Therapeutic Music – Upper Hands Piano Blog

December 19, 2022December 19, 2022

Drumroll please…

The Music Remedy No. 3: 12 Passionate Pieces to Move You from Discouraged to Hopeful is on the shelves! My team and I have been working hard to get this book finished for the holidays. It’s available now on Amazon and can get to you or a loved one in 2 days.

The Music Remedy series is intermediate to late intermediate level, for the piano player who has completed all four of my Upper Hands Piano books.

I started writing The Music Remedy books during the pandemic, because as it says in the introduction, “…listening to and playing music is deeply therapeutic, and more often than not, we musicians have the power to take our emotions into our own hands and literally play our blues away.”

The Music Remedy: No. 3 was created for anyone who is feeling discouraged, and might benefit from some musical therapy (piano players, guitarists and singers can all use it). Here is a list of the songs and pieces in this book:

As you can see, The Music Remedy No. 3 is an eclectic mix of classical, jazz and popular music. I love the old jazz standard Everything Happens to Me, and I think Peter Gabriel’s Don’t Give Up is one of the best songs ever written. My arrangement of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue is now 3 pages long (I’ve pared it down a bit from the 4-page arrangement I gave away a couple years ago, and it feels just like the right length now), highlighting the most beautiful themes. (I also shortened the Moonlight Sonata!🌙) I love all of the pieces in this book, and worked hard to curate the best music I could find, to help you move from feeling discouraged, to feeling hopeful.

I hope you might consider purchasing one of my Music Remedy books for yourself or a loved one this holiday season! They are art books as well as sheet music collections, which makes them great for gifts, or for treating yourself. Learn more on my website. By the way, Amazon has discounted all three books to $10.95 each, until the end of December.

You might also want to consider giving one of my Songs of the Seasons ⬇️ music books (Winter, Spring, Summer, or Autumn) which are arranged for beginners (years 1-3), or my ⬅️ Upper Hands Piano books for older adults who might want to learn or re-learn how to play the piano.

OK, commercial over! Usually I offer free sheet music, worksheets and practice tips on this blog, but I hope you don’t mind if once in awhile I tell you about my books.

Soon I will tell you about a great new free offering for beginning piano students! But for now, I want to wish you all a wonderful week of holiday music and magic. We celebrate the return of the light 🌞on the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year! Many thanks for your support, and Happy Holidays! With Love and Music, Gaili

November 1, 2022

November Free Sheet Music: Erik Satie’s Gymnopedie No. 1

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Happy November!

For my monthly free sheet music I wanted to give you a sneak preview from my forthcoming new piano songbook called The Music Remedy, No. 3: 12 Pieces to Move You from Discouraged to Hopeful. I am finishing my arrangements and am working with the graphic artist on the artwork for the book. I’m so excited to share it with you, that I want to give you one piece from the book now, even though it doesn’t include the artwork yet.

Gymnopedie No. 1 was composed by the French composer Erik Satie, as part of his set of pieces called Trois Gymnopedies. I have simplified it a bit to make it easier to read and play for the intermediate pianist. The piece might sound familiar to you, as it has been frequently featured in films and television shows. I love it for its tranquil, pensive quality, which feels appropriate to the season, and the end of Daylight Savings Time (in my state, this Sunday!) To shorten my video a little, I went straight to the CODA without taking the D.C. in my demonstration video:

Remember, my sheet music is only available free for 1 year, so print today if you think you might like to play this piece sometime in the future! You can print it from my website:

PRINT: GYMNOPEDIE NO. 1

I hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving however you choose to celebrate. This month I plan to write in my Gratitude Journal every day, at least 2 or 3 things for which I am grateful. If you have never kept a gratitude journal you might consider it, as research shows that thinking about what you appreciate in your life can elevate mood and calm the spirit. Sometimes you might write a small simple thing such as gratitude for the light shining through your window in the morning, beautiful leaves on a tree, or the delicious taste of your morning coffee. Other times you might be grateful for finding time to practice, for the beauty of your piece, or your ability to play a difficult passage in your music a little bit better than the last time you played it. You might be grateful for help from a family member, for your good health (even if it’s not perfect, it could be worse!), your friends, your food, your opportunities, your home, your life. This is the journal I have, but there are many – look for them at your local bookstore, or create your own from a notebook!

Try keeping a gratitude journal this month with me, and see how you feel. Everyone I know that has taken the time to write a few grateful observations each night, reported feeling happier. When you are looking for things to be grateful for, you notice more beauty in the world, and more of what is good, and working well, instead of focusing on what is not working well. Anyway, just a thought! Leave a comment below and tell us what you are grateful for and what you might be playing on your piano for loved ones at your Thanksgiving celebration!

Today, I am especially grateful for my job as a piano teacher, for my love of music, and for you, my readers who follow my blog, play from my sheet music, and make me feel useful. I hope you enjoy playing Gymnopedie No. 1, and enjoy this month of Gratitude!

With love and Music, Gaili

P.S. Here are some of my books!

February 5, 2022February 6, 2022

Giveaway! The Music Remedy books No. 1 and No. 2

I hope you have been enjoying playing my February free sheet music, My Love is Like a Red, Red Rose. To further celebrate the month of 💗 love 💗 I am giving away 20 of my new books:

The Music Remedy, No. 1: 12 Passionate Pieces to Move You from Loss to Love
The Music Remedy, No. 2: 12 Passionate Pieces to Move You from Anxiety to Calm

***I am giving away 10 of each on February 14th, Valentine’s Day, of course! To enter, subscribe to this blog (if you haven’t already) and LIKE @UpperHandsPiano on Facebook or FOLLOW Instagram or Facebook, and be sure to LIKE the post about the Giveaway! Two chances to win if you LIKE/FOLLOW both. Also extra entries each time you tag a friend on Facebook or Instagram, or share this giveaway in your stories (remember to tag me @upperhandspiano) Includes free shipping within the USA.***

*If you buy one of The Music Remedy books between now and the drawing, you will get a refund if you win the drawing (you will just need to show proof of purchase)*

Click HERE to learn more on our website

SONG LISTS:

The Music Remedy: No. 1 – 12 Passionate Pieces to Move You from Loss to Love

What’ll I Do– Irving Berlin
You Made Me Love You– James Monaco and Joseph McCarthy
I Ain’t Got Nobody– Spencer Williams
I’ll See You in My Dreams– Isham Jones and Gus Kahn
Piano Concerto No. 1 – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Somewhere Out There– James Horner, Barry Mann, Cynthia Weil
The Man I Love– George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin
Romance Without Words– Gabriel Fauré
Ready for You– Gaili Schoen
It Had to Be You– Isham Jones, Gus Kahn
At Last– Harry Warren, Mack Gordon
La Vie en Rose– Louiguy, Edith Piaf, Mack David

The Music Remedy: No. 2 – 12 Passionate Pieces to Move You from Anxiety to Calm

The Tempest– Ludwig van Beethoven
Alla Turca– Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Breathin– Ariana Grande
Rumination– Gaili Schoen
This Train – Gaili Schoen
Clair de Lune– Gabriel Fauré
The Swan– Camille Saint-Saëns
Meditation– Jules Massenet
Tristesse– Frederick Chopin
In My Room– Brian Wilson and Brian Usher
A Little Night Music II– Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Quiet Nights of Quiet Stars– Antonio Carlos Jobim

*from The Music Remedy No. 1: 12 Passionate Pieces to Move You from Loss to Love*

from The Music Remedy No. 2: 12 Passionate Pieces to Move You from Anxiety to Calm

The Music Remedy is a collection of beautiful, melodic songs and pieces for intermediate Piano/Guitar/Vocals that use the healing power of music to help restore your emotional balance. Because playing music can be the best medicine.

The Music Remedy books begin with pieces that align with a troubling emotion. Playing pieces that resonate with your emotional state can help you clear a path toward healing and growth. It is widely known that listening to and playing music is deeply therapeutic, and more often than not, we musicians have the power to take our emotions into our own hands and literally play our blues away. As you progress through each book, the music seeks to gradually shift your perspective, guiding you to a more balanced outlook; an emotional state that can enable you to imagine and create a brighter future filled with renewed possibilities.

These books make great gifts for your loved ones, or for yourself! Leave a comment below to tell me which book you would like if you win and I’ll do my best to honor your request. Good luck and thanks for playing! 🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶 – Gaili

P.S. You can purchase the books plus my Upper Hands Piano books for adults 50+ below, or order from your local bookstore (The Music Remedy series is only available in the USA, for now. The Upper Hands Piano series is available in the US, UK and Canada). Thank you!

January 22, 2022

Goals, Intentions, Scheduling, Structure

We know that setting goals can be an effective way to focus our practice time. In the past I have held “Pledge to Play: 10 Minutes A Day” challenges, where everyone pledges to get themselves to their benches for at least 10 minutes every day for a month. During those 10 minute practice sessions we concentrated on short-term goals such as learning a difficult musical passage smoothly, memorizing a short piece, or learning the minor 7^th chords in all 12 keys, etc. Challenging yourself to practice every day for 10 minutes is a great way to become a better musician, as research shows that daily exposure is the best way to improve.

Pledges can be a great motivational tool, but what about after the 30 days is over? Just as after a weight-loss program, we have to create an enduring plan for maintaining the good practices we cultivate while working towards our musical goals.

When in maintenance mode we might speak in terms of intentions rather than goals. Life coach Jennifer Louden writes that the word intention comes from the Latin “intendere” which means “to stretch toward something.” Louden suggests that while a goal drives you toward a future outcome, an intention helps keep you in the present. Louden writes:

The goal feels positive, but closed, almost a should, and it doesn’t inspire the imagination nearly as much as the intention, which feels open-ended, expansive, encouraging….

Instead of, or in addition to setting a goal such as, “I will learn this piece in 60 days,” you might want to form an intention, such as, “I am folding piano practice into my life four days per week.” Or, “I am exploring improvisation in my piano studies this year,” etc.

Write down your intention. Then come up with a structure to support it. You can adjust your expectations and intentions as you go along, but a written intention and structure acts as a roadmap. For example, if your intention is to become a more skilled musician, schedule 4-6 piano practice sessions per week in your phone calendar using the repeat: weekly and the alerts functions. Schedule your practice at times that you believe you can consistently follow through. Some might be 10-minute sessions, some might be 30 minutes or more. If you miss a session, reschedule it, or just let it go and look forward to your next scheduled practice. If your intention is to explore improvising, the structure might be scheduling weekly improv, just noodling around on your instrument or trying my improvising exercises, watching jazz, rock, or folk YouTube videos, and planning monthly visits to jazz and folk concerts (when it is safe to attend concerts in your town!) Whatever your intention(s), find a structure that you can embrace. Setting unreasonable expectations is counter-productive.

When you have to leave town and won’t be able to practice, set an intention to put practice aside until you return, and name the date that you will resume your practice routine. That way, your travel becomes part of your intention, and not an aberration.

When days or weeks pass in which you didn’t fulfill your intention, let regrets go. Start fresh the following week doing your best to reinstate your structure. This isn’t about perfection, it’s about process. Keep it light and enjoyable. Intentions are about how you want to live your life. Your intentions are driven by your values. A little guilt is ok if it keeps you aligned with an intention, but don’t let yourself slide into shame and negative self-talk.

Be brave enough to live creatively…. You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. You…get there…by hard work, risking and by not quite knowing what you are doing. What you will discover will be wonderful: You will discover yourself.

-Alan Alda

Please leave a comment below to share your goals or intentions with our piano community, and let us support you! While we are still battling Covid-19, community support is especially important for our emotional well being!

If you are new to this blog, welcome! I am a veteran piano teacher of almost 35 years! I post free sheet music every month, arranged for beginning to intermediate piano students, plus posts like this one to motivate and inform. I have written piano instruction books for adults over 50 (UpperHandsPiano.com), younger adults and teens (PianoPowered.com), Songs of the Seasons piano sheet music books for seasonal classical and popular favorites, and my latest piano/guitar/vocals books called The Music Remedy – sheet music collections to restore and revitalize the spirit. Check out my books on the websites above, or click below to view them on Amazon.com.

I hope you are enjoying a beautiful winter’s day wherever you are. With love and music, Gaili

January 1, 2022

January Free Sheet Music: Someone to Watch Over Me

Happy New Year Friends!

I always enjoy posting free sheet music for you at the beginning of each month, but on January 1st it’s especially exciting, because it is Public Domain Day! That means that an entire year’s worth of songs (today it is 1926) come into the public domain, and I get to pick one to arrange for you! This year my favorite song to become available is Someone to Watch Over Me by George and Ira Gershwin.

Someone to Watch Over Me has been recorded by Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Barbra Streisand, Willie Nelson, and Lady Gaga to name just a few! It’s one of the Gershwins’ most popular collaborations, and I hope you will enjoy playing their beautiful song.

⬇️ Click to print ⬇️

SOMEONE TO WATCH OVER ME

Here’s a demonstration of this arrangement:

This is an arrangement for intermediate pianists. If you are a beginner, print it out now for the future, as it will only be free for 1 year, until December 2022. [After that time you can purchase it on Sheet Music Plus where you can find a lot of my arrangements for songs such as White Christmas, Autumn Leaves, Hallelujah and a lot more!]

🎶  I'm a little lamb who's lost in the wood. I know I could, always be good, to one who'll watch over me....🎶

I think we have all been feeling a little lost this year, and we all need someone to watch over us, making sure we’re not getting too isolated during this painful Covid era. New cases are multiplying here in Los Angeles, and I hope that you manage to stay safe and find companionship, wherever you are.

Most of you know that I just released some new books called The Music Remedy last month. A thousand thank yous to those of you who purchased these therapeutic song books (No. 1 – 12 Passionate Pieces to Move You from Loss to Love, and No. 2 – 12 Passionate Pieces to Move You from Anxiety to Calm) for yourself or for loved ones! I am hard at work finishing up No. 3 – 12 Passionate Pieces to Move You from Discouraged to Hopeful! Amazon.com is keeping the price at $9.50 for one more week! Also, If there is an older adult in your life whose New Year’s Resolution is to start or restart playing the piano in 2022, please remember that my Upper Hands Piano books make great gifts!

Ok that’s enough advertising! 😆 It’s time for you to get playing! Please leave a comment below and tell me and our Upper Hands Piano community what you are playing now, and what you might like to play in 2022. Let us know if you are playing Someone to Watch Over Me, and tell us how it’s going! Now that we are locked down again, it’s a great opportunity to play your piano more! Try to sit down for at least 10 minutes each day; daily exposure to a new challenge is the very best and fastest way to learn. Don’t get discouraged if it takes a while for you to learn a difficult passage in your piece. Honor your own pace and keep playing!

I’m looking forward to releasing some other pieces that have come into the public domain, throughout this year. I just love arranging songs and pieces for you, and I so appreciate that you have subscribed to my blog! Stay warm, safe and healthy. We can get through these difficult times, apart but together, sitting on our benches, playing music from the heart.

With love and music, Gaili

December 13, 2021December 18, 2021

Announcing… New Books and Free Holiday Sheet Music!

My series called The Music Remedy launched today!

For the past year I have been hard at work researching, selecting, arranging and editing songs and pieces for a new series of sheet music books called, The Music Remedy. For many of us, playing music was the best medicine during the Covid-19 pandemic, getting us through the isolation, the anxiety, and our many losses. In The Music Remedy books we target some of life’s most problematic obstacles, offering songs and pieces to help the musician (pianist, guitarist, vocalist) move through distressing emotions to a more positive and balanced emotional state. Piano players and guitarists who have tested these books report that playing (and singing) these songs and pieces helped them to cope with painful feelings; they also reported that the pieces renewed their optimism, restoring a sense of well-being. Playing and singing the songs in The Music Remedy: No. 1: – 12 Passionate Pieces to Move You from Loss to Love, helped them to extend themselves to people and to open to the idea of bringing a new love into their lives. The Music Remedy: No. 2 – 12 Passionate Pieces to Move You from Anxiety to Calm helped musicians to relax and trust that they would be safe. It’s been so exciting creating music books that might help people feel better (while also boosting their brain power, of course!) But even if you aren’t experiencing these issues, the pieces within The Music Remedy books are beautiful, melodic, and fun to play!

You can click the images above to order on Amazon, or click here to view sample pages and song lists for each book.

This month only, The Music Remedy books are on sale for $9.50! On January 1st they go up to $12.95, so buy now!

On TheMusicRemedy.com you can find links to video demonstrations for every song in each book. I think you’ll find that watching the videos will help you to learn the pieces more quickly and accurately. All of these arrangements range from the early to late intermediate levels. I hope that you will consider giving these books as gifts, or buying them for yourself (as my student Joan says, playing the piano is the best therapy!)

As an added incentive, if you buy ANY of my books this month (Upper Hands Piano levels 1-4, Songs of the Seasons: Spring, Summer, Winter or Autumn, Piano Powered, or The Music Remedy) send a screen shot of your receipt to me at UpperHandsPiano@gmail.com, and I will send you some free holiday music- Dance of the Sugarplum Fairy, Deck The Halls, Dona Nobis, I Saw Three Ships, Jingle Bells, Joyful Joyful, Little Drummer Boy, The Nutcracker Suite, O Christmas Tree, Oh Chanukah, Oh Holy Night, Sevivon, Silent Night, and Vivaldi’s Winter. Request one or request them all! That’s just this month, December 2021.

Selling my books helps me to support this blog so that I can continue to offer you free sheet music each month, so I hope you don’t mind my advertising today! Many thanks for your kind and generous support. Happy Holidays friends!

With love and music, Gaili