Sheet music for a Grade 4 9YO

[TwoInTheMourning]

My DS aged 9 has recently done his Grade 4 exam. He's a bit bored with it all so I'd like him to spend some time playing music he actually enjoys and forget about grades for a while. My problem is that I don't know anything about music and DS won't have a piano teacher now until September. I definitely want to keep him going with some fun pieces. He enjoys blues in general although it can get a little repetitive, upbeat songs and also likes Apologize and Counting Stars by OneRepublic. I was wondering if anybody could recommend some grade appropriate tunes for my DS to work these next few months. Please be as specific as you can and send links if possible as I am not able, from looking at the music sheet, to gauge the grade. Thanks so much.

This is for piano by the way

There are a series of books called Up Grade which are designed for light relief in between grades. there is one for between grades 3+4 and one for 4+5, so it would depend how far advanced your DS is as to which one you get. If it's more for fun, the 3+4 one might be better. I think they also do versions with jazz or pop pieces.
www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_c_0_8?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=upgrade+piano&sprefix=up+grade%2Caps%2C166

That looks perfect Seeline thanks. What sort of tunes are they though? Classical, pop?

I don't really know, I think it depends on the version you get. My DD had a Christmas one which was a mix of traditional carols and more popular Christmas songs.
There do seem to be separate books for pop and jazz, as well as just ordinary piano. They do stress they are for light relief so nothing too heavy I wouldn't have thought.

A word of caution - several of the ones on that Amazon link seem to be in German. The music would be the same but if there are words it may get tricky

Hello OP

I don't think you need to worry about grade appropriate books tbh as long as they aren't really simple your ds will benefit from playing lots of different pieces.
I would advise your local music shop, too many people over look these as a good source of advice. They will help you choose appropriate books and you'll be supporting your local shop.

Good point *morethan8. Music shops are fairly few and far apart these days, but nearest is always very helpful. You could take DS with you and see what he fancies. If he wants to play something I think that is a good start!!

morethan I couldn't agree with you more in theory. Our local music shop (we only have one) has not been at all helpful in the past, they just point with the finger to the section I should go to, but then once there I just haven't got a clue what's what. I'd be more interested in knowing what has interested other kids of roughly the same age.

Jazzin' About Styles by Pauline Hall. It's a Grade 2-4 book, so he'll be able to sight read some and enjoy them straight away, and work on the others. So many different styles in there - boogie, disco, reggae etc.

You could also try, for something different, the Rockschool grade 3 or 4 syllabus (same standard, totally different genre).

I use Upgrades, LCM jazz syllabus (they have repertoire lists online) and Rockschool materials as supplements to classical piano lessons. Also, most online "Easy piano" arrangements of pop music are around grades 3-4 at least.

I loved playing Jazz music when I was grade 4ish, also played a lot of Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals stuff.

Does he enjoy composing his own music, Two? Or have a particular band he likes - there are always piano/vocal books available with chord progressions and this would be a different style from the usual 'exam fare' and also involve a little creativity.

Ah, that is really rotten and you question how they stay in business.
Since posting last, we passed our music shop and the owner stopped us and pointed out they had stacks upon stacks of music they were almost giving away, would we like to see it.
So tomorrow we go to view it all, now I know what I'm doing, but know for certain they would be really helpful if I couldn't.

In that case give ebay or Amazon your money, they don't deserve it.

My dd likes Hannon books and has the serious exercises/study and the boogie woogie book. She hasn't taken exams on piano yet but these books are great for intermediate to advanced players.