dawn's piano

During our summer session, one of my Elementary students asked to start learning this piece by Luke Bryan, so I set to work arranging it for her and ended up with this Elementary Piano Solo version of a country hit that is now available in my store on Sheet Music Plus .  While it is arranged for Elementary Piano, a familiarity with the song and cadence of the lyrics will help young students grasp some of the more challenging timings, or may even allow them to learn some passages by rote. Some of the quick repeated notes will offer technical practice, and overall the structure of the song offers an opportunity to familiarize students with the common parts of a popular song (Verse, Chorus, Bridge, Instrumental, etc). You can preview the sheet music, listen to a sample of the arrangement, and view purchasing options using the links below, or on the Sheet Music Plus website.  look inside Rain Is A Good Thing - Easy Piano ...

Can you believe we're already thinking about the Christmas Festival again?! For those of you just joining in, each year our local Piano Teachers' League hosts a Multi-Piano and Guitar Christmas Festival wherein area students prepare holiday duets, we line 8 pianos up on stage, and students & teachers perform these duets in a lively piano ensemble. This is a highly anticipated event each year, and we have been brainstorming how to carry on with this favorite performance in 2020.  Given the caution around COVID this year, naturally things are going to be a little different. But we piano teachers have brainstormed and come up with an idea that we are pretty excited about that will continue to give your students the opportunity to get ensemble piano experience, AND we will be able to avoid large gatherings and do our very best to keep everyone healthy. So, here's the current plan: Students will prepare their leveled duets in lessons as usual. On December 11th ...

One of my projects during our studio break in May of this year was to get the artwork on our studio walls sorted out to be a little more thematic, and 'put together'. One of the things that had been holding me up in this previously was that I didn't have any art to hang right behind the piano that would really help bring the room together. So, during our downtime, I decided to go ahead and create some studio art that could fill this space! You can see the image below with the 5 original prints hung in a collage form behind the studio piano. We will also be using these as our grand prizes for the studio practice challenges this year! Each student who completes their 40-hour Piano Maestro Challenge will choose a print of their choice to be personalized with their name & achievement, framed and presented at our Spring Recital! Now for the freebies! The Treble Clef print pictured here is free to you as a digital download if you would like it. All you ...

Did you know that day old infants will breathe differently depending on if they are listening to Mozart vs. Stravinsky? This is because a s soon as we are capable of hearing music, we are already responding to and interacting with that music as a vehicle for emotional and cognitive development.  Traditional methods of teaching music have often started children around 7 or 8 years old with instrumental & technical learning, but a lot of research is now available to show that early childhood music education and integration is so incredibly valuable for essential development. In today's post, I'm sharing two different articles highlighting the benefits of early childhood music education. One is from the National Association for Music Education and the other is from Carnegie Hall.  This first article from NAfME outlines their position on Early Childhood Music Education, and that every child deserves play-based and developmentally appropriate music education. I'm dropp...

Mark your calendars for Saturday, November 7th at 11:00 am CST/9:00 AM PST because that's when we'll be hosting our Fall Video Recital!  As we've done the past couple years, our Fall Recital will be a recorded video recital that I will edit together into a single video file for online viewing. One thing that will be different this year is that the recital video will air as a Video Premiere on the studio Facebook page. I'm excited to give this a try because it will enable us to all sit down and watch the recital together with our videos synced up in real time, and to comment, cheer each other on and interact together while watching the performances. You'll also be able to invite friends and family to tune in with us making this something more akin to a live recital experience. For those of you who use Facebook, you can RSVP to the Fall Video Recital here to get updates on how to tune in for the watch party, and you are welcome to invite friends and family as w...

It's that time again! We are unveiling our Young Composers Project for 2020.  This project is highly anticipated by both teacher & students each year because we get to enjoy a change of pace for the summertime, and turn our attention towards writing original music.  Engaging in writing music has several great benefits. It enhances our understanding of music theory, note reading and music fluency, while exercising some creativity.   How Young Composers works:  Each year in the summertime, all of our piano students explore creativity through writing music. The ways we approach this are adapted to all levels, from preschool up through advanced students. AND continuing students who have a working knowledge of note reading, as well as at least 6 months of playing experience, also have the opportunity to notate their original music using Noteflight notation software, and to record a track of their composition during our recording week in the studio. For online stu...

Practice Challenges help keep piano students motivated and progressing throughout the school year session. So in today's blog post, I'm outlining our practice challenges for the 2020-2021 School Year.  Year-Long Challenge First, our year-long challenge this year is going to be a Piano Maestro 40-Hour challenge . Any student who practices 40 hours or more in Piano Maestro over the course of the school year will receive a special prize (TBD) as well as some serious studio bragging rights. This adds up to a little over an hour a week, so making a 10-15 minutes of Piano Maestro a part of your every day practice might be the best way to reach this one.  The chart below is tracking our 40 hour challenge (which is 2400 total minutes!) Month-Long Challenges We will have 4 month-long challenges spread throughout the year. These are good motivators because they are short-term and make for easily measurable wins for students who track them. Here's what it will look like...