Miss Melody's Wardrobe

Imre Mez (born 1932) composed several popular works for children and young people studying music. His most recent collection is extraordinary in that all the 153 tiny pieces are based on the same Hungarian folk song, offering a myriad of ways and options of presenting and elaborating the same melody without altering it.

The variations are grouped by key and, within each chapter, are placed in order of difficulty. In so doing, the composer offers, as piano teacher Erika Becht writes, ''two ways for teachers and pupils to know and try out the many musical and technical variations (such as augmenting, diminishing, canon, melody pairs, etc.). This can be done within the same key, inorder of difficulty, or by using the scope of the music to find the right degree of difficulty, and advancing through the key signatures, so developing pupils' ability and sense of security in reading a score by playing in various keys.''

This publication is not only recommended to beginners or more advanced pupils undergoing traditional musical tuition, but also to those interested in the secrets of composition and musical structures.