Edition Peters – Page 2

Discovering Backer Grøndahl

Pianodao Music Library
Selected and Reviewed by Andrew Eales

As I write, I am enjoying the magical afterglow of an event I recently attended at the Norwegian Ambassador’s residence in Kensington. Organised with publisher Edition Peters, the evening celebrated the release of the first ever urtext editions of piano works by Agathe Backer Grøndahl (1847-1907).

The Edition Peters scores for both works have been published in association with Kode, the association of art museums and composers’ homes in and around Bergen, who previously also partnered for the publication of Grieg – A Piano Treasury, reviewed here.

Christian Grøvlen, who is Director of Music and the Composer’s Homes for Kode, and the editor of the Edition Peters scores, performed the two recently published works: the Fantasy Pieces Op.39 and In the Blue Mountain Op.44, introducing each with the rapt fascination and deep insight of a true expert.

While the latter piece was a virtuosic concert work in the manner of Liszt, it was the Fantasy Pieces that impressed me the more. While designating these miniatures “salon pieces,” Grøvlen highlighted Backer Grøndahl’s genius with the form, and her innovative compositional style.

I am surprised that a renewed interest in Backer Grøndahl’s music hasn’t come sooner. Enjoying the generous hospitality and chatting with other guests after the performance, it was clear that none there doubted that this music is of special importance and quality.

Your New Piano Journal

Fermata • The Pianodao Blog
Short Reflections by Andrew Eales

Keeping you own Piano Journal is an idea that is so simple it seems obvious, yet so powerful that it could transform your piano journey in the months and years ahead.

In my book How to Practise Music, I wrote the following to suggest adult learners keep a piano journal:

“Older learners often like to keep their own journal in which they write a more reflective account of their practice journey, which may or may not be shared with a teacher. These can be excellent tools for structuring practice sessions, probing for solutions, or looking back on previous work.”

It is a suggestion I unpacked in more detail in my article Keeping Your Own Piano Journal, which fascinatingly proved to be one of the most popular posts ever published on this site.

That article includes an explanation of what a piano journal is, what the benefits of keeping one are, how to get started, and questions that you might wish to reflect on in your piano journal.

I won’t rehash the answers given in that article, but I want to let you know about a new gift book from Edition Peters, a simple but gorgeously presented notebook which could be the ideal repository for your reflections and tool for piano journaling over the next year.

Edition Peters Piano Anthologies

Pianodao Music Library
Selected and Reviewed by Andrew Eales

Following the launch of ABRSM’s 2023-24 syllabus, Edition Peters built on the success of their regular Grade 8 Piano Anthology series by issuing anthologies for Grades 5, 6, 7, and 8. At the time, I noted:

“Whatever one thinks of graded exams, there’s no denying that the ABRSM piano syllabus offers a stunning and helpfully progressive view of the rich and varied piano repertoire. And if their own publications open too small a window through which those wondrous joys might be discovered, the widescreen presentation Edition Peters offer with these anthologies must surely be welcomed with the broadest of smiles.”

With the advent of the 2025-26 ABRSM syllabus, which I have reviewed in depth here, Edition Peters (now under the roof of Faber Music) have returned with a new set of anthologies to supplement the latest syllabus.

It should be noted that there is a one-year overlap of syllabi, meaning that the older anthologies will (alongside ABRSM’s own piano exam piece books for 2023-24) remain valid until December 2025.

But what of the new anthologies? Here as always is my first in-depth look at them, including a detailed comparison between the ABRSM and Edition Peters books. For those on a budget, which is the better purchase, and why? Let’s find out…

Discovering Heller’s Studies

Pianodao Music Library
Selected and Reviewed by Andrew Eales

For many years, Burgmüller’s 25 Easy and Progressive Studies Op.100 have been a mainstay of my teaching, embraced by students as enjoyable piano pieces, while being immensely useful for addressing so many of the technical challenges of the Classical and Romantic piano literature. I consider this collection as near-essential as anything else found in the pedagogy repertoire.

And to support my students and others, I have recorded Burgmüller’s Op.100, compared various editions, and considered his more advanced Op.105 and Op.109 studies here: Discovering Burgmüller.

But where to for similar material for the player who wants more, either as a supplement or follow-on? I have at times used attractive études by Bertini (reviewed here) and Czerny, but recently my colleague and friend Lisa Burns suggested I take a deep dive into the studies of Stephen Heller (1813-1888).

I have of course encountered many of Heller’s études over the years, thanks to their inclusion in various anthologies and syllabus publications, but I had not previously considered them as a body of work in more depth. Doing so has proven to be genuinely rewarding, offering perhaps the perfect answer to the question above…

Grieg • A Piano Treasury

Pianodao Music Library
Selected and Reviewed by Andrew Eales

Were I to provide a roll call of the composers whose music is of essential and special importance in the piano repertoire, Grieg’s name would be an early and easy addition to that shortlist (as indeed it was when I considered what music to include in The Joy of Graded Piano series).

For those who haven’t discovered the wonders, variety and joy of Grieg’s music, most of which is suitable for late intermediate and early advanced players (UK Grades 5-8), a new collection from Edition Peters offers a superb introduction to the man and his music.

Liszt: Années de pèlerinage

Pianodao Music Library
Selected and Reviewed by Andrew Eales

As a teenage pianist entering the Bedford Festival back in the early 1980’s, I was told that I “didn’t have the right touch for Chopin”, a misty and slightly absurd put-down that somehow embedded its way into my psyche. My young mind decided that perhaps I should switch allegiance to Liszt, whose epic Sonata in B minor was already on my bucket list (where it remains).

Having already enjoyed the ever-lovely D flat major Consolation, I tried my hand at the somewhat absurd St.François de Paulo marchant sur les flots, which quickly established itself as my party piece (and with which I exacted my revenge), before turning my attentions to Liszt’s seminal (if still underrated) cycle, the Années de pèlerinage.

Edition Peters were my go-to publisher for this music, and their edition by the great Liszt student Emil Von Sauer seemed as authoritative as they came. My fixation with Liszt gave way to a fascination with the French Baroque long before I had learnt most of these variously eloquent and virtuosic pieces, but Sauer’s single volume tome has seen plenty of abuse over the years, finally becoming ripe for replacement.

How brilliant to find that Edition Peters have brought out a brand new critical performing edition of all three volumes of the Années de pèlerinage, this time edited by Leslie Howard, a towering authority whose deep knowledge and advocacy of this repertoire has extended to recording a definitive set of Liszt’s complete piano works across 99 compact discs.

Whether you have an older edition or not, this new one in three volumes and with additional pieces more than lives up to expectations…

Notebook for J.C. Bach

Pianodao Music Library
Selected and Reviewed by Andrew Eales

Piano teachers, students and players the world over are familiar with Johann Sebastian Bach’s Notebooks for Anna Magdalena Bach of 1722 and 1725, and it is no surprise that there was considerable interest when I reviewed Edition Peters superb new edition of them (the first complete new critical edition for some 60 years). You can read that review here.

Given the universal appreciation of the Anna Magdalena Notebook, it is odd that there is less awareness of the notebooks he compiled for his other family members. Of these, the Notebook for Wilhelm Friedemann Bach has survived fully in tact. Following the success of their new Anna Magdalena Notebook edition, Edition Peters brought out a stunning edition of this also, which I have reviewed here.

We don’t know for certain how many other notebooks Bach compiled, but there is sufficient evidence for a Notebook for Johann Christian Bach, and a probable surviving source. Now Christoph Wolff, the leading Bach scholar responsible for the previous two publications, has pieced this together to complete the trilogy, based on extensive research and compelling evidence to authenticate the material.

Make no mistake: this is a landmark publication. So let’s find out more…

Penelope Roskell • Essential Piano Technique

Educational Resources
Selected and Reviewed by Andrew Eales

Few aspects of piano playing seem to divide opinion on forums as much as healthy technique: what it is, how, and when to teach it. Happily, anyone who is looking for clear, authoritative answers to these questions can find them aplenty in the milestone (and mammoth) book The Complete Pianist, which I reviewed here when it appeared in 2020.

The author of that award-winning book is the concert pianist and teacher Penelope Roskell, a world-leader in the field of injury-free piano playing, and piano adviser to the British Association for Performing Arts Medicine.

Having so plainly and comprehensively shown us what an essential, healthy piano technique looks like in her previous book, Roskell is now back with an attractively presented series of three books aimed at younger beginners and their teachers. Her new Essential Piano Technique books are certainly unlike any previous children’s piano series I have encountered…