Piano Solos

It was so exciting for Luke to finally participate in a piano recital after taking lessons for about 4 months.  He didn't seem nervous for his first recital but I took him to the recital hall earlier in the afternoon so that he could play the piano on the stage and get a feel for what it would be like.  He seemed very comfortable performing when it was his turn and did a great job!  He performed "Petit Rondo" by Geoffroy and a set of variations of "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star."

Dry run

The real thing

He was also comfortable jumping on the piano at the
end of New Beginnings and playing for all of the people
in the RS room to hear.

He was unflustered at the solo festival the next week as well.

Luke had been asking me about how to use the pedals and I told him
Sarah would teach him when he needed to learn.  I finally brought it up with
her at a lesson after the recital and festival were over and to my surprise she started
teaching him right away, and found a simple piece for him to learn, which uses pedal.
Here Sarah is pushing Luke's foot down to help him learn the correct timing.

Eliza did a great job of learning "Fur Elise," just the year after Jack performed it.  Her rendition is much more fluid than Jack's and she really loves playing it.  Her second selection was a short, fast piece from "Sonatina in G Major" by Haydn.  Eliza played both pieces at the solo festival as well and she was a winner!  She chose to perform "Fur Elise" at the winner's recital and walked away $20 richer.

Jack was excited about his music too: two iconic pieces which he really enjoyed practicing.  He performed "Invention No. 8" by Bach and "Turkish March" by Mozart and did a great job!

Cat also really enjoyed learning the two amazing pieces she performed: "Fantasie in C" by Mozart and "Fantaisie Imprompty" by Chopin.

I'm so proud of these kids - each recital/festival reflects

hours and hours of practice and so much progress!