1,000 Days of Piano - Day 87: In Translation

The beauty of the Suzuki Piano Book 1 is that it presents simple melodies with (mostly Alberti bass) chord accompaniments. However weary they may be of nursery tunes, students must learn London Bridge, Mary Had a Little Lamb, Go Tell Aunt Rhody, and others. They are learning more than children’s songs. They are learning play chords and use techniques of theory that are essential to making music of all kinds. They don’t learn the actual theory any more than toddlers learn how to diagram sentences when learning to talk. However, with a chords and variations, they can learn to build a bridge from preschool melodies to popular movie themes.

In this example, I take several chords—E, A minor, F, D, G, and A (major)—play all three notes of the chord at once, arrange them into a variation of Alberti bass, and pair them with the theme from the latest Marvel film. I have translated techniques introduced in Mary Had a Little Lamb and Aunt Rhody, with some additional chords, into a movie theme. That’s when learning gets really good.