but you will be able to play it faster and see improvements if you keep working at it.

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