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A Guide to the ABRSM Syllabus (2023 - 2024)

This series provides a detailed guide to the ABRSM piano examination syllabus for 2023 - 2024, including video walk-throughs with practice suggestions, tips on style and interpretation and other ideas for a selection of pieces (from initial to Grade 8).... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing Examinations

Simple Improvisation with Christopher Norton's Connections

A series of step-by-step guides to using pieces from Christopher Norton's Connections to learn chord shapes and do simple improvisation.... Read >>


Christopher Norton Performing Improvisation

How to Improvise

A step-by-step guide to improvisation for classical pianists

Do you know your chords and scales but struggle to think of anything to play when faced with a piano with no sheet music? In these videos, Dave Hall provides a step-by-step guide to improvisation for classical pianists with activities for ear training, fundamental theory and most importantly, ideas to... Read >>


Dealing with Performance Anxiety

Although sharing your playing with others can be deeply rewarding, most pianists (including many professionals!) suffer from some form of stage fright at the prospect of playing in a public setting. In this video, Graham Fitch shares some of his thoughts and methods for dealing with performance anxiety.... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing

A Guide to the Trinity College Piano Syllabus (2021 - 2023)

This series features video walk-throughs of a selection of pieces from Trinity College London’s 2021 - 2023 piano examination syllabus, giving plenty of tips for practice, as well as suggestions for piano teachers, and guidance on matters relating to style and interpretation.... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing Examinations

ABRSM Grade 8 - Piano Exam Pieces

This collection of video walk-throughs from our guide to the ABRSM 2021 & 2022 piano examination syllabus provides practice suggestions, tips on style and interpretation and other ideas for a selection of the Grade 8 pieces.... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing Examinations

A Guide to the ABRSM Syllabus (2021 - 2022)

This series provides a detailed guide to the ABRSM piano examination syllabus for 2021 - 2022, including video walk-throughs with practice suggestions, tips on style and interpretation and other ideas for each of the main pieces (from initial to Grade 8), and a selection of alternative pieces.... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing Examinations

Preparing for an Examination

This collection of videos offers general tips and suggestions for preparing or a piano examination. It serves as a complement to our repertoire guides and covers topics including sight-reading, aural, technical tests (scales and arpeggios), general preparation and practice strategies.... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing Examinations

A Guide to the Trinity College Piano Syllabus (2018 - 2020)

This series features video demonstrations of a selection of pieces from Trinity College London’s 2018 - 2020 piano examination syllabus, with examples from each grade from Initial to 8. You will find plenty of tips for practice, as well as suggestions for piano teachers, and guidance on matters relating to... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing Examinations

ABRSM Grade 7 - Piano Exam Pieces

This collection of video walk-throughs from our guide to the ABRSM 2021 & 2022 piano examination syllabus provides practice suggestions, tips on style and interpretation and other ideas for a selection of the Grade 7 pieces.... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing Examinations

ABRSM Initial Grade - Piano Exam Pieces

This collection of video walk-throughs from our guide to the ABRSM 2021 & 2022 piano examination syllabus provides practice suggestions, tips on style and interpretation and other ideas for each of the main Initial Grade pieces.... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing Examinations

ABRSM Grade 6 - Piano Exam Pieces

This collection of video walk-throughs from our guide to the ABRSM 2021 & 2022 piano examination syllabus provides practice suggestions, tips on style and interpretation and other ideas for each of the Grade 6 pieces.... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing Examinations

ABRSM Grade 5 - Piano Exam Pieces

This collection of video walk-throughs from our guide to the ABRSM 2021 & 2022 piano examination syllabus provides practice suggestions, tips on style and interpretation and other ideas for each of the Grade 5 pieces.... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing Examinations

ABRSM Grade 4 - Piano Exam Pieces

This collection of video walk-throughs from our guide to the ABRSM 2021 & 2022 piano examination syllabus provides practice suggestions, tips on style and interpretation and other ideas for each of the Grade 4 pieces.... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing Examinations

ABRSM Grade 1 - Piano Exam Pieces

This collection of video walk-throughs from our guide to the ABRSM 2021 & 2022 piano examination syllabus provides practice suggestions, tips on style and interpretation and other ideas for each of the main Grade 1 pieces.... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing Examinations

Create First! - Part 1

Learning Music the Pattern Play Way

An introductory Pattern Play series that introduces the materials of music (scales, intervals, and chords) in creative and musical ways.... Read >>


Forrest Kinney Performing Improvisation

Anyone Can Improvise!

Dedicated to helping everyone play the music they love and long to play, Lucinda Mackworth-Young introduces her step-by-step system for learning to play by ear and improvise, so that even classically trained piano players can play spontaneously, anywhere, anytime - and say “Yes!” when asked to play Happy Birthday!... Read >>


Lucinda Mackworth-Young Performing Improvisation

A Guide to the ABRSM Syllabus (2018 - 2020)

This series contains resources and further links to other resources featuring the ABRSM syllabus (until 2020) and is designed for elementary level players, young musicians and their teachers. Articles in this series provide step-by-step (or phrase-by-phrase) approaches to learning a pieces thoroughly and securely, offer practice exercises to help solve... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing Examinations

Playing Together - Etiquette and Tips for Duet Playing

These videos, based on content from the Piano Teachers’ Course UK, provide a demonstration of the “do’s and don’ts” of duet playing. Using Mozart’s Five Variations K501 as a practical example, the videos illustrate the various challenges that arise, including pedalling, page turning and getting in each other’s way in... Read >>


Beate Toyka Teaching

Spread Chords

Spread (or rolled, ripped, broken or arpeggiated) chords are simply chords where we play one note after the other, rather than playing all the notes simultaneously. Although this sounds relatively straightforward, there are questions and problems associated with spreading chords which this series of articles will seek to address.... Read >>


Graham Fitch Performing

Fanfarinette and La Triomphante (from Suite in A minor)

Trinity College - Grade 8

Jean-Philippe Rameau was an important composer and theorist of the High Baroque. He wrote three books of very fine pieces for harpsichord - Fanfarinette and La Triomphante come from the Suite in A minor (third book), and are examples of character pieces with descriptive or fanciful titles typical of the... Read >>


Graham Fitch Learning pieces Rameau

No. 2 from Kinderstücke (Op. 72)

Trinity College - Grade 7

Mendelssohn wrote his set of six Children’s Pieces, op. 72 for his young relatives during his summer holiday to England in 1842. No. 2, an andante sostenuto in the key of E flat, close in spirit to the composer’s many Songs without Words, features a lyrical melody in the right... Read >>


Allegro molto (3rd movement from Sonata in C major, Hob. XVI:50)

Trinity College - Grade 7

This is the last movement of the so-called “English” Sonata in C, inspired by the powerful and resonant Broadwood pianos Haydn encountered on a visit to London in the 1790s. The music is full of humour and lightness of spirit, requiring a sense of comic timing, clarity of texture and... Read >>


Graham Fitch Learning pieces Haydn

Elgar - Andantino (First movement from Sonatina)

Trinity College - Grade 4

Here we find the first movement of a two-movement sonatina that Elgar wrote for his niece. It is song-like and gently expressive, calling for sensitivity in shaping phrases and timing larger melodic intervals. The Andantino demands careful listening in the balancing of the hands, the accompanying left hand, while quieter,... Read >>


Graham Fitch Learning pieces Elgar

Beyond Stage Fright - Inspired Performance

This series features the first two weeks of Inspired Performance which is an online video and audio course which aims to help you move through your performance blocks towards a free, joyful and inspired performing life. It provides an overview of performance anxiety, how we experience nerves and how we... Read >>


Charlotte Tomlinson Performing

Beyond Stage Fright - Managing Performance Nerves

This short course aims to start you on the first steps of a journey to help you find ways to manage those nerves so that you can perform to your full potential and enjoy the whole experience. The course is divided into fives days with a short video for each... Read >>


Charlotte Tomlinson Performing

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