Shades of Sound Listening & Coloring Book: Thanksgiving

Description

My goal in creating this curriculum is to help piano students gain an interest in and a love and appreciation for great classical music.

Aspiring pianists need to know the literature, hear the greats perform, and be inspired and excited by the great music that is available! Just as writers need to read, read, read, pianists need to listen! Through this fun curriculum, students will learn about the musical periods and the great composers and their works. Listening repertoire selected includes selections from the standard solo piano literature, as well as solo piano and orchestra literature and orchestral works.

My hope is that students can add just 5-10 minutes of listening per day to their normal practicing. Listening to great music will change their understanding of music and will vastly increase their music history knowledge. It will excite and inspire them, encourage further study and listening, give them new pieces to add to their own repertoire wish list, infuse more great music into their lives, homes and families, and will boost their musicianship and expression to the next level.

The Thanksgiving Shades of Sound book includes 8 different pieces, including:

• AD MDCXX, from Sea Pieces by Edward MacDowell
• Piano Sonata No. 3 by Alberto Ginastera
• Selections from Annees de Pelerinage by Franz Liszt
• Indianisches Tagebuch by Ferruccio Busoni
• Appalachian Spring by Aaron Copland
• Thanksgiving and Forefathers’ Day by Charles Ives
• Harvest Hymn by Percy Grainger
• String Quartet No. 15 by Ludwig van Beethoven

Students may use The Playful Piano – Thanksgiving Listening Playlist to listen along with their book. The playlist is ordered to go right along with the book, and includes the optional “Further Listening” piece as well.