(S4) Truly Astounding Animals, by Peter Rudzik. Canadian composer Peter Rudzik's collection of twelve short piano solos for intermediate-to-advancing pianists takes us on a delightful, creative romp through the animal world. Reminiscent in spirit to Camille Saint-Saëns's Carnival of the An...

A bonanza for creative teachers and students A teacher places a spanking-new repertoire book in front of a student. "We're going to learn a contemporary piece," the teacher says. The student notices, however, that the piece was composed in 1945. "How," the student asks herself, "can this music be contemporary?"Living human beings write new pieces e...

(S4) Bach Meets Jazz: 15 Well-Tempered Classics, arranged by Phillip Keveren.Phillip Keveren's latest arrangements will entertain anyone who loves Bach. In Bach Meets Jazz, Keveren cleverly adds a jazzy spin to fifteen popular Bach works. All the original melodies in these two-to-three-page arrangements are recognizable throughout, and the settings...

The Music of Teaching: Learning to Trust Students' Natural Development by Barbara Kreader Skalinder By inverting two words—teaching and music—Barbara Kreader Skalinder changes what could have been a fairly mundane title to one that intrigues and gives us pause. But it is her subtitle, Learning to Trust Students' Natural Development, that grabs you ...

This spunky solo is atoe-tapping audience pleaser.A humorous recurring bumblebeemotif alternates with jazzybroken chords and syncopatedrhythms to create a very visualand dancelike aural story.Students move quickly aroundthe piano, exploring ever-changingtextures and articulations. The few pedal markingsfor sonority do not require a legato pedal tec...