Blizzard outside my studio

My piano is ready for Music

playing music in a Blizzard

I am on a two week vacation.  What opportunity to just play piano all day.  Yet, I have distractions just outside my studio door.  My children are home as well and they are watching movies.  I am one to be completely sucked into television.  It's an old habit from childhood.  I feel regret that they watch as much as they do.  At this age I can no longer be an influence - the media world is a much stronger influence.  We have books and radio and cooking. But that TV blares in the background.  Sigh!  So I rush through to find my piano and the pile of music on it.  There is Debussy and Prokofiev, Mendelssohn and Chopin and Schumann.  It's a lot of music and I have to also be careful not to spread myself to thin.  I am setting my goals to keeping the Mendelssohn Variation Serieuses in shape and the concerto No. 3 of Prokofiev, and I want to learn the 2nd movement of the prokofiev.  That should be enough for now.  I think I will treat myself to an hour of music exploration each day and that should keep it from spreading to every moment at the piano.  That and bake a pie and make pecan bars.

This is my group for Book 4 coming this Fall.

Pictures

I promise to take pictures of the class tomorrow.

Christmas in August

Tomorrow will be my fifth piano drop in class. I have been reviewing reading skills, by ear pieces from book 2 and playing favorite games and dances and drumming from the program. Each week I have included a new reading piece that is a familiar song. I decided to add christmas tunes for August. What better way to make the children laugh! And, I know that learning christmas songs in December is usually too late for the children. They are so stressed out. I thought it would be fun to learn three tunes for the season now and then bring them back during the season. Then we could expand then reading pieces to include chords, accompaniments, and different keys. I thought I would start with Jingle bells.

Piano drop in update

We have just completed our fifth piano drop in class. I am having a lot of fun teaching this program. Each week I compose a new reading piece. I also make sure I have a mystery reading piece. I plan on reviewing a by ear piece which I call "the pieces no one every quite gets the first time". Depending on their level I add chords or chordal accompaniment. I plan to repeat the reading pieces as dictation pieces in August. I also plan to add Christmas carols (never too early). I found real nice paper to print on (a heavier weight). I also leave copies on my bulletin board so the students can always select a reading piece to take home. We always play aural improv games. This week I opened the class by having them choose a card that included either a warm up, a chord progression or an improvisation. They had to pick a key to do it in. We also played bingo with tonal patterns. I kept the patterns in g minor because the reading/by ear piece was "When the Train Comes along" which we did in ensemble as well.

Next year I may split the group to year one and year two. However, I so far don't see any problem combining the classes. I am mostly reviewing the end of year one, which includes so many fundamentals. If they are comfortable with book 2, they can continue with the other books.

I also taught an adult to read music using the adult MG program (with adaptations of course) and we had a blast. When the adult came in she was nervous but when she left she felt empowered and was laughing and excited about her homework.

Piano

My first Piano Drop in is a Success

First, three children showed up and they all were excited to be there. We warmed up with five finger warm ups in all keys. Then we played song circle and I let them choose their favorite activities. I expanded each activity into either an ensemble or a dance or a scarf activity. We then learned about "America" and I showed them a picture of Washington crossing the Deleware. We learned the first half of the song and I chose G major so that the "ti' would be easy to find. I assigned the left hand to play the "ti". Then we played with MMAW rhythm cards from the Germany Unit that connect to Handel's Firemusic (fireworks, get it?) and it was so satisfying to see how clear these cards were to them. We listened for the patterns in the music and danced with scarves. Then we had a mystery reading piece which was, of course, Yankee Doodle (in G position) and they all could read it. I forgot to mention that two of the children just finished book 1 and one finished book 2. They all had a great time. I also had the reading piece with chords if a book 4 child showed up. Of course we reviewed the I and V7 chord.

Lots of fun.

Piano Drorp in is starting tomorrow

Before I can even start work on the post grads, I need to set up lesson plans for my piano drop in program. This program is a weekly drop in hour where the students sign up for any wednesday in the Summer. I opened the hour to all levels so I have the problem now of meeting the needs of the differing levels. This sounds like a challenge, yet if I think about it, they all have a commen desire to make music for one hour on a summer afternoon. No one is going forward in their studies. Rather it is a fun one hour singing their favorite songs, working on the ear training, composing, improvising, and ensemble fun. I also would like to add a new reading piece for each level. I was thinking of using one melody and making four levels. This could be a lot of fun but I better get to it. I was thinking of America for the first piece because it is July fourth weekend.

Today was my second and final Spring Musicale for the Season. I took a new slant on this event. I made it more formal with a program and asked for the children to dress up and bring a dessert to share. Between each child playing, I added an interlude which was a favorite activity and I used this valuable time to explain its value in the program. Parent orientation is always ongoing.

Update on a Group of Post Grads in the Fall

I spoke to the parents and although they all would like to continue as a group, they are concerned about what day. Last year we move the day to Monday and then the school moved afterschool band to Monday. We don't know what the school will do next year and they aren't telling us. It makes it hard for me to schedule the class because I need to book other classes as well. I may have to simply designate my available hour and then wait to hear from the parents.

I am offering a piano drop in class and my parents have responded pretty well. I mixed the different books into one hour. We will see if this works. The only children that registered are from book 1 and 2 so it won't be to hard to review and borrow glimpses of dance and drumming from book 3 and 4.

My Graduates take part in my Spring Musicale

Today is my Spring musicale for my private students and my graduating class is invited to play in the program.  Here is what they are playing:

Indigo is playing  Quadrille  and Kookaburra

Samantha is playing America, Juba (complete arrangement) and Melody for the Left Hand

Kara   is playing     First Dance, Bag Pipes and Country Dance II (Solo)

 Lina  Friendly Conversation and Country Dance I (Solo)

Kara and Lina  are playing Country Dance as a 2 piano 4 hands ensemble.

   When you consider the scope of the music in the curriculum, it is pretty impressive.  I plan to video their performances.                                                                        

 

 

 

Yesterday, I spoke to the parents of the children graduating from the program. I don't see the enthusiasm to continue as a group although two of parents would like to continue. One parent is more interested in private lessons and one parent is unwilling to commit to anything. They are addicted to baseball season and if interferes with this passion.

so I sent the group an email giving three paths they could consider.

One is the group idea.

One is a partner lesson idea with a group lesson every five classes or so.

One is private lessons with group lesson every fifth lesson or so.

I gave them until the end of the month to respond.

I probably will contact them all on the 28th to hear their ideas.

We wait and see.


Meanwhile I am preparing my MMK students for a spring musicale. We celebrate tomorrow night. I look foward to all the desserts, lol.

I guess the first task to figure out exactly where my students are at the end of the keyboard program. I have a group that will end the program in 4 weeks. They are all playing well. I need to introduce them.

Kara is the oldest of the group, age 9 1/2 and probably the most creative of the four. Her father has been her noblest supporter although he has inadvertently sabotaged Kara's reading skills the way a parents does best. Unknown to me, he marked all her music with the letter names and fingering. He also would spoon feed the music to Kara. As a result, she has no strong relationship to solfege. For her it was the annoying part of the class and she would often be doing headstands against the wall rather than read the music. She was always the moving type but it would worsen during this part of class. Yet, every week she would have all her pieces properly learned, although never with music in front of her. No matter what I did (and I racked my brain) did she connect to the music, yet, because of Dad's "support" she always was ahead. She also has very tight fingers and although we have come a long way from "spastic", still fights me if I casually mention the idea of using a 1, 3, 5 fingering for a tonic chord. She has a misaligned hand position that we are slowly changing and believe me, it has been a struggle since day one. Of course, I bet you can imagine the quality of tone she produces - harsh, harsh and harsh. So we spend a lot of time (weekly) discussing tonal quality and I have the other children raise their hands when she produces a harsh sound. She is beginning to come around and so his her hand. I find imagery works better to reduce tension in her hand rather than to say, "Relax".
We are spending mucho time on aural games with patterns so she reconnects to the solfeggio. Better late than never. On the positive side, she has created three CDS of original music with vocal and she does all the background music. Pretty incredible. Also she has composed quite a few 12 bar blues and has a natural connection to this form or composition and improvisation.

Lina is a sibling and dutifully does all her work and never misses class. She is super shy and sweet and will figure out anything. She is fluent in her solfege and in her rhythm language. Like her peers she will need practice naming notes but it really doesn't faze her. she is a bright spot in the classroom and always gets the concept the first time.

Samantha is the rebellious one that learns ahead and plays Ode to Joy at every share (sigh). She is actually the best of the four and her technique is solid. She has independence of hands and is a strong reader. She is the one that creates hell in the room and I often have to sit on her. Unfortunately the parents consider music to be a seasonal sport and when baseball season hits, I lose her. She is the leader of the group and very musical.

Indigo is the ultimate rhythm machine. He adores video music and plans to be a future creator of this music. He is best a dictation and will sing in tune if you ask him to. He always picks out the most interesting supplement pieces and learns them on his own but usually gets it all wrong. Yet if you mention anything, he fixes it immediately and thats that. He is fine with three girls in the room although the touchy hands thing sometimes invades the room. Oh for another boy in the room...

These are my students who, I hope will continue next year as a group.

For the past few days I have emmersed myself in the Van Cliburn International competition. They are streaming the entire competition online. This is a dream come true. I am overwhelmed by the music and the performers. I can only dream of playing at this level.

I also think about whether I am part of this creation of music in my studio. Am I training the next pianist for this event? Are their ears and body in my music program? what if I came from this place with all my students? It is an interesting and intriquing thought.

Today is a good day to start thinking about the overall goals of a group music class. Here are some goals that come perculating up:
1. improve fluency
2. ensemble opportunity
3. explore the piano reportoire
4. further discovery of music form, particularly sonata form
5. music games
6. master class format
7. continued group support

I am not sure the children truly support one another in their work. I have heard of practice buddies and this may work.

Welcome to my blog. I am looking for a space where we can work together to create a class for children that have graduated from the Music Makers At the Keyboard program. For many teachers, these children are sent to private piano teachers and we sometimes have no idea how our work is being perceived. Some teachers are considering keeping the classes together and continuing their piano study in this format. There has been various successes and some failures. Perhaps we can create a supportive space for all our efforts. I want to approach the questions: how do we move these children forward in a creative and musical way.