Alfred's Adult All-In-One Piano Course: Level 1

Sophia I never had piano lessons, but I dabbled with it five years before I started again last January. Back then I had no idea there was such a thing as Internet learning. When I found his channel it was like a light bulb went on above my head... the way he explained dynamics, melody hand louder, etc. I also learned to use the pedal for the first time, though it so happened that it suddenly became clear(er) after a post in this forum. So much to learn still!

For sure! That's why after I found his channel I went back and redid the pieces. Before I was pretty much just focused on hitting the right notes.

Sophia Glad you're enjoying your learning! I am not familiar with the other books you use, but for Alfred, the rite of passage is basically Blow the Man Down. It is surprisingly tricky to learn, so if you survive that one without blowing your piano up, from then on you can boast that you play piano

I just took a peak at the contents list and see that it's on page 89. and I'm on page 45. So not sure how long that will take before I find out if my piano blows up.

Sophia Speaking of which, I'm not sure if you mentioned it but what piano did you purchase?

It's a Casio Privia PX-850. It looks really nice and everything I've tried on it so far seems to work just fine. Not that I'm really sure about all the settings. I decided to leave it on the grand piano concert setting.

Animisha Recording for your own sake and for uploading to this forum are two very separate things. Don't let yourself get stressed by someone who thinks you should upload. I am a very active member here at PianoTell and so far I have not participated in any recitals or in another way uploaded my videos. Nobody has held this against me.
So please feel free to participate in the way that suits you best.

Thank you, I really appreciate that. I have seen a lot of your posts and enjoy reading them along with everyone elses.

Kaydia I'm curious, did you just do audio only or video recordings? I think what I don't want is to see myself playing, though I get how that might be useful to monitor posture.

I use Pianoteq which records everything played as midi. That's audio only. I am way too lazy to setup a camera. But I really should. For first 6 months I thought I didn't have major problems with my technique. Then (surprise, surprise) I've realised that some of my fingers are collapsing during play. If I was video recording, I would be aware of it much sooner.

Kaydia

It's called "Operation Steinway." It used to be called "Operation Shooting Star" but various international government agencies started snooping around and asking questions about our lists of favorite "hits."

Kaydia Welcome to the forum! I'm not personally familiar with your piano, but apparently it has internal recording, so you could record and listen back without having to use any phone, tablet or computer. This is an AI generated description of the functionality:

Casio Privia PX-850 Recording
To record on the Casio Privia PX-850, follow these steps:

Press the SONG RECORDER button to activate the song recording mode. The indicator light will illuminate.
While holding down the FUNCTION button, press the SONG RECORDER (L/R) button to select the track you want to record on.
Press the SONG RECORDER button again to start recording. The indicator light will start flashing.
Play the desired song on the keyboard. The recorded track will play simultaneously with your performance.
To stop the recording, press the SONG RECORDER button.
To play back the recorded song, press the SONG button. The recorded track will start playing.
To adjust the tempo while the song is playing, press the SONG button again to stop playback, then use the TEMPO buttons or the + and - keys to adjust the tempo.
Press the SONG button once more to stop playback.
Additionally, you can save the recorded song to a USB flash drive. To do this, follow these steps:

While holding down the FUNCTION button, press the save keyboard key. This will cause the GRAND PIANO (CONCERT) button lamp to light.
Use the procedure below to save data you recorded on the Digital Piano to a USB flash drive as a MIDI file (SMF format 0).
For more detailed instructions, refer to the user manual or the online resources provided by Casio.

Player1 I like it!

Kaydia in case you don't know already, Faber has audios of the pieces in two different tempos; practice and performance: https://pianoadventures.com/qr/ff1302/

I was aiming to match to practice tempo for most pieces. And just like you, I thought my tempo was OK until I've listened those recordings. Even "practice tempo"s were always faster

Kaydia
I'm glad the recording worked!
Yes, that tempo illusion is very familiar. As a beginner the brain gets so busy processing and executing everything that it feels like we're playing sooo fast. It does slowly get better with lots of practice, though, so just hang in there!

hebele Oh, very cool! I didn't know that, thank you very much! And, oh yeah, I was playing it way too slow. I've bookmarked the page and will be trying out playing along to the tracks for the rest of the pieces in the book.

Kaydia

Practice the piece first, paying attention to learning to read the notes on the scale, note values (half, quarter, eighth notes, etc and how long to hold them), tempo, key signatures, and counting. Then listen to/watch the recordings/you tube videos to see how close you got to the way it's supposed to be played.

If you practiced the piece first, you not only learn the piece but you also begin to learn to spot the rhythm and harmony/melody without needing to listen first. If you listen first, you'll have a harder time learning the other things you need to start picking up on.

Player1 I appreciate the advice, thank you. This is the approach I've been taking so far. Sounds like I'm on the right track, so will continue to work on learning the notes, counting, etc. before viewing a video.

I finished with both the left-hand and right-hand chords versions of "When the Saints Go Marching In" separately, then went through the challenge of connecting them together on the repeat without there being a gap in the timing. I ended up doing it by using only the left-hand chords version, instead of having to flip to another page. Also, the right-hand version doesn't have the words from the song written in, and I'm not sure why, but it was throwing me off.

Now, on to learning the F Major chord.

Congrats @Kaydia - sounds like you're making steady progress! Funny, I did the same with When the Saints - it's fun to play both versions back to back and finding ways to reduce the page turning time gap. In fact it's one of the pieces I still play on occasion - it's so happy and bouncy.

Mind you, page turning is a skill we need to learn at some point... in fact I may need to face it soon with my current piece (I just started Moonlight Sonata which is two double pages long, yikes).

Another piece I really enjoyed playing (and still do) is Mary Ann, I believe that you already had that one. But then again I enjoy calypso type music and it has a very cute left hand melody

Kaydia

Be sure to learn your chords and scales by heart both on the keyboard and being able to speak/define/explain them.

Kaydia Congratulations with your first recording! I wouldn't bother too much with the tempo though in this stage. It will take a lot of time to get it up to speed - I think you'll learn more when you move on to new pieces. You can always go back a couple of months from now and surprise yourself by finding how much easier it all will be.

Also, don't bother yet with chords and scales. Too early!

As you see, Player1 and I disagree on quite a few things, but that is the nice thing about a forum. You get different answers and you choose the one that suits you the best.

@Sophia I did enjoy the challenge of doing it in both hands. Also, I agree, it is happy and bouncy. And I also liked the Mary Ann piece. My tastes tend to run to pop, country, folk tunes, and mellower stuff.

Sophia Another piece I really enjoyed playing (and still do) is Mary Ann, I believe that you already had that one. But then again I enjoy calypso type music and it has a very cute left hand melody

I liked Mary Ann also. I didn't know what calypso music was until I just now looked it up. I'll be checking more into it later. Thanks for mentioning it.

Sophia Mind you, page turning is a skill we need to learn at some point... in fact I may need to face it soon with my current piece (I just started Moonlight Sonata which is two double pages long, yikes).

I'm going to kick that "some point" down the road as long as I can. Good luck with your multi-page turnings.

Player1 Be sure to learn your chords and scales by heart both on the keyboard and being able to speak/define/explain them.

I will do my best to learn and memorize them, but not so much on the speak/define/explain part since I've never been good at doing that.

Animisha Congratulations with your first recording! I wouldn't bother too much with the tempo though in this stage. It will take a lot of time to get it up to speed - I think you'll learn more when you move on to new pieces. You can always go back a couple of months from now and surprise yourself by finding how much easier it all will be.

Thank you! It wasn't so much the tempo itself, it was the realization that the tempo I thought I was playing and the tempo I heard on the recording were noticeably different. Otherwise, I agree with you about getting faster eventually, so right now I am not that concerned with tempo speed.

Animisha Also, don't bother yet with chords and scales. Too early!

As you see, Player1 and I disagree on quite a few things, but that is the nice thing about a forum. You get different answers and you choose the one that suits you the best

At this point I'm only learning the chords as they're presented in the lesson book. So far that' be 3 chords, I think. No scales yet. I don't see much point in learning more than I'm using since I don't tend to remember things unless I use them on a regular basis.

I appreciate the different perspectives. I just piece together different people's advice that I think will work for my goals and way of learning.