About the creation

This album of short pieces is designed for piano pupils during their first years of study, starting out from the very earliest stage. The material is intended to supplement – not to replace – other accepted didactic piano methods from which the pupil acquires the basis of piano-playing and the familiarity with note reading. While the entire album has a pedagogic orientation, its main purpose is to develop the connection between young pupils and Israeli music in particular and contemporary music in general, from the moment they begin their studies; if one delays this confrontation to a future stage, it may already be too late. The Israeli-jewish character of the music manifests itself in the following:  a. the evocation of our nation's cultural background (for example, in the piece Folk-song, Hassidic Dance and Oriental Song in Volume I, In the Village, Kleizmerim and Dance of the Pioneers in Volume II).  b. the use of modality as one of the basic elements of the basic elements of our traditional folk music. Many different modes make an appearance in the piece: Aeolin, Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Pentatonic and various chromatic modes.  As regards the music's "modern" spirit, elements of the 20th century techniques are employed simply and in progressive manner. One needs to take into account that these elements sound unfamiliar and strange to a child, so that an introduction to the new idiom must be made with great care. For this reason, the «new» atmosphere is more clearly stressed in Volume II, whereas Volume I accustoms the child initially to the more easily acceptable modal music.  The technical resources related to contemporary idiom are:  a. Fluidity of tonality (A Comic Dance in Volume I, In the Race in Volume II);  b. Dense chromaticism which results in blurring of tonality (The Troublesome Buzzer in Volume I, A Savage Rite in Volume II); c. A Whole-tone (six-tone) scale which prevents the flixing of a clear tonal centre (Mechanical Dolls in Volume II);  d. Bi-tonality (An Argument, Klezmerim, Naughtiness in Volume II); e. Atonality (The Train, Drivers in a Traffic Jam in Volume II)  As mentioned before, the didactic direction provides the basis for the formation and organization of the material; The idea is to guide the pupil's technical and perceptual progress gradually and in a controlled fashion. Nearly every piece present a new problem both in pianistic texture and through heightened musical complexity. Without defining the subject – matter being dealt with (although this is obvious to the teacher) the general direction is: from unaccompanied melody to harmonic texture, from slow tempo to finger agility, from the smallest dimension (of phrase) to longer and more complex sections. The alternation of solo pieces with duets for four hands make for variety in the material, while the music becomes more complex as regards texture, harmony and rhythm. In spite of the order called for from the pedagogic point of view, it is the logic of musical construction which decides the sequence of the piece in the album.  I sincerely hope that this album will prove to be a source of enjoyment to the young pupil and, at the same time, will contribute to the development of an artistic approach and a capacity for self-expression in performance, from the very beginning of the child's musical education. Hence the dedication "To the Young Pianists."    Sergiu Shapirra