dawn's piano

Who else grew up reading The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg and then double checking that you could still hear the jingle bell tree ornaments every Christmas? It can't be just me, right? I remember being pretty excited when the movie came out many years ago now, and I still tend to watch it each year during December. But it was only a year or two ago that I actually got the itch to play some of the music. Inspiration is funny, sometimes it just hits you after years of enjoying a thing and you suddenly want to engage with it in a new way.  Now, being a full time piano teacher means that the majority of the arrangements I actually sit down to write tend to be with students in mind. BUT every once in a while, I'll have the itch to play a song myself, and not be able to find an arrangement that I love. Last Christmas I had that happen with the song When Christmas Comes to Town from the  The Polar Express.  I had just finished working on an arrangement of Believe arr. by ...

It's Christmastime! And holiday tunes are a major feature in the studio right now as we're learning parts for the Multi-Piano & Guitar Christmas Festival , as well as some special solos to play at those cozy family gatherings.  Over the years, I've arranged many holiday favorites for student requests, and I've wanted to share these arrangements more broadly for quite a while, but when I first started publishing music through SMP Press , these titles were not among those I could publish. I just recently thought to check again to see if they had been added to the ArrangeMe copyright list - AND THEY HAD! 👏 So today, I am sharing a whole bunch of popular Christmas songs ( Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer, Jingle Bell Rock, Frosty the Snowman, Rockin Around the Christmas Tree and Winter Wonderland!)  arranged for beginning and early intermediate piano solo that are now published with the sheet music available on SheetMusicPlus. Most of these arrangements have been used in...

Just a heads up to any regular readers that this blog post is going to be more reflective, a little personal, and not necessarily the usual fare here on this blog. However, I do think the thoughts are valuable, both to piano students as well as just in general. Or maybe I just need to process them out loud somewhere, and if that's the case, thank you for indulging me.  Some context: Several years ago I was working 6 days a week as a traveling piano teacher, then waking up early for rehearsal to play piano in church on Sundays, and often taking a shift or two a week at my second job at an independent bookstore. I also had plans most nights keeping up with friends & family. I was hustling with a capital 'H'. All the time. And I loved everything that I did. Teaching was rewarding, and the bookstore was my happy place. This was a pace I'd kept up without any trouble for almost 10 years starting back when I was in college, and I didn't have a strong reason to change ...