During choir practice yesterday afternoon…our choir was practicing “Faith is the Victory” in unison.

I noticed it was just SO awkward trying to grab all the melody notes…especially during the verse!

Each sentence of the verse starts on a fast note (eighth note) making it almost impossible to keep up with the melody. I thought, “The choir KNOWS the melody…why not delete the first word of each sentence to alleviate the awkwardness!?!  (Exception: I’ll play the first word of the song to allow for secure entry) 🙂

My mind devised a plan to ease up my old moving hands 😉  Time to have some fun!  Just stay within the vicinity of the melody and you won’t get AS lost 😉

Let the singers do the work!

The result: (Download the free pdf version of “Faith is the Victory” below)

Faith is the Victory

I was able to adapt When I Survey Ensemble to a two piano arrangement.  I know not every church has three pianos in addition to flute and clarinet but hope this arrangement of When I Survey will be more feasible for the church pianist(s).

We have two pianos (one grand plus one digital piano) at our church on opposite ends of the stage.  I’m going to add strings and have one of our pianists play the digital for the strings.  I’m bringing in two… 76 key keyboards and placing them facing me at the grand piano.  The flutes and clarinet will play from the front pew facing the pianos.  I have found it easier to stay together when positioning the instruments as close as possible to each other with the pianists facing each or maybe side view (depending on the space) in order to see each other’s movements for unified playing.

I’m sharing a “buy it now” and preview of the two piano version below. Click on the image to view a sample page from each piano part.

When I Survey Two Pianos

Intermediate to late intermediate sacred piano duo (two pianos) 4 pages per piano. *Adapted from "When I Survey Palm Sunday Ensemble" Also available as Three Pianos with flute and clarinet

Price: $6.00

Just finished publishing When I Survey the Wondrous Cross for Palm Sunday.  IMPORTANT INFO…Click HERE!

Our ensemble has our first practice this Sunday night after church.

Looking forward to working together to share a descriptive arrangement on Christ’s death and loyalty we should have to our Saviour.

*Important note: Each instrument in this ensemble depends on each other for the melody except piano #3 which is optional.

I am preparing a two piano version of this and hope to publish it by this Saturday. (February 2, 2019)

Palm Sunday Ensemble

Early intermediate to Advanced Ensemble Includes: Three Pianos (Piano One: Early Advanced, Piano Two: Late Intermediate, Piano Three: Early Intermediate) One flute clarinet or Two Flutes (2nd flute can replace clarinet) *Piano 3 is optional and a violin can replace flute #1 View sample pages by clicking on product image.

Price: $8.00

PDF collection of “When I Survey”

(Palm Sunday Ensemble)

Posting this PDF collection this evening!

Hear entire arrangement below:

*Special note:  Every instrument in this collection depends upon each other for the melody except piano #3 which is optional

To purchase this ensemble….click HERE

I’m trying VERY hard to publish my Easter/Palm Sunday Piano trio + flute duet + optional clarinet part….by this weekend!

Here are sample pics thus far….Click on image below to enlarge for better viewing.

I just need to enter the optional clarinet score into Finale and my piano part (Piano #1)

I created this as an easy-to-learn ensemble since we will have limited group practices.

Piano #1 (early advanced)

Piano #2 (late intermediate)

Piano #3 (early intermediate)

Flute & Clarinet are rather easy too.

I recently ordered “Simply Hymns” by Molly Ijames and it just arrived today.

Just finished playing through the entire book. I love it!

Simple…yet elegant is the best way to describe this sacred piano arrangement book.

Molly provided a nice array of lush chords without sounding too complex.

I like the description of the book: “Accessible Piano Settings for the Church Year”.

Church pianists at the early intermediate up through advanced will enjoy playing this book!

Tastefully done!  The pieces even accommodate the church pianist with small hands!

Molly’s book can be purchased from Lorenz Publishing.

See sample and hear audios HERE.

If you’re a beginning church pianist and learning to play from the hymnal…this lesson is for you 🙂

There are always exceptions to the rules as we’ll see in this lesson dealing with five part playing style from the church hymnal.

The thumb cannot always comfortably plug the tenor note into the right hand as we’ll see in the last video below.

Watch this video first if you need a more involved description of the five part playing style and then proceed to the latest video below which describes the exception to the five part playing style.

Spending the morning browsing Lorenz’ Fall Piano 2018 Piano Solo Books for Christmas and beyond 🙂

Lorenz Publishing has a youtube channel dedicated to providing church pianists with visual and audio samples from most of their sacred piano books.  It’s a great resource!

Some of my favorites so far… from the Fall piano 2018 series are: Click on each image for details. (See video below)

Enjoy browsing below to find your favorite piano books!

Does your hymn playing sound cloudy or too choppy and you just can’t figure out how to fix these issues?

I’ll share several tips that will hopefully help the beginning church pianist to  sound smoother.

Prep list for correct pedaling:

1.  Sit on the front half of the bench
2.  Knees barely under the keyboard
3.  Right leg will be at an angle (heel remains on the floor when pressing pedal)

When to pedal? Pedal once  per chord change

To avoid choppy sound in playing: NEVER lift pedal and hands at the same time during a hymn that needs to sound smooth.

Lift the pedal while the hand is going down on the new chord

I’m preparing a video tutorial on pedal suggestions for the church pianist who would appreciate some helpful tips on how to sound smooth when playing hymns.

Get ready with these prep tips!

1. Sit elbow length from the keys (knees should be slightly under keyboard.)
2.  Sit on front half of bench

More pedaling tips coming soon!