Customer Reviews

My First Book of Classical Music: 29 Themes by Beethoven, Mozart, Chopin and Other Great Composers in Easy Piano Arrangements

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I am an adult beginner and I'm teaching myself. This book has fun and easy arrangements to songs that you may already know the melody to. It's good for the adult beginner that is ready for their second book after getting down the basics. You should know how to read the notes (at least figure them out) in the bass and treble clef. It's a good book because you can probably play these songs right away, and you'll feel like you're really playing something, that otherwise would take years and years to accomplish. It's much better that playing kiddie songs. It has easy, short, two-hand abbreviated arrangements of classic's such as Nocturne by Chopin; Minuet by Bach; Ode to Joy by Beethovan; Minuet in G by Beethovan; Hungarian Dance by Brahms; Rondo in C by Clementi; From The New World by Dvorak; Sarabande by Handel; Sonta in C by Haydn; Suprise Symphony by Haydn and others.

I'm another adult who had piano lessons as a child and am now trying to relearn the piano with my own 10 year old. As advertised this book has a lot of familiar tunes that are easy for a novice player. I like the notes about the composer and song that preface each of the pieces. Almost all of the pieces are written in either the key of C or F which was much appreciated by me. Both hands are used in all pieces but in many the left hand simply plays chords while the right carries the melody.

One of my biggest regrets in life is that I didn't stick with my piano lessons when I was a child. I took for about three years, never practiced, and basically, have to struggle through most arrangements, usually with only the right hand. This book, however, makes me feel like a virtuoso!

The book includes familiar sections of well-known classical pieces. Each one is done in a very simple arrangement that somehow still captures the essence of the original composition.

I am able to sit down and sight-read most of the pieces without too much difficulty, and within a week or so of practicing, even my husband (a true musician) admits that I don't sound too bad.

The book is easy enough that I don't get frustrated, yet challenging enough to give me a sense of accomplishment. I highly recommend it to anyone who's taken lessons for about 3 to 4 years.

From a teacher's perspective: I love this book. The arrangements sound great and they are left/right hand balanced (versus having a stationary or primary chord left hand). They are not, as the book implies, for REAL beginners. My students can play SOME of these songs after they've studied for about a year, but the difficulty level in the book varies quite a bit. Only three of the 29 songs use exclusively whole, half and quarter notes. All of the others use more advanced rhythms including triplets, dotted eighths, & sixteenths. All but three songs have key signatures (F, G, D, d, ) and/or accidentals. Many use ledger lines, intermediate fingering techniques (like crossing), and even have dual bass and treble clefs. Songs are in 3/2, 4/4, 3/4, 2/4, 3/8, 6/8. It has GREAT teaching points for expression and phrasing. The silly irony of the book is that, after all of the complex keys and rhythms they include, they transposed and simplified Bach's Minuet in G...what a crack up! You can't beat the price for what you get.

I'm re-learning piano with my 5 year old, and playing music from this book was easy and entertaining for me. It got my child really interested in the music.

This is a great book for a piano student. It allows them to enjoy true music while learning how to play fairly easy pieces. These aren't little dittys made up to teach notes. It is classical music. Beautiful Dreamer by Stephen Foster, Traumerei by Robert Schumann and The Happy Farmer by Robert Schumann are my favorite pieces. They are a joy to learn and play! This music makes you WANT to practice.
I also recommend My First Book of Christmas Carols as well.

These arrangements are good, but a bit advanced. I am just not quite ready for this book. It is not self-explanatory. You need to be adept at reading both clefs, time signatures and the fingering is a bit tricky. I will have to slowly work up to it and these pieces definitely require a lot of slow, repetitive practice. Not as easy as Alfred's Basic Piano Course Book 1.

Even the right hand only player, can enjoy classics from these simple arrangements. The left hand is coming along with practice. This book makes learning the classics less intimidating. I would pay more for a spiral bound version.

This is a great book for beginners to get aquainted with the classics. I teach piano lessons and I'll use this one over and over for recitals! I usually like to see the music before I buy but I took and chance on this one and it paid off. I hope to try other Bergerac books.

I purchased this book some time ago as a "promise" to my little girl that she would one day have piano lessons. We now have a wonderful piano teacher who encourages us to explore other pieces besides what she assigns us and was happily surprised when we showed her this book that she hadn't seen before. The title is a little misleading; our teacher says that it's more appropriate for a level 3 child student, but it works well for us (a teenager and her middle-aged mom in their 2nd year of study.) What I really appreciate is the way that the pieces can dovetail with the material that we're studying. For example, while I was working on the 1st inversion of the C Major chords, I serendipitously found in this book "Beautiful Dreamer", an arrangement that utilizes the very chords I was studying. Our teacher calls this "an excellent little book" and I recommend it to those who would like to play something more than the pieces found in their lesson books.