Piano Forum

Hi all,

Before I will go to the point, just brief introduction. I am 37 year old piano returner. I was actively playing till around being 25, and level that I achieved were easy Chopin Etudes, Rachmaninov op.23 no5, Beethoven Sonata op2 no3, Brahms Rhapsodies op 79 and similar stuff. Unfortunately, due to the fact that I had a good concert upright, it had deteriorated action, which did a lot of bad things to my technique, which was always very weird to everyone. Almost last 7 years I spend with barely touching the piano, as on that upright I couldn’t do any more development, and piano was always my hobby, not basic education. I always had a teacher, but after years I realized that they were not correcting lots of my mistakes. Week ago I took from my parent my old piano, and started to play a bit… O got I play so bad, that I can’t even stand hearing myself playing lol. Within maximum one year, and if financials will let even sooner, I want to upgrade to at least Kawai CA98 digital, or Yamaha N1X/Kawai NV10. I cannot get acoustic grand, and I prefer to have digital with actual grand action, that mediocre upright.

Also, before I was spending half year (!!!) to learn simple Bach invention. What is strange, I needed same time to polish 1st movement of 5 pages Beethoven Sonata. That’s the way I was taught.

As I have an infant, I cannot play one hour a day, if I will find 15 minutes it will be good.  Also, unless my kid will be at least 1,5 year old, I do not see a point to getting a teacher, as I will not be able to do a proper progress. But maybe will take few lessons as I have few piano friends, but well, still the same bad action piano. And renovation without changing any parts costs like 1500$.
Therefore what I decided to do is:

1.   Get back to absolute basics, as I have big holes there.
2.   Start practicing easy pieces, etudes and so on.
3.   After a year get a solid teacher

I got some easy sheet music from my young years, so for free pieces I will choose them by myself. However, for  technique development I do have a question.  For the next 4 years I want to go through all of the major finger development books, but want to start with the basics. I am not in a hurry, I will not win next Cliburn, so no need to hurry, but want to get extreme solid basics. Now the questions is, can you help me with grading of those books, and tell me which can be unbeneficial? This is my initial way of exploring:

1.   Czerny op. 821 (eight bar exercises) – great due to my limited time
2.   Bartok Mikrokosmos (all books, first one should be extreme fast to do, and will be good to make my fingers work again, even though its absolute beginner level)
3.   Czerny op. 299
4.   Czerny op 740
5.   Loeschhorn – all three booked op 65-67, but I do not know how to grade them between Czerny?
6.   Clementi Gradus ad Parnassum.
7.   Bach Two and Three part inventions


For any other advices I would be glad, as I know I will get a proper instrument within maximum one year and want to achieve professional level, and this does not mean to be next Yuja Wang, but to be able Chopin Ballades, all Rachmaninov heavy stuff, Scriabin Sonatas etc. Do not need to play Scarbo though 😉 maybe giving some concerts sometimes.


Of course my childchood dream is to play Rach 3 with Berliner Philharmoniker, but I am aware that even if I will spend next 10 years plying for 10 hours a day with best possible teacher, this is in 99% far out of my range 😊 so lets skip unrealistic dreams aside.