Customer Reviews

How To Play The Recorder

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

 

 

Wow! This book is so easy to understand! I taught myself by using it at six, and now that my mom wants to learn, I'm getting it again. It gives you all the fundementals of recorder playing, and makes learning easy.

I recalled about 5 years ago feeling the urge to learn another instrument (I play Clarinet so I'm kinda ahead of some of the books concepts). I decided to try the simply made recorder and found this cheap sold by the register in a music store. I pick up on the simple instructions and was playing mid way to all the songs within a day.

Fast foward to a few months later, and I was giving a small group of kids informal music lessons.This group ranged in age from 7 to 11 years old. These kids did not have any music experience. They all voted on playing/learning the recorder, so I had them get this book...2 months later we had a mini recital and some played in a huge group, 2 of them did an awesome duet, and all from the simple laid out instructions of the book. Definitely good for all ages and easy to pick up!

The book's all "Greek" to me, but I'm working on it. I'm 62, my granddaughter is 11, and she's helping me with it. I wanted to exercise my mind and retain control of my arthritic fingers, and thought this might be a worth-while challenge for me. It is.

One of the confusing things about recorders for the uninitiated is the existence of two different flavors. Sopranos, the familiar elementary school variety, actually sound an octave above the notation, and have C as the lowest note, while altos sound as written and have F as the lowest note. Assuming you want to play a concert pitch C, this means the finger patterns differ between alto and soprano recorders. For example, with all holes covered, the soprano sounds a C, while the alto sounds an F.

This book describes the differences between the English and German fingering, but doesn't even mention the differences between the various recorders. This leads to two possible problems. If you have an alto recorder and learn the fingerings from this book, you may be unpleasantly surprised if you ever try to play with anyone. The other alternative is, if you have found the correct fingering from another source, you will not be able to play some of the selections since you won't have the low C, D and E notes.

Wow! This book is so easy to understand! I taught myself by using it at six, and now that my mom wants to learn, I'm getting it again. It gives you all the fundementals of recorder playing, and makes learning easy.

Purchased as a gift for 6-year old grandson. Biggest issue for him is that the book does not stay open and lie flat.
I'm not there to see him practice so I can't really review how well it teaches to play the recorder.

This is a good supplement for 'Its Recorder Time'. This will expand the sheet music available for practice. I find it's a handy source for tunes that I already know how they are supposed to sound.