Brent Hugh's Piano Home Page

Brent Hugh
Assistant Professor of Piano
Coordinator of Piano Pedagogy
Missouri Western State College Department of Music

Please take a moment to visit the Missouri Western State College Keyboard Studies Home Page, to learn more about our programs in piano and organ performance and pedagogy.

Piano Sites

Notes and information about piano performance and music in general

• My www pages and email newsletter on piano practicing:
  • A page on Useful Techniques and Methods of Piano Practice. Learn your music more securely and play more musically. Get more done in less time!
  • Pep up your practice by getting an interesting and useful practice tip in your emailbox once every week. Click here to find out more about PIANO PRACTICE TIPS, my bi-weekly email newsletter.
  • Practice Tips Archives--a wealth of ideas for piano practicing.
• Notes from a masterclass with world-renowned pianist Claude Frank.
• Notes from the 1998 World Piano Pedagogy Convention in Fort Worth, Texas:
  • Jerome Lowenthal, Learning As Forgetting
  • A Masterclass with renowned pianist Russell Sherman
• A List of Piano-related Professional Organizations and Publications
• A short history of the tune used in "The Battle Hymn of the Republic"
• EarTestonline, an online eartraining program.
• Brent Hugh's Music Instruction Software Page--online, downloadable programs for your computer.
• The homepage of the BrailleM email list, which discusses everything of interest to Braille music users and teachers. (You can also read the BrailleM list archives and the Braille Music FAQ.)
• The homepage of the Audience email list, which discusses issues and ideas about finding audiences for classical music. (You can also read the Audience list archives.)
• Practical, Simple, Useful Ways for Music Teachers to Use the Internet. You're a music teacher and you want to know why the internet is such a big deal. What can you really do on the internet? Click on this page to find out . . . (Includes a handy list of the best and most useful web sites for music teachers.)

Information about piano teaching and piano pedagogy

• An online message board for the discussion of all aspects of piano learning and teaching, sponsored by Missouri Western State College Keyboard Studies.
• Why teach piano? Information about the Piano Pedagogy Program at Missouri Western.
• Teaching Note Reading Skills with Flashcards
• Teaching Rhythmic Skills with the Metronome
• A list of mnemonic devices and ideas for teaching grand staff notes, the order of sharps and flats, and other musical concepts
• Ideas and Suggestions for Teaching with Piano Method Books
• The Basics of Phrasing

Research in the field of music preference and learning

My research into music preferences and learning over the lifespan has some fascinating and little-known ramifications about how music should be taught, to both younger and older students. The ideas can be applied by all school teachers (music teacher or not) and all music teachers. But for parents and teachers of young children--about age 10 and under--the ideas are particularly compelling.
• Music as a Social and Functional Art: A Simple and Practical Way to Integrate Music into the Elementary and Pre-School Classroom (the basic idea can also be adapted for use at home, church, or day-care)
• Music IQ Songs--songs I wrote for my own child to put into practice the ideas I found in my research (sheet music and recordings are available for free download on this page)
• Teaching Young People to Be Musical has much more information, details, and helpful strategies for teachers and parents.
• The abstract of my doctoral research project, "Can Musicians Alter the Music Preferences of Audiences? The Effect of Pre-Performance Informational Presentations on Music Preference"
• The entire text of my doctoral research project, "Can Musicians Alter the Music Preferences of Their Audience? The Effect of Pre-Performance Informational Presentations on Music Preference", in PDF format.

Sites with music, either recorded music or sheet music

• Mathematics and Science in Music--a page with MP3 music inspired by mathematics and science. The page has, among other things, my works "Music of the Human Genome" (music made by reading rhythms and melodies directly from the human DNA code) and "Earthquake Fugue" (music made entirely from earthquake sounds as recorded by seismographs).
• My Internet Music Mall, with Brent Hugh's sheet music and recordings (many freely downloadable).
• The Interactive Internet Piano Concert--follow and participate in the development of a piano concert.
• RealAudio Piano Music, by Brent Hugh, online for immediate listening.

Concert and CD Reviews

• 1998 Gina Bachauer Competition
• Kansas City Symphony with Chick Corea
• Pianist Angela Hewitt
• Pianist Ann Schein's performance here at MWSC in November 2000

Bicycling

• I have a separate page for bicycle advocacy links and also maintain a Kansas City Bicycle Log.
• Is on-street bicycling safe? (also in printable PDF format)
• Safety issues in on-street bicycling (Bike KC proposal)

Miscellaneous pages

• About Brent Hugh
• 3-D Views of the Mars Pathfinder Landing Site
• The Indecency Page

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You might take a moment to find out more about the Keyboard Studies program at MWSC, or visit our online message board about learning and teaching piano.

Copyright © 2002 Brent Hugh