Any suggestions please for good books to use post grade 4.... there's so much out there and I find it very hard to chose something suitable, that will improve technique and repertoire prior to grade 5. Thanks.

Please specify what instrument! I've noticed sometimes that the piano teachers here assume everybody else is a pianist, and that's just not the case!

Violinia

QUOTE (barcarolle @ Feb 23 2005, 02:22 PM)

Any suggestions please for good books to use post grade 4.... there's so much out there and I find it very hard to chose something suitable, that will improve technique and repertoire prior to grade 5. Thanks.

John W Schaum Piano Course Books G, H and 'after the H Book'.i find these books INVALUABLE!!!! Brilliant pieces and have been using them for well over 20 years..the children like them too

QUOTE (Violinia @ Feb 23 2005, 03:22 PM)

Please specify what instrument! I've noticed sometimes that the piano teachers here assume everybody else is a pianist, and that's just not the case! Violinia

oops, sorry - piano.

I like the Trinity First Repertoire book for around grades 4 - 6. It includes MacDowell's "To a Wild Rose" and the Maxwell Davies piece, "A Farewell to Stromness".

QUOTE (Jen W @ Feb 24 2005, 12:40 PM)

Maxwell Davies piece, "A Farewell to Stromness".

now that piece is beautiful!

The 'more romantic' series are roughly graded, and have the added bonus of occasionally being included as alternatives in the exam syllabus

My students like Joan Last - Dance Time, Pam Wedgwood - Green Jazzin About, Classics to Moderns vol 4, Christopher Norton Micro Jazz and some of the More Romantic/ Romantic Sketchbook series, between exams after grade 4.

I find that the majority of the compilation books are 'Romantic Pieces for Piano', 'More Romantic Pieces', 'A Romantic Scetchbook' or some more modern collections of pieces (like the Pamela Wedgewood ones and Microjazz). It almost seems that tutor books covering earlier pieces have gone out of fashion (maybe they were never in?) and the between grades repertoire is becoming quite biased (in terms of publications at least) towards romantic music onwards. (Maybe this is why people seem to struggle with list A pieces more than the others?). Anyway, I have nothing against Romantic or later pieces but it seems more difficult to find books that cover the wider spectrum. Hours with the Masters is a good book covering from Baroque through to some Romantic Pieces, they're also quite good from a learner's point of view as they feel like 'real' pieces as they're written by the 'great' composers. Another series of books is the AB's 'Baroque Keyboard Pieces' which is basically what it says in the title (I haven't used it but they look good).

I wouldn't suggest ignoring the modern repertoire but it's definitely worth Supplementing the Romantic collections with some earlier pieces.

(Whoops, I just noticed this is the teachers' forum, having said all this I'm not a teacher but I'm not deleting it all now!)

The Keyboard Anthology (Series I, II and III) contain Baroque, Classical and Romantic, and cover various Grades. Book 1 of each series is Grades 1-2, Book 2 is Grades 3-4 and Book 3 is Grade 5 approximately.

The AB also publish Graded Study books (Heller, Czerny etc.) which contain useful technical material.