It’s been a while since I posted pictures, so I figured it was about time! The Thursday before Thanksgiving week, we held our third studio group class. We have four main areas we’re focusing on this year, and each group class highlights one of them. This one focused on performance. We started out with a […]
Recital Ideas
A New and Exciting Era of Recitals!
Growing up, one of my least favorite things to do was attend recitals. I think most of the other students and audience members felt the same way. So it has been my personal mission to make our studio recitals not only tolerable, but immensely enjoyable and something that students and families look forward to. It […]
September Surprise!
Many of you know that I hold a September Surprise! kickoff event for my students each year. Since I take off the whole month of August, this gives them a chance to work on whatever they want in order to “surprise” me at the kickoff. We held the September Surprise! last Thursday evening and it […]
Comment of the Week – Memorizing
I require memorization as a yearly goal – 20 2-3 page pieces over the course of the year. But, I never require them to perform from memory for the same reasons as you. I believe trying to work on memory skills is a worthy goal I think for their own satisfaction of having a repertoire […]
Monday Mailbag – When Students Can’t Memorize
What happens when students just can’t memorize (I’m one of them; I just don’t have the capacity for memorization)? Do we give up on them as musicians, or is there another way? We are all gifted in different ways, with different capacities for various skills. In my opinion, it’s more valuable to be able to […]
Monday Mailbag – Memorization Strategies
I have been pondering how to teach memorization to students who have a different learning style from me. I know exactly how I memorize, but if visualization is not working for one of my students what can I try? This is a great topic that I hope others will weigh in on as well! Most […]
