u/Errant_Fence_Burp16

For 18 years, I've used combinations of Bastien and Faber pretty much since I began teaching, along with a selection of dozens of other supplemental material that I've really liked.

I often see posts here about people leaving the method series and moving on to repertoire books and the like. I also see a lot of talk about the Royal Conservatory of Music series, but I'm unfamiliar with that here in the states.

I'm interested in exploring some other options, especially for a couple of my intermediate students that I'm working with through book three of Faber right now.

What do you use for theory and technique when there are still skills and concepts that need to be learned? Do you go ahead and move to things like Hanon and Schmitt dexterity exercises and just work on scale theory? Or do you still find books to use that help with these concepts?

And other than actual repertoire books such as Masterwork Classics or Grade by Grade and things like that, do you use other that may supplement the learning but aren't original repertoire pieces.

I'm just looking for some general ideas and details to get started on research and how to go try out a different direction.

Thanks!

I looked in the wiki and I didn't see this as an answer. I am trying to find a specific piece of copyright-free music that someone used in over of their videos because I think it would be great music for something I'm working on. I've done some Googling and searching around on Reddit. I found a site mentioned seven years ago that supposedly did this, but it's long since dead. So I was just wondering if there's a modern resource for this.

Thanks!

We all know that there are quite a few typical books that almost always get mentioned as favorites. Taking away those that would show up on every top 10 list ever made by AI or a blogger (or an AI blogger), what's your favorite?

Mine's The Dark Half. George Stark absolutely terrifies me. He's probably the scariest Stephen King villain to me. And I love the mythology of the sparrows in the book.

And no joke, no meme - I truly love Tommyknockers. I know it is a cocaine-fueled mess, but if nothing else, the second act where the entire town and all of their machinery just becomes a wacky Lovecraftian surreal nightmare sparks something joyful in me.