Author Archives: Susan
MasterclassJanuary 2021
Even though this year has had it’s challenges in working with students, I was thrilled to be able to conduct an on-line Masterclass with the auditioned piano students from Earl Haig Secondary School, Toronto. The program included a varied selection of repertoire from a number of my advanced piano collections. The student performances, a combination of recorded performances and live performing from their home, allowed for dialogue and immediate feedback. The students were amazing – extremely musical and polished! Thank you to Kelsey Taylor for coordinating all of this!
Re-issue Book ReleaseMarch 2020
Little Hands, Big Pieces has expanded! Each piece of music has an informative Study page to help students learn. A step by step guide to see the patterns on the keyboard as well as reinforce basic music knowledge.
Re-issue Book ReleaseMarch 2020
Piano Mime has been reissued! Now called Piano Mime in Concert it has four new pieces added. You can listen to all the pieces here. Performed by the amazing Sylvia Shadick-Taylor.
New Book Release!December 2018
An exciting new and highly original collection of advanced Dance pieces just released! From Grade 7/8 Early Advanced to ARCT/Diploma level – music that will stand out and capture everyone’s attention! Perfect for Recitals and encores!
Take a look at the scores and view You Tube videos here. – all performed by Joseph Ferretti.
Free Music!March 2018
Written and performed in 2017 to celebrate Canada’s 150th birthday, this music is for sharing! You can request of copy of my Junior Choral Anthem called “We are Canadians“. It’s very traditional musically and is easy to teach, easy to learn. Perfect for school concerts and Festivals! The score is free. Just send a request via my Contact page. I will send you a pdf file of the score and you can also request just the vocal score and/or just the piano score separately. I have one request. If you get the chance to perform it, please let me know so I can share that with everyone! You can see a score sample here. Thanks
ReviewJanuary 2018
A wonderful review of my Let’s Pretend! collection has just been published in the CFMTA’s Canadian Music Teacher Magazine. You can read the article by clicking on this link. CFMTA-Winter-2018
Recordings and PerformancesOctober 2017
New video recordings are available for my Out of the Box collections. Click here to listen. And this reaction from my very talented colleague, Martha Hill Duncan.
“Great Out of the Box collection – absolutely stunning Susan – certainly some of your finest work yet! I loved Charissa’s performance. The collection is complex, sophisticated, quirky and great thematic connection – they all seemed to belong together. Super!”
Martha Hill Duncan, Composer
Re-issue Book ReleaseAugust 2017
Two of my original collections have been re-issued. They have been improved with new covers, additional music and revised layout for easier reading.
For Let’s Pretend! – a new piece Cowboy joins the gang. The Great Wizard has been re-written to fit nicely between both hands and Beautiful Princess is now in a key to eliminate all those flat accidentals. Take a look!
Out of the Box has been enhanced with some exciting new music and a few title changes. I’m very excited about ‘Parade for One’ – formerly Marching to your own Drummer. High quality video recordings are being scheduled in the next month but here is an initial (rough) sound file
And Shhhhh is now called Veiled. Spinning has jumped up a level and a new piece, Brush Strokes has been added to balance the ‘quieter side’ of the collection. Have fun exploring the scores here!
Syllabi and PublishingJuly 2017
I was excited to have my ‘Huron Carol’ duet selected to be included in the Canadian National Conservatory’s publication of Canadian folksongs in celebration of Canada’s 150th Birthday! Here is a short score sample.
You can purchase the book on the CNCM website at this link.
New Book Release!April 2017
The CFMTA has published a book containing the scores of the winners of the 2017 Call for Compositions. This book also contains artwork, four of which are my images. You can open the book by clicking here.
News!March 2017
My piano piece, The Road Goes On was one of the winning entries selected by the CFMTA Call for Compositions. Click here to hear the piece performed on You Tube by the amazing pianist Arianne Ewing-Chow.
Recordings and PerformancesJanuary 2017
NEW! Arctic Voices Video Collection
You can see videos of all the pieces in the Arctic Voices collection on You Tube. Click here.