— Transcript —

My daughter Giuliana is a senior in high school this year, which means our family calendar is suddenly filled with “last firsts”: the last first day of school, and the last beginning of a year that will end with her walking across the stage and into whatever comes next.

Maybe that’s why the five pieces I’m playing today began to sound, in my imagination, like scenes from a September school day long gone by: a beautiful fall morning, the thrill of learning new things, and a trip to the playground.

All five come from Ben Crosland’s Easy Beans, part of his popular Beans series. They’re fairly short, accessible pieces, but each bears Crosland’s unmistakable mark of creativity—and his gift for giving young pianists something with genuine character to play.

It’s back to school we go, coming up next on The Piano Pedagogy Playlist.

Greetings, and welcome. I hope your school year is off to a great start.

My name is Luke Bartolomeo. I’m a pianist, a teacher, and also a developer of music-education apps for children, including Flashnote Derby.

Each Monday, I play through some of my current favorites from the piano teacher’s repertoire, written by living composers.

This week on the podcast: school-day memories.

September mornings are some of my favorite moments of the entire year. The weather is generally sunny and still warm, but usually not oppressively so. There’s an excitement in the air, carrying new possibilities.

Our first piece today, Beautiful Morning, captures some of that atmosphere. It also has a sincere, childlike innocence—and it achieves this without sounding at all childish. That can be trickier than it sounds.

I can imagine this piece appealing even to those not-entirely-innocent middle-school-aged students who are beginning to regard anything overtly sweet with a little suspicion. It’s gentle and uncomplicated, with a sweet melody over a lovely accompaniment made of arpeggiated triads. There are also some equally lovely fingering suggestions that help us learn how to move smoothly from one chord pattern to the next.

It’s time to wake up and embrace the challenges and possibilities of the day ahead. Here’s Beautiful Morning.

[Performance: “Beautiful Morning”]

Arriving at school, we get right down to work with a piece called A Little Study. It’s a very tidy and direct piece—a little classical in style—but it offers a good opportunity for students to work on producing a uniform tone as the right-hand melody is echoed in the left hand, and then vice versa.

Before we know it, it’s time for recess, and we move outdoors for a piece called Playground Blues.

This definitely falls into the “student’s first blues” category. It has the familiar pattern of alternating fifths and sixths in the left hand. Both hands stay close to familiar five-finger patterns, but not entirely. There are sharps, flats, and naturals to be navigated, so it’s a good piece for making sure we understand how all the various accidentals work.

These next two pieces represent the more approachable end of Easy Beans and should be within reach of late-elementary students. Here are A Little Study and then Playground Blues.

[Performances: “A Little Study” and “Playground Blues”]

Our final two selections present another interesting contrast.

First comes 2 Kool 4 Skool, a sneaky little piece with an immediately recognizable protagonist. We all knew one of these kids. They had their stuff together, operated under their own set of rules, and always got away with the things that would have resulted in detention for the rest of us.

Yeah, I was definitely not that kid—although at the time, I kind of wished I were.

After that little bit of school-day swagger, we end with a wistful dream of summer.

I imagine a student gazing out the classroom window, remembering that only a few weeks earlier, nearly all of their time was their own and the days seemed to stretch on forever. Now that freedom has been traded for schedules, assignments, and early mornings. But with that comes the possibility of making new friends, learning new things, and having new adventures.

Here are 2 Kool 4 Skool and A Dream of Summer. I would ask you to pay close attention to the first piece—especially the final notes—as we’ll be playing a round of “Identify That Jazz Chord” at the end of the episode.

[Performances: “2 Kool 4 Skool” and “A Dream of Summer”]

Today’s collection, Easy Beans, contains an impressive 32 pieces, described as progressive studies in popular styles. What may be even more impressive is how convincingly each piece presents its own identity.

Sometimes I’m hesitant to ask a student to purchase an entire collection when all its pieces share essentially the same style or theme. The student may love the first one, only to discover that the remaining pieces offer more or less the same experience.

But I don’t have that hesitation at all when recommending Easy Beans. Its range extends from contemporary classical influences and blues to pop-influenced pieces and more lyrical, atmospheric writing. It’s a book that students can grow into, and one that can remain a useful source of repertoire and musical inspiration for several years.

Easy Beans belongs to a larger family of seven volumes, all published by the British publishing house Editions Musica Ferrum. The digital edition is especially convenient, but if you prefer a physical score, I can say from experience that Musica Ferrum’s printed editions are first-rate.

The scores are beautifully produced, and Easy Beans includes wonderful original illustrations by Magdalena Lewinowicz—an actual human, and a very talented one at that.

I’ll include purchasing links in the episode description. You can also visit PianoPedagogyPlaylist.com to find those links, along with links to my previous performances of music by Ben Crosland.

And just like that, the final bell has rung on this episode of The Piano Pedagogy Playlist.

Now, about that final chord in 2 Kool 4 Skool. Could you hear it?

It was a dominant-seventh-flat-five chord.

I always teach my students how to finish with a little jazzy flair by using a seventh chord instead of a regular tonic triad—usually when we learn the little tag ending to “Happy Birthday.” But slip that flatted fifth in there too, and suddenly you’ll be 2 Kool 4 Skool.

I’ll look forward to seeing you again next Monday with some more of what’s good in the contemporary piano teacher’s repertoire.

Until then, keep nurturing the music, and have a great week.