The 2027 & 2028 ABRSM syllabus is out! Once again, Zonko’s Big Adventure has been listed in Initial Grade List A!
1. Zonko’s Big Adventure by Canadian composer Rebekah Maxner
Solo or duet? On ABRSM Initial Grade exams, students will play Zonko’s Big Adventure as a piano solo.
Zonko’s Big Adventure is inspired by 8-bit video game themes, and tells the story of an imaginary character, Zonko. Imagine a barbershop-singing squirrel who sings and plays his way around a jazzy city to collect points and reach his musical goals.
But just in case you think Zonko’s Big Adventure is sugar-coated candy floss music with a wonky name, consider the pedagogical value that’s embedded in it.
Why ABRSM List A? The selections in this list develop an understanding of articulation.
Baroque 1600-1750. Zonko is a precursor to Baroque music in the following ways:
- Like Baroque music, articulation is developed with careful attention to where the music is slurred and non-legato, contrasting touches on the keys.
- Like Baroque music, hands play in contrary motion. While in Baroque music this is typically played out in imitative counterpoint (for example, a fugal subject may be inverted), this composition technique occurs in Zonko with simultaneous mirrored finger numbers.
- Keep the musical interpretation simple, much like what was possible on the Baroque keyboard instruments. Because it’s copying the style of 8-bit video game music, avoid nuanced shaping of the longer slurs or phrases and play with a straightforward, boxy sound. The dynamics in Zonko can be angular like Baroque terraced dynamics, with clean shifts to new dynamic levels.
Classical 1750-1825. Zonko also helps prepare for Classical technique:
- Notice throughout the piece that there are two-note slurs. Do play with the “more-less” Classical two-note slur technique with more weight into the first note and less into the second. But in keeping with a “boxy” sound, keep it a bit playful and subtle.
Because this piece imitates video game music, it’s okay to keep the phrases rather robotic. Avoid being too tender with the longer slurs. Play them legato, and all the same touch and dynamic. This doesn’t mean to play “unmusically”, it simply means that this music is meant to copy the particular style of computer sounds of the 1980s.
2. FREE Escape Room Practice Strategies – tutorial sheet
When I was a student, sometimes I’d be overwhelmed by the notation of a new piece and I’d think it looked too difficult. I’d feel defeated before I’d even begun! Well, I’ve found an approach that helps kids learn one thing at a time.
Download this escape room-styled printable (free!) For Zonko’s Big Adventure. It simplifies the look of the music, using only small samples and keeping the rest of the notation hidden. This helps students with focus, and to prepare to play the piece with a step-by-step “gamified” approach.
With the YouTube video tutorial and free printable, you and your student can start the exciting adventure of learning this piece with small achievable bite-sized goals, with just enough notation visible for each one, and the rest of the notation hidden.
As your student learns the music, they can imagine that they’re chomping their way through like a video game character. And, that completing each step of the escape room tutorial sheet is like beating a video game level!
Also, check out this cool YouTube tutorial that visualizes the music on the piano keys. Even if you don’t use this video as a teaching aid, your student might use it to double-check that they’ve learned it correctly.
3. Behind the scenes of composing Zonko
On May 4th, 2005, the main theme came into existence. For many years, based on the opening rhythm, it was called ‘Fiddlesticks!’ and was written without any hands together.
For about fifteen years, the theme was a pet ear worm of mine. I’d walk around my house to a steady beat, living my life and the theme would play, and all the while I’d have a counter rhythm in octaves on the go inside my head. Eventually, this became the duet because I couldn’t imagine Zonko without that extra rhythmic activity. Once it got this extra part, the music took on a video game quality and I knew it needed a new title. It had been my soundtrack for getting things done, almost like the theme to a video game as the main character earns points and achieves goals.
Then in 2020, I released it with the title Zonko’s Big Adventure in the Elementary piano collection Rock This Town. For the first time, Zonko was given the mirrored phrases and got its optional duet.
How Zonko’s Big Adventure got its name…
4. A visit with the ABRSM editors
ABRSM contacted me in the spring of 2024 to let me know they had selected one of my pieces for their piano syllabus. Not only was I very excited to have been chosen, but I realized that my husband, Paul, and I were going to be in London the very June the new syllabus was to be announced. As we live in Nova Scotia, Canada, this was a special trip! I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to try to connect with the editors, so we found a time to meet.
Vicky, Hazel and Teresa and I (and Paul!) had a visit in their staff lounge over tea and had a very lively conversation about music and pedagogy.
They learned that I thought of Zonko’s Big Adventure as video game music, and loved that idea! While there, we filmed a short interview and performances of the piece (shared from the ABRSM account, above).
I learned that they had chosen Zonko’s Big Adventure because it includes an optional duet. They’d like Initial Grade students to gain the benefits of collaborative piano playing.
While it’s an exam solo, it may be played as a duet in a recital, competition or music festival, either teacher-student or student-student. It sounds very wonky with the duet!
5. Where you can get it
Here are some helpful links to help you start this adventure!
Link to the FREE printable: Zonko’s Big Adventure Escape Room Practice Strategies
To perform Zonko’s Big Adventure, the escape room tutorial sheet does not take the place of actual purchased notation. Here’s how to get the sheet music.
Purchase Zonko’s Big Adventure once and use it with all your students for as long as you teach, with a studio-licensed eSheet: Zonko’s Big Adventure.
Globally, Zonko’s Big Adventure is available from Amazon in the Elementary piano collection Rock This Town, printed and shipped to you in your own country from Kindle Direct: AMAZON
Zonko’s Big Adventure is available in Rock This Town as an 8 1/2×11 studio-licensed eBook.
Within continental North America, Zonko’s Big Adventure is available in Rock This Town as a 9×12 print book.
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Video of the Week
Rock Around the Block (Elementary, Initial Grade, Prep B) is inspired by 1950s rock idioms and Elvis Presley’s Jailhouse Rock. It includes left hand fifths, accents, staccatos and slurs, sharps and flats, and a crescendo that builds, all wrapped up in the irresistible rock and roll style! From the print and eBook Rock This Town, or check out the Rock Around the Block eSheet! Listen to this student performance.
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