Fake Book Fundamentals: Exercises and Song Examples: A Complete How-To For All Ages

"Fake Book Fundamentals" is an easy and informative book that shows pianists of ALL ages how to read chord symbols and translate them into chords to play on the piano. Learning to play chords on the piano is one of the most basic music concepts a pianist should learn, and learning to play an arrangement of a song/piece without reading a lot of notes is the appeal of a fake book. Fake Book Fundamentals is perfect for any pianist who would like to open up a world of songs to them and creatively make up their own arrangements! This book is an appropriate method book for piano teachers to use with their students, of all ages! A young student can start at the beginning of this book as soon as they are able to play scales with their right hand and play a basic two-three note chord with their left hand. That young student would be in this book from the first section learning basic chords, to the last section with more advanced skills, as they grow older. Fake Book Fundamentals is perfect for teen and adult students who want to play as well as they can in a shorter amount of time, and for adults on their own who want to relearn their piano skills after taking a long break, especially those adults who had never learned playing with chord symbols!The text is written in the easiest possible terms, for all ages to understand. The author, Holly McCann, with over 30 years of private teaching experience, has successfully been using the exercises and lead sheets with her students for almost 10 years. Fake Book Fundamentalsis divided into three sections, in order of difficulty and all song examples and lead sheets are in the Key of C so the pianist can learn all of the basic chords. Each section has chord exercises with varying rhythmic patterns, song examples that demonstrate possible arrangements, and lead sheets of familiar songs. Section one demonstrates basic left hand triads with easy right hand melodies. Section two demonstrates left hand triad and inversion chords with broken and blocked chord patterns and how to start making your own arrangement with a right hand melody. Section three demonstrates how to transfer chords to the right hand and play bass notes and left hand patterns to accompany the melody. Supplementing with any kind of fake book is highly recommended as the pianist studies in this book, so there are many more songs to practice with. Songs/pieces included in this book are: Hot Cross Buns, When the Saints Go Marching In, Yankee Doodle, Jingle Bells, Lightly Row, Sonata Them by Mozart, For He's a Jolly Good Fellow, Chopin Prelude no. 7, America, the Beautiful, Happy Birthday, Country Gardens, Twinkle Little Star, Morning, Down in the Valley, Shepherd’s Hymn, Michael Row the Boat Ashore, Take Me Out to the Ball Game, Can-Can, The Sleeping Beauty Waltz, Minuet from Don Giovanni, The Entertainer, Amazing Grace, Lullaby, Ave Maria, New World Symphony Theme, Who’s Sorry Now?, Come Back to Sorrento, Barcarolle, Greensleeves, Fairest Lord Jesus, Ain’t Misbehavin’, Give My Regards to Broadway, and Are You Lonesome Tonight?. Read more