Rosemarie Penner’s Unfinished Lessonblog got a remodel and is now Must Love Music
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I’ve tried several Sleep Masks over the years, but my latest is hands down the best I’ve ever used. I am a light sleeper, and every night that I wear these, I swear I have slept more deeply than ever. They are incredibly comfortable and fit the nose and face just right.
Sweet and Savory Shared Brussels Sprouts Salad is perfect for this time of year as we close out summer and enter autumn. It makes a pretty good size salad, so be prepared to make it for 6-8 people or halve the recipe for less.
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Interested in some ideas on what to make for lunch? Listen to Episode 81 – What’s for Lunch of The Piano Pantry Podcast.
I’ve been needing to invest in some larger storage containers. While I have a couple of different nice 8-cup ones, I really needed some larger sizes. After scouting out what’s out there, I ended up on these fabulous Sterlite 16-Cup Plastic Storage Containers. On Amazon, one container was $15, but there was also a set of four for $30, so… yeah, I now have four large containers!
This past weekend, I had the honor of providing music for my cousin’s outdoor wedding.
I don’t know about you, but even though playing for weddings has never been part of my regular gig, it seems as if requests have definitely slowed down even more in the past ten years.
It likely has a lot to do with people having easier access to music tracks as well as the changing culture in church music and, thus, the declining demand for church pianists and organists. Of course, I’m COMPLETELY speculating here, but that’s my rough take on it.
Even though they happen infrequently and every wedding’s musical requests are different, there are a couple of books and several pieces of repertoire that I have found to be my trusty go-to’s.
In the course of my preparations for this past weekend, I came across a couple of other items that were great additions to my list. I now have enough now – I thought it was time to share!
This is one of those books I’ve had for so long I can’t even remember buying it! Unfortunately, it’s not available on SheetMusicPlus.com, but it does still appear on a couple of other sheet music sites.
It’s part of an “Unfold & Play” series, which means the pages are printed and folded so that you can actually open them out across your music rack. Luckily, with the invention of the iPad and apps like forScore, that is no longer an issue – you can scan the music. It’s still a pretty ingenious way of printing!
While there are lots of great arrangements in there, there is only one that is part of my go-to list. I love it so much, I would buy the whole book to have this arrangement! It’s a combination of the songs “I Will Be Here” by Steven Curtis Chapman” and “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring.”
I used that particular piece for when the pastor, groom, grandparents, and parents entered. Everyone loved it!
Anyone who’s a Phillip Keveren fan won’t be surprised by this one!
More than half of these 15 solos make it onto my regular list. I find a lot of these tunes are perfect for the 20-30 minutes of music preceding the wedding.
There’s a lot of great variety with anything from soft rock like More than Words and Don’t Know Much to Broadway’s Seasons of Love and Sunrise, Sunset to worship music’s Hallelujah (Your Love is Amazing). This book is DEFINITELY worth every penny to have in your library.
Just a heads up that I am an affiliate with Sheet Music Plus which just means I get a very small percentage back if you purchase using any of the links here today without it costing you extra. Thanks for the support!
As I said in the introduction, there are a couple of others I recently came across that I’m excited to share with you today as well.
This is a book I thought sounded fun and dropped into my shopping cart a year or so ago. When it arrived, I played through it and realized the pieces were great for background music, so I stashed it with my wedding music file.
I played a half dozen or so of these following the ceremony while the bride and groom were dismissing their guests.
One piece from this book made it into the ceremony – Johann’s Music Box. It was a lovely 3-page arrangement on the progression from Canon in D. As is often done, I used it for the bridal party procession.
My cousin told me to play whatever I wanted for the wedding – she just “figured” she would walk down the aisle to the traditional wedding song. (That was a pretty easy gig, I will say!)
You know how, most of the time, the walk down the aisle – whether for the parents, bridal party, or bride – is WAY shorter than our arrangements? I was ruminating over this dilemma for a bit until I found my concerns (thankfully) squelched.
First up – as I already stated – I found the short canon arrangement. Then, I came across an arrangement of the bridal chorus that was loaded into my forScore app that I didn’t even remember I HAD!
It’s a fun, unique, and SHORT arrangement of the wedding song from Leila Viss. She actually has two different arrangements available in the download. I went for the first.
Score! Thanks, Leila!
Do you have any favorite books or go-to arrangements you like to keep up your sleeve for wedding gigs? Share in the comments!
In April 2021, I discovered and shared here on the blog that Piano Explorer Magazine had been discontinued. I know how sad many of you were to hear that news, so I’m excited to share with you today a similar type of magazine that is now available!
In July 2023, Piano Inspires Magazine announced a new publication called Piano Inspires Kids. (Just to be clear, this new publication has no affiliation with the former Piano Explorer Magazine, which was published by The Instrumentalist.)
Piano Inspires is one of many resources part of The Francis Clark Center and is the brainchild of Andrea McAlister and Sara Ernst (pictured above). The magazine is geared toward young pianists of all levels, ages 8-14.
Printed quarterly, each issue will contain feature articles on musicians, composers, musical styles, music in the news, practice tips, new music, theory lessons, creative activities, games and puzzles, and student submissions.
At the time of this post, individual subscriptions are $29.99/year or $14.99 for a single issue. Group subscriptions of 5 or more copies are available at $24.99 (per copy) per year. (International subscriptions are also available.)
You can get a special introductory price through 10/01/2023 using code LAUNCH 23 at checkout.
Check out more details on the Piano Inspires Kids website here.
06.02.2024 Update!
There is now an accompanying music lab sheet you can use during your studio’s music lab time that corresponds with the Piano Inspires KIDS magazine. Check it out here!
A virtual retreat for teachers to come and be refreshed, rejuvenated, and enjoy collaborating with fellow teachers!
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After reading an article by The Kitchn on the best way to store blueberries, I was pleased to discover I was already using the best method! Who wouldn’t want berries that lasted longer?
Already, I am considering if I should stock up on the rest of the books in his series. I loved this easy read. It’s such a simple concept, yet we often place more “conditions” on our students than we may realize.
I love hearing about books other teachers love! There are so many out there, I’ve tried over the years to focus on only purchasing those related to piano. If you’re interested in seeing more, check out these posts here on the Piano Pantry blog:
Wow! Viola Davis and so many others are incredible in this movie! Not only does it bring to light the history of this group of women warriors, but I love seeing how community, in general, used to be such a big part of how people lived and had their being.
I’ve wanted one of these cute little coffee makers (pictured left) for years and finally got one this past Christmas.
I love using it with an instant milk frother (pictured right) to make my special weekend lattes. It’s cheaper and more fun than a big fancy espresso machine!
Bonus: Check out this YouTube video for great tips on making an even better cup of coffee in the Moka Pot.
Do you keep track of the pieces your students learn? I’ve done it for as long as I can remember, although I can’t recall what made me get started. There are two reasons one might consider tracking student repertoire.
(1) As time passes, it can be easy to forget the work that students have done. Writing down pieces makes it easy to look back on those accomplishments.
(2) You might need to intentionally track pieces in order to meet specific goals or challenges (such as the 40-piece challenge.)
While this post is not necessarily about the 40-piece challenge, here’s just a brief background if you’re not familiar.
First made popular by Australian-based teacher Elisa Milne, this challenge was ultimately a reaction to piano culture’s highly steeped exams and competitions, where students were only learning a small handful of pieces to perfection each year.
While exam culture is not as prominent in the states, the challenge still gained much attention – and for good reason. Even for students who study higher-level repertoire, the goal is to learn some easier pieces they can learn quickly in order to have exposure to as much repertoire as possible.
I’ve never actually run the challenge formally in my studio, but I do give away an award at my Spring Recital to the student who masters the most pieces. I mainly like to track repertoire so we can remember the work they’ve completed.
Over the years, I’ve used a variety of tracking sheets. In recent years I feel like I’ve refined what works well for me, and I finally feel like I can present you with a sheet I’m proud of that you might also find useful in your own studio.
While there are two parts to this sheet that likely won’t surprise you – “mastered” and “memory,” there are two parts that might have made your head turn – “studied” and “level-up.”
Why “Studied” Pieces?
The goal is ultimately for students to polish their pieces to a solid state, sometimes we start pieces with students and eventually realize we have to let them go. It could be that the student is just struggling to connect with or enjoy the piece or that it’s proving more of a technical challenge than we expected it to be. I’ve learned that – that’s OK! It doesn’t mean that working on the piece was a waste of time – there’s always something we can learn along the way.
As you can imagine, this can happen more frequently with some students than others, so tracking these pieces helps us see the big picture of how much we “let go of” to ensure we don’t see too much of a trend.
Calling it a “study” piece removes the negative connotation that they were not able to master it fully and maximizes the fact that they still benefited from learning and doing some work on the piece.
Why “Level-Up” Pieces?
This particular idea I have to attribute this to my friend, Christina Whitlock, who, in episode 113 of her podcast “To Pass or Not to Pass,” shared the idea of giving students the option to “level up.”
While I use the term “mastered” (unlike her), I’m of the same opinion as her that “mastering” a piece may not necessarily mean it’s polished to “competition-ready” absolute perfection. It might look a little different for each student.
In my early years of teaching – this one was a big struggle – not knowing what “standards” to uphold. Experience has taught me that while generally yes, a nicely played piece should have all the elements – steady beat – appropriate tempo, accurate notes, dynamic contrast, etc., sometimes we have to consider each individual student.
I don’t want to get into too much detail here – I would encourage you to listen to Christina’s episode on the topic. I will say, though, that asking students if they want to “level” up is a good way of knowing how much they love a piece and how determined they are to play it well.
Memory Pieces
Memorizing repertoire is not something I push, but I encourage students to memorize a good handful of pieces each year. This is another area that can be revealing and help you know how much a student loves a piece. They don’t want to memorize something they aren’t enjoying that much.
I tell them that the goal is that they have to play it for me by memory three weeks in a row. (Keep in mind that I’m just talking about general weekly study here—not necessarily what you might need when preparing for a festival, recital, or competition.)
I count the first one as long as it’s “close,” but the second and third ones have to be confidently memorized, or they need to work on them a little longer.
I hope you and your students enjoy using this repertoire list throughout the year!
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08.30.2024 Update
An updated version of this sheet is now available. See this blog post for more details:
Movie recommendation! Barefoot on Netflix is so cute! My husband even enjoyed it.
The ne’er-do well son of a wealthy family enlists a young woman he meets at a psychiatric hospital to pose as his girlfriend at his brother’s wedding. (Description from Netflix?)
Happy Friday, everyone! Wow. It’s been quite a few weeks since the last Friday Finds post. I have a big stash ready to go, though, so you can look forward to one this week and next! Have a great weekend!
Recently, I discovered Canva has a desktop client! I’ve always loved using desktop apps for Evernote and Notion, so I’m curious to see if I’ll like using Canva more on my desktop or will stick with it on the web.
Piano Adventures by Randall and Nancy Faber has been a staple in the piano teaching community for a long time. The method books, supplementary PreTime to BigTime, and Developing Artist series are well-known and familiar to many teachers.
I feel like the solo sheets are less prominent, though, as it took me a few years into teaching before I realized they had Achievement Literature Sheets as part of the Developing Artist series.
It’s the same way with the Achievement Solo Sheets. I was familiar with a few but didn’t realize the full scope until recently browsing their website. There are more than 30 available (3-6 per level!)
While you can find all the Achievement Literature Sheets easily in the Developing Artist Piano Library, interestingly enough, there is no way on their website to easily see all of the Achievement Solo Sheets in one place. They’re not even listed where you might expect, which would be under the “Piano Books” segment with each level. The only way to find them is under “Quick Shop.” Let me show you quickly in this video:
I thought it might be useful for you (and myself!) to be able to see all of these in one place, so I compiled all of them from Primer to Level 5 in one music list for you on Sheet Music Plus!
I’ve wanted one of these cute little coffee makers (pictured left) for years and finally got one this past Christmas.
