One thing that I highly value is organization. I don’t function very well when things are cluttered, so I am always looking for better and more efficient systems that will help maintain order with minimal effort. An area where I have not developed a good system is with the variety of flashcards and small paper […]
Review of How Sweet the Sound
When our local music teachers association dubbed our first meeting of the year a “New Music Review” I knew exactly what I wanted to play. I had recently received Wendy Stevens’ newest book, How Sweet the Sound, and fell in love with the first arrangement – Day of Arising. It’s a gorgeous setting that just […]
Monday Mailbag – Duets with Students
When you do an ensemble recital, with duets, how do you work with the students in their individual lessons? Do they each practice their parts separately, then get together a few times to work together? Do you play the other duet part with each of them so they know what it sounds like? I would […]
Game: Chord-Building!
For this game, I just used three dice and three game markers. One die had Major, minor, augmented, and diminished on various sides, another die was just a 9-sided number die, and the final die had Root Position, 1st Inversion, 2nd Inversion on varying sides. The student rolled the three dice and the built the […]
Game: Interval Grab
This is the game that I used all last week and everyone loved it! Here are step-by-step instructions for how we played Interval Grab: 1. Dump out a bunch of scale blocks on the piano fallboard (or a table) and place a bell within reach of the student. 2. Instruct the student that you will […]
Game: Note Line-Up
This game is very similar to the Key Signature Line-Up game, but is designed to drill note identification instead. First I give the student a selection of note flash cards (in this case, we were working on bass clef notes from the low G up to middle C) and have him line them up in […]
