Faber and Faber

The books by Nancy and Randall Faber are a popular and heavily
promoted piano "method" with many adherents. The Faber and
Faber beginning books can serve a teacher well who needs a pre-
programmed series of books to follow as a starter for their
teaching. Each page of the books embodies delightful graphics
and is cross-referenced to other books in the series along the outer
edge of each page. There are good practice suggestions given for
most of the materials such as counting aloud and holding the
hands in a rounded position on the piano. The main pedagogical
weakness of the Faber and Faber beginning method books is the
insistence on using position playing, although the books also
attempt to mitigate the effects of position playing after it has been
introduced. From the standpoint of substance, the Faber and Faber
"method" offers little that is fundamentally pedagogically new
over methods like the Clark, Robyn and Suzuki that have been in
existence for many years. Methods like the Clark cover the same
material in one or two books that the Primer Level and the Level 1
in this method take 8 or more books to do. We would like to see
students exposed to unvarnished beginning classical repertoire
earlier than they are in these books, which utilize arrangements for
most of the repertoire.
The Alfred method uses a lot of colored pictures and graphics to
help with the teaching process. The newest updates in the Alfred
Method for children include use of software, compact discs,
and /or cassettes. This method utilizes the concept of position
playing, which has a disadvantage that students sometimes do not
learn to read the notes, but rather rely totally on position playing.
Thus, if they approach a piece of music not written in a Five
Finger Position, they are at a loss. An advantage of this method is
that students learn to read intervals and to see the intervalic
relationship between notes. They are also exposed to chords and
progressions. While the lyrics to the songs are not really
necessary, the pictures and graphics are wonderful. Students who
have been raised on this method exclusively sometimes seem to
have limited competence in note reading and undeveloped
technique. Another disadvantage is that the major classical
composers should be presented to the students at a much earlier
stage than is typical in this method. The Alfred method is great for
beginning teachers who need a pre-programmed lesson format to
follow. It would be our hope that once the beginning teacher
becomes more comfortable and knowledgeable with different
methods that they would expand beyond sole use of this method.
Clark Method (The Music Tree)
This method is tremendous for getting right down to the basics;
the students are presented with dynamics, counting, phrases, and
form. They are reading intervalically from day one. Another
strength is the introduction of ensemble playing from the very
beginning. After the students are finished with the Music Tree
Series, they are quite competent in music terminology, sight
reading, knowing form, and generally have a solid enough start to
begin study of the masters.