Do you ever teach pieces to your students by rote? I have a couple of students that absolutely amaze me with their ability to watch me play something once and then repeat it almost perfectly and retain it in their memory all week long! Here are a few pieces that I frequently use for this […]
Repertoire Suggestions
Free Curriculum – Musical Travels for Children
I just downloaded a 161-page free curriculum called, “Musical Travels for Children“! The course was created by Catherine Schmidt Jones and includes units on Europe, Asia, Africa, Americas, and Australia. Each unit is comprised of practical teaching ideas, printed music from the various continents, and additional notes and resource links. This would be fabulous as […]
Review and Giveaway of Sonatinas and Little Sonatas CD!
Don’t you just love it when your students come into lessons saying, “I want to play this really cool piano piece by J.C. Bach that I heard over the weekend?” OK, really, when was the last time you heard such a comment? 🙂 It’s much more likely that they want to play the theme song […]
A Compendium of Composers
Yesterday, I shared a little bit about the Galaxy of Composers group class that we held in the studio last week. In preparation for this each student selected (or was given) a composition by a composer of interest to them. I tried to keep the duplicate composers to a minimum, but of course we did […]
Review of Irish Celebration
St. Patrick’s Day is just around the corner, and if you enjoy hearing holiday-themed music in your studio you’ll want to grab a copy of Wendy Stevens’ latest sheet music: Irish Celebration. The melody is fun and catchy – one that any early elementary student will love learning and playing over and over…and over and […]
Monday Mailbag – Moving Away from Method Books
At what point do you discontinue using method books with more advanced students? What does their curriculum consist of (i.e. what do you do for repertoire, technique, etc)? Wow! Like my Introducing Baroque Music post, I’m afraid this will reveal my lack of structured lesson planning when it comes to the higher levels! Just don’t […]
