Alfred's Basic Adult Piano Course: Lesson Book Level 1: Lesson Book, Level One/2236

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Since the Alfred books tend to be chord-focused, they’re naturally more pop-focused as well. The majority of the selection contains standards like Happy Birthday, When the Saints Go Marching In, The Entertainer, Amazing Grace, and other pieces in that vein. The Alfred series has been around for a long time – I grew up using their regular lesson books for children, and I’ve taught with their books as an adult. In today’s video and blog post we’ll be talking all about Alfred’s Basic Adult Piano Course. We’ll go through the material this method book covers, talk about its pros and cons, and I’ll let you know if I recommend it for your piano learning journey. My rating for this series would be A-, and my rating for the Piano Adventures books would be A. I haven’t yet found a series that I consider A+, but I haven’t done too much exploring – something I plan on doing more of this year.

Alfred Basic Adult Piano Course - Free Download PDF Alfred Basic Adult Piano Course - Free Download PDF

I’ve been asked about this method time and time again, since it’s one of the most popular method book series for adults. I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to do a video on it! Most students won’t be learning from the Alfred method books exclusively – they’ll also be learning supplemental side pieces and technical exercises (whether from other Alfred books or not). Because of that, the lessons in each of the books can be stretched out comfortably to a year (or six months for a very motivated and impatient student willing to work twice as hard). Focus of the Alfred series: Chords The downside of a chord-based approach is that your left hand won’t be as equipped to deal with Classical music if you’re headed that route. Classical music requires a more dexterous and independent left hand, which is initially more tedious to develop.

The difficulty of the first Adult book follows an interesting path. The first half is very simple and easy to get into. However, there tends to be a difficult hitch at the end of the “G position” chapter with the pieces “Beautiful Brown Eyes” and “Alpine Melody”. Both Alfred Adult method books have a focus on chords. This is both the method’s strength and weakness.

ALFRED’S BASIC ADULT PIANO COURSE Le v e L 2 Adult All in One ALFRED’S BASIC ADULT PIANO COURSE Le v e L 2 Adult All in One

The preparatory level in music is generally a 1 to 2-year process for adult students (longer for children). The first Adult book roughly corresponds with the RCM’s Preparatory A level, and the second Adult book roughly corresponds with the RCM’s Preparatory B level.

The next adult series I’ll be talking about on this channel is the Piano Adventures one, so stay tuned for that. I’ll give you a brief overview on how to go through Alfred’s Basic Adult Piano Course if you’re a complete beginner, and then we’ll get into some of the finer details. But once that natural motivation starts to fade, they hokeyness becomes a problem. At this point I like to introduce supplemental pieces (perhaps something from the RCM’s Preparatory books) – pieces that seem more professional, serious and fancy. At book two I’m often prompted to say things like “Hang in there! The pot of gold is around the bend!” There’s so much to overcome at this stage in your learning journey – I’d almost go so far as to say it’s one of the hardest points of your learning journey period.