I would like to start teaching keyboard as well as piano as I think it would be accessible to a wider spectrum of kids including those who can't afford the money/space for a piano, and those who like pop music of course!

Has anybody else taught keyboard having come from a piano teaching background? How did it work out?

Hi , yes i teach keyboard as well as piano, mainly in schools in small groups. Unfortunately the tutor books for keyboard aren't as good - I use the Scott& Turner books and the Complete Keyboard Player series, and I enter pupils for London College exams (I use ABRSM for my private piano students though.) although I don't have many up to exam standard - the progress tends to be slower in a group. I find not many of them can play in time to the backing beat, which they are required to do in the exam- most have still passed though. Hope this helps.

I taught keyboard years ago at the very first school I worked at- it wasn't very satisfactory for me or the pupils, as I feel I approached it too much from a classically trained pianist's point of view. If I were to teach it again, I'd work through a keyboard tutor book myself, first, recognising that it's a very different, although related, instrument. I agree that the tutor books for keyboard aren't as plentiful or as good as for piano-I have had students who have used Kenneth Baker Complete Piano Player, but I didn't like the way the letter names were written over the notes in the early books-I can't remember if the keyboard books by him have the same problem. Well worth a browse at the local music shop I think.

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have used Kenneth Baker Complete Piano Player, but I didn't like the way the letter names were written over the notes in the early books

I agree - I've used this book with a couple of older beginner piano students, and we found that the note names actually got in the way ... Haven't been tempted to look beyond book one.

Maggie

Why do they insist on putting in letter names over every note in keyboard tutors?
Do they assume that if you are learning keyboard then you really don't want to be bothered with being able to actually read the music as well??

When my pupils learn piano on an electronic keyboard, I tend to give them the opportunity to include the skill of learning to use the keyboard with single finger then full chords, as it is such a useful skill and knowledge to have. For this I use the SFX TUTOR and the SFX TUTOR BOOK 2 which I have found very good - particularly in how the books progress through the chords. I don't tend to touch the Kenneth Baker books much.

This has been very interesting so far - keep it up and thanks for your input!

Someone else I met said they hated the Kenneth Baker series so I have steered clear of this. I quite liked the Scott and Turner but I think this also had letter names written inside the notes! I suppose you could just tippex over all this but it would be a pain.

I bought a book by Sarah Walker called Electronic Keyboard Basics and I really liked this except that it started off in D minor position rather than C position. My classical conditioning kicked in there, but can anyone think of a reason why starting in D position would be a problem? The only problem I could think of would be that you start off with d minor chords which are a tiny bit more complicated than c major chords because when you use "single finger" you need to use two fingers for minor chords.

I like the way she uses the drumkit sound to learn rhythms and she gives lots of suggestions for group activities throughout the book. There are also improvisation and aural games scattered through the text as you go.

I personally like 'Keyboard Magic' as a tutor for the keyboard, but combine this with a piano tutor, so that students learn how to play with both hands equally well, but also have the benefit of learning fingered chords so they can benefit from the technology of the keyboard early on (playing other styles of pop music, use of the rhythm unit, sequencing, etc)

I never use the single fingered chord facility as this is incredibly restricting, and I have always found students cope fairly easily, right from the beginning of their study with fingered chords, which offer far more scope and less restriction. Although they find the fingered chords a little difficult at the beginning, it is amazing how quickly they catch on to this method of chord playing, and once they have learned several chords, such as C, G, F, A minor, E and D minor, usually find learning more chords actually quite easy, which increases their repertoire very quickly and opens up a great deal of music for them to play.

Sue

Sue - can you tell me more about Keyboard Magic .

Keyboard Magic (and how to achieve it) by John Hughes is a small, brightly coloured, attractive tutor for the keyboard, much better than the Kenneth Baker series, which I really don't like. At the beginning of the book, the pieces are similar to many other tutors, such as Little John, Ode to Joy, etc, but soon moves on to more colourful pieces in a wide variety of styles, bringing in left hand chord playing almost immediately. Although John Hughes suggests the use of single finger chords right at the beginning, I feel it is far better to begin using fingered chords straight away, and bypass these, as having to press two fingers to play a minor or seventh chord is almost like learning a code! A complete waste of time, especially as all my students have always coped remarkably well with fingered chords, even the younger ones. I have been using Keyboard Magic for several years, along with other piano tutors, and found my own students making excellent progress.

The first few pages include note names above all the notes, but this quickly disappears (thank heavens!)

Sue