Customer Reviews

Advanced Piano Solos Christmas Encyclopedia

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is the best collection of solo piano Christmas music I have found. The arrangements are probably not advanced, but they aren't easy either and they sound great (i.e harder than they are). I especially like "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" and "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town" which has been reworked in a jazzy vein.

If you are an advanced player, you will be able to sight read these easily. Intermediate players should be able to practice and get them up to speed without too much trouble. I always get a great response when I play these for people.

The printing is very clear; no squinting to read the notes on the staff. I also appreciate the clear musical notation and instruction (metronome speeds are listed, none of this Keverenesque "Mystically playful" nonsense).

If you are looking to find a great Christmas book, look no further. This is the only one you will need.

The level of difficulty here is advanced-beginner or lower-intermediate, definitely not advanced. But the arrangements are very well done so that they sound a lot more advanced than they are. They're great for sight-reading on the spur of the moment, which is what most players probably want from Christmas music. After all, it's played only once a year and is probably not something you want to spend a lot of time practicing. Most Christmas favorites--some you might not expect--are included. Also, several of the arrangements are startlingly original and wonderful fun to play. I recommend this collection strongly and give it four stars only because of the misleading title.

Tom Roed is my favorite arranger for more advanced pop, jazz, and Christmas music and his "Christmas Encyclopedia" is the ultimate collection of full, fun-to-play arrangements of forty-three solos and six duets. Usually in a collection this big, I'll find at least half of the arrangements are duds, but there are only a few songs in this book that I really don't like (and they are usually songs that I don't particularly like anyway, not the arrangements!). I have used various incarnations of this book (there have been many over the years! This is the "complete" collection, at least up to 1997!) with my advancing students, and these pieces were wonderful in recitals because they are different, sometimes very spirited, and always showier than most standard Christmas collections and teaching books. I got a few standing ovations myself with the bluesy "Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town," the boogie-woogie "Rudolph," and the wild and rockin' "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree." Also on the fun, up-tempo side are "Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer," "Up On the Housetop," and "The Chipmunk Song." Slower but still jazzy are "Christmas Time Is Here" (my favorite arrangement of this song!), "The Little Drummer Boy" (a student favorite), "Winter Wonderland," "Patapan," and "The Ukranian Bell Carol" - all exceptional. In the graceful and beautiful category are "Away In a Manger," "What Child Is This?," "We Three Kings of Orient Are," "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas," and the stellar (and difficult!) "O Holy Night." More advanced players will find this book essential for holiday parties and there are plenty of sacred pieces for church musicians as well. I enjoy playing in a variety of styles, so this is my all-time favorite Christmas book. The arrangements vary in difficulty from intermediate to fairly advanced, and most of them involve a lot of chord reading and octaves. Love it!

This book has many of the songs that others do not and the music is arranged nicely. It is not beginner but is not too difficult which is good since I typically get my Christmas music out around Thanksgiving and don't want to have to practice too much to play the songs. The only drawback to this book is that if you want to have words with the arrangements there are none. Maybe I should have realized that since it was piano solos but many of my piano books do have the lyrics. I will have to order another book for vocals.

I love Christmas piano music, but I was a little iffy about getting this book. I have another collection of Christmas songs that I love, but this Christmas Encyclopedia had many of the same songs. However, I am very happy with my purchase. The arrangements for every song that I've played have been beautiful. I consider myself early advanced at piano; these songs were challenging enough, but I didn't have to spend weeks upon weeks trying to ace the arrangement.

If you're looking for a Christmas piano book, I highly recommend this one!

Tom Roed has a knack for picking popular tunes on their way to becoming standards and writing solid intermediate-to-advanced arrangements. This is a compendium of 42 tunes that won't take much work and will get good reviews.

Warning: most of the recent stuff tends to be romantic. Be sure to include some up-tempo stuff so the rest of the audience doesn't get turned off.

Absolutely agree that these pieces sound harder than they really are. I minored in piano performance in college & I picked these up very quickly. They really wow everyone. I agree "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas" is probably the best piece in the book.

I think this is a perfect book. It isn't highly advanced, but that's alright since you typically only play it one month out of the year. You can pick up right where you left off 11 months ago!

I like the arrangements, though they start to sound similar, and are fairly generic. I also wish there were more of the traditional Christmas Carols instead of some of the more obscure ones.

For me this anthology has very few good, creative arrangements...Don't Get Around Much Anymore, Take Five, Linus and Lucy,and Pink Panther to mention a few. Coincidentally, none of the more interesting arrangements were by Tom Roed. However, just a few acceptable arrangements for me are "par for the course" in most collections.

John