Today’s piece is Also Sprach Zarathustra by Richard Strauss. It was made popular in the 1968 Stanley Kubrick science-fiction movie 2001: A Space Odyssey.
The organ part in this snippet looks pretty easy.
Just the main theme for piano
One-quarter speed
A piano reduction of the whole orchestral score
The orchestra playing the entire word
Just the opening of 2001: A Space Odyssey
The Blue Danube Waltz composed by Johann Strauss (no relation) was also used in this movie.
Today’s piece is Serenade by Franz Schubert composed in 1826. Find it in Piano Pronto Movement 4 and anthologies of classical piano music.
Music Box
Clarinet
Ragtime – see if you can find the melody!
Today we will listen to Minuet in G. Several people composed a Minuet (a slow, stately ballroom dance for two in 3/4 time, popular especially in the 18th century) in the key of G including Beethoven, Mozart and Bach.
How are the same? How are they different?
JS Bach’s version
The Bach version also was “acquired” for a popular song in the 1960s
Beethoven
Rowlf from the Muppets plays the Beethoven Minuet
Mozart
So – never say to your teacher that “I already played that” – you never know which version s/he has in mind!
Today we listen to Beethoven’s “Moonlight Sonata”. The real name for this work is The Piano Sonata No. 14 in C♯ minor “Quasi una fantasia”, Op. 27, No. 2. It was completed in 1801 and dedicated in 1802 to his pupil, Countess Giulietta Guicciardi
The piece is one of Beethoven’s most popular compositions for the piano, and it was a popular favorite even in his own day.
It’s in the Piano Pronto Beethoven book as well as many compilations of classical music.
Arranged for piano and orchestra
An animation
The above were all of the first movement only. Here’s the whole sonata played by Valentina Lisitsa:
Today’s piece is called the British Grenadiers and I’ve included it because most students today haven’t heard of the piece OR know what a grenadier is. Find this in Keyboard Kickoff, Prelude and many other piano method books.
“The British Grenadiers” is a traditional marching song of British, Australian and Canadian military units whose badge of identification features a grenade. The original melody dates from the 17th century.
Some talk of Alexander, and some of Hercules
Of Hector and Lysander, and such great names as these
But of all the world’s great heroes
There’s none that can compare
With a tow, row row row, row row row
To the British Grenadiers
When e’er we are commanded to storm the palisades
Our leaders march with fuses, and we with hand grenades;
We throw them from the glacis about the enemies’ ears
With a tow, row row row, row row row
For the British Grenadiers
Then let us fill a bumper, and drink a health to those
Who carry caps and pouches, and wear the louped clothes
May they and their commanders live happy all their years
Sing tow, row row row, row row row
For the British Grenadiers
In the examples below you can hear the steady marching drumbeat.
The band of the Highlands and Lowlands plays “The British Grenadiers” at Edinburgh Castle
Fife and drum
Piano
Guitar
A piano tutorial
A different take
Today’s piece is Steven Heller’s Avalanche. This may be his most recognizable piece and is a perfect study for an intermediate level pianist, with triplets, accents, pedaling and dynamic challenges to add to the excitement.
I chose this today, when it’s so hot, to remind people of snow and coldness!
On clarinet
“In the Hall of the Mountain King” is a piece of orchestral music composed for the sixth scene of act 2 in Henrik Ibsen’s 1867 play Peer Gynt. It was originally part of Opus 23 but was later extracted as the final piece of Peer Gynt, Suite No. 1, Op. 46. Its easily recognizable theme has helped it attain iconic status in popular culture, where it has been arranged by many artists, including for the piano.
Borrow a copy of the sheet music from the O’Connor Music Studio. I have this arranged for piano, duet, 2-piano, simplified…
8 part vocal orchestra (plus a tiny pair of cymbals)
Pianist Paul Barton
Solo piano sheet music – Video Score
Orchestral version
“Sakura Sakura”, also known as “Sakura”, is a traditional Japanese folk song depicting spring, the season of cherry blossoms. It is often sung or played in international settings as a song representative of Japan.
On a koto
piano from Piano Adventures book 3A
A fantasy
Flute
Violin duet
“The Entertainer” is a 1902 classic piano rag written by Scott Joplin. It was sold first as sheet music, and in the 1910s as piano rolls that would play on player pianos.
It was used as the theme music for the 1973 Oscar-winning film The Sting by composer and pianist Marvin Hamlisch.
The Sting was set in the 1930s, a full generation after the end of ragtime’s mainstream popularity, thus giving the inaccurate impression that ragtime music was popular at that time.
Find the sheet music in a variety of levels including Songs I Love to Play, Volume 1 and Alfred Premier Piano Course Book 4. It’s also available in Piano Maestro and to borrow from the O’Connor Music Studio
As played in The Sting
Adam Swanson
Piano Duet
On an older piano
At Disney
Player piano
Harder than it needs to be
From a 4-year-old
Violin and piano
String Quartet
On guitar
Saxophone quartet
Miss Piggy sang The Entertainer
And, everyone’s favorite – the ice cream truck!
Today’s piece is based on a collection of tales known as the One Thousand and One Nights or Arabian Nights.
The story, which was written many hundreds of years ago, tells of a Persian king who married a young girl every night. Every morning he would send his new wife to have her head chopped off. He had already killed 3000 women in this way.
When Scheherazade heard about this, she wanted to spend the night with him. She spent all night telling him a story. At the end of the night, she stopped the story at an exciting moment, like a modern-day soap opera.
The next night she finished the story and began another one, which she again stopped when it was dawn. The king had to wait another night to hear the rest of the story. Scheherazade kept this up for 1001 nights. By then, the king had fallen in love with Scheherazade and he let her live.
Rimsky-Korsakov’s best-known work is Scheherazade, an orchestral piece that describes in music the stories told by Scheherazade.
The work consists of four movements:
The Sea and Sinbad’s Ship
The Kalandar Prince
The Young Prince and The Young Princess
Festival at Baghdad. The Sea. The Ship Breaks against a Cliff Surmounted by a Bronze Horseman
Today, we’re focusing on The Young Prince and The Young Princess which can be found in Piano Pronto Movement 4
Piano duet
Orchestra
Flute ensemble
Gene Kelly dancing with a cartoon partner
The entire work
MaryO'Studio 