The Pianodao Music Library brings together the repertoire and resources which have been reviewed, shared or otherwise featured on the site. As such, it offers a varied, extensive, inclusive, and ever expanding body of carefully curated music.
Early Intermediate music is suitable for players at around UK Grades 3-4 level or equivalent. Selected highlights are showcased below. You can also explore the full archive, and check out the most recent reviews here:
The following selections showcase publications that my regular students have enjoyed and that I frequently recommend. The selections offer a core program of classical, contemporary, and jazz music suitable for each level.
My Publications
The Joy of Graded Piano
These five inspiring collections bring together essential repertoire for players of all ages. The “greatest hits” of the Baroque, Classical and Romantic piano literature appear alongside brilliant newer pieces composed by women and men from all around the world, right up to the present day. Grades 1-5.
Graded Gillock • Three Essential Collections
William Gillock’ music continues to inspire piano students around the world with its catchy tunes and imaginative content. My three collections deliver 41 of his very best pieces, sorted by level and including my playing tips.
Naoko Ikeda Graded Collection
For this publication I have selected and edited 24 of Naoko Ikeda’s best solo works, presenting her pieces in approximate order of difficulty, grouped from Grade 2 to Grade 5 level.
Willis Student Recital Collection
Add a sprinkling of STARDUST to your student performances! These 40 stunning piano recital pieces are sure to steal the show! Suitable from Grades 1-6
Recent Reviews
Disney • Graded Pieces for Piano
With respectful arrangements of many of the most popular songs of the twentieth century and beyond, designed to be enjoyed throughout several years of musical learning and interleaved with more “serious” music, it’s hard not to fall in love with Disney: Graded Pieces for Piano…
ABRSM • Encore Plus
In a year that has seen some excellent, focussed educational publications, ABRSM’s new ‘Encore Plus” books are another must-have success, offering a range of pieces primed for the exam room which I cannot imagine teachers will want to be without a set
Arise and Shine
‘Arise and Shine’ offers 28 piano solos by Black composers suitable for intermediate to early advanced players. With such a beautiful addition to the piano pedagogy library, there’s no doubt that this music’s time has come…
Piano Tales for Winnie-the-Pooh
‘Piano Tales for Winnie-the-Pooh’ is the latest title from best-selling jazz composer Nikki Iles, brought to us in a superbly presented publication from EVC Music. And it is sure to be treasured by players of all ages.
Piano Player • Anime
Anyone for Anime? These accessible solo piano arrangements are fundamentally true to the originals, presented in full, and in key. They can even be played along to the original soundtracks…
First Steps Piano
Darragh Gilleece is an Irish pianist, composer and educator, whose pieces in these collections are traditional with a modern twist, imaginative, highly appealing, and packed with valuable learning content.
Piano Music of Latin American Composers
Here’s a series which can be highly recommended, and which brings an important body of little-known piano education repertoire to a wider global audience.
The Beatles • Graded Pieces
Here’s an easy publication to recommend, combining classic hit songs, solid progressive arrangements at five levels (Grade 1-5), with educational insight and helpful practice tips.
Exploring the Classics
Schott’s Easy Concert Pieces
Schott Music’s Easy Concert Pieces series offers very traditional, but superbly presented and well edited, selections of core repertoire for elementary to late intermediate players.
Piano Music by Women Composers
Immanuela Gruenberg’s two new collections of ‘Piano Music by Women Composers’ are quite simply outstanding, an essential milestone which every intermediate or advanced pianist should rush to welcome…
The Classical Piano Sheet Music Series
I love it when a music book exceeds my initial expectations, and the three books in Hal Leonard’s new Classical Piano Sheet Music Series score a hat trick on that front…
Women Composers: A Graded Anthology
Melanie Spanswick’s groundbreaking ‘Women Composers: A Graded Anthology’ series offers three volumes of superb and highly varied music by composers past and present.
Discovering Burgmüller
Burgmüller’s three collections of piano etudes, Op.100, Op.105 and Op.109 have been cornerstones of the piano pedagogy literature for over a century and a half, and remain as popular today as ever…
Bartók • Definitive Collections?
I can’t help feeling that the ongoing preservation of our culture (both folk and art) rests at least in part on the success of publications such as these in inspiring a new generation of musicians to carry the flame onward.
My First Haydn
Haydn’s music can be guaranteed to put a smile on your face, and I think that this collection is the best introduction to his easiest piano works that I’ve come across!
My First Schumann
This is a collection that will “keep on giving”, with such a great selection of pieces for students to enjoy over a number of years.
‘My First Schumann’ is a brilliant introduction to one of the world’s greatest ever piano composers.
Contemporary Favourites
Paul Harris • Rainbow
Boosey & Hawkes have recently issued a brand new edition of Paul Harris’s brilliant “Rainbow” collection of intermediate piano miniatures, with audio recordings and the composer’s performance tips.
Find out more about this classic reissue here…
Piano Tales for Peter Pan
Nikki Iles has done it again! Piano Tales for Peter Pan delivers another delicious mix of her trademark wit, imagination, and jazz-tinged brilliance.
Mike Springer: Lyrical Landscapes
Lyrical Landscapes is Mike Springer’s latest series, appearing as three collections of solo piano music aimed at intermediate players.
Angeline Bell’s Garden Notebook
Angeline Bell’s Lyrical and Quirky Notebooks were a highlight of 2023.
Now she’s back with ‘My Garden Notebook’, which confirms that she really is a superb composer of appealing educational piano music…
Phillip Keveren’s ‘Piano Calm’
For his latest publication, “Piano Calm”, ace arranger Phillip Keveren has turned his hand to composing 15 original pieces, suitable for intermediate players, which he describes as ‘reflective solos’. And I think they are excellent…
The Gradebusters Series
“Gradebusters” from Hal Leonard, now encompasses five solo piano books, for Grades 1 to 5, each delivering “15 awesome solos”, and together serving up a rich feast of 75 universally popular and neatly arranged songs that piano players everywhere will be keen to play…
Easy Piano Series: “Film” and “Shows”
There is always room on the music shelf for easy piano arrangements of well-known and popular songs – players of all ages naturally find it encouraging and enjoyable to tackle tunes that are familiar to them, their family and friends.
The Jazzin’ About Anthology
‘The Jazzin’ About Piano Anthology’ brings together 41 of Pam Wedgwood’s favourite pieces from across the series, presented progressively in one volume from early elementary to intermediate level (UK Initial to Grade 5)…
Celebrating Disney
As the Disney centenary draws to a close, I don’t want to miss the opportunity to highlight some of the recent publications from Hal Leonard celebrating the studio’s unrivalled catalogue of hit songs, spanning the decades…
Calming Piano Solos
These books are for all intermediate pianists with an open mind and a desire to discover fresh musical treasures. And if the music here promotes a sense of calm, that will I am sure be a very welcome bonus!
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