Happy Easter

I love this musical selection that was sung by a young couple in our church today for Easter.

Classical Themes Lab Assignment

Using your "In Recital with Classical Themes-Volume 1" by Helen Marlais book, complete the following activities. (affiliate link)

After listening to the first few minutes of the following video clips choose a Rating for each piece from the list.
1- I have no interest in learning to play this.
2- This piece is okay.
3- Nice but not one of my favorites.
4- I would like to play this piece.
5- I would love to learn to play this.

Piano Lab 101: Scheduling, Structure, Assignments and Progress

There are several different elements to consider when setting up a piano lab.

FEES AND SCHEDULING
When I incorporated piano lab into my private lessons, I had just relocated to a new area so I advertised the piano lab as one of the benefits of regular lessons and included lab fees with tuition. I charged a bit more than I would have without the lab to cover the additional expenses and planning time involved. Because of the lab feature in my piano instruction, I only accept students who are of age or maturity to be able to focus and work independently for 30 minutes (generally age 8 and above) unless the parents are willing to accompany them during the entire hour of lessons.

Initially I staggered lesson times (ex:4:00, 4:30, 5:00, etc.) so that each student first had private instruction with me and their piano lab activities reinforced the concepts introduced during their lesson.

Making Musical Memories

Some of my favorite family traditions at Christmas time involve music.

• This year our 4 oldest children are fluent enough readers that we can all gather around the piano and sing multiple verses of Christmas carols - so we'll actually be able to contribute some volume as we around the neighborhood in a trailer filled with hay bales:)
• To start out each December we watch the annual Christmas Devotional including music from the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and messages centering on the true meaning of Christmas -the birth of Jesus Christ. My favorite message this year was "Of Curtains, Contentment and Christmas" by Dieter F. Uchtdorf. Our children were pretty intrigued by his story of a memorable Christmas as a boy when he was a little too fascinated with the combination of curtains and flickering candles on the tree. I appreciated his reminder to not allow our seeking of the picture perfect Christmas events to drown out our efforts to seek Christ at Christmas and throughout the year.
  

• This year we watched some new free video clips depicting the events surrounding the Savior's birth. I love how most of them include beautiful soothing background music with a brief narration straight from the Bible (KJV). We'll definitely be adding this new tradition to our list!
• And of course.... I love overhearing all of the piano practice of Christmas songs.
  

Free Resources for Simple Christmas piano arrangements

Today while searching for an easy piano version of one of my favorite Christmas songs - "Still, Still, Still," I discovered this site - www.easybyte.org that contains numerous arrangements of Christmas songs and other music in the public domain arranged by William Wallace. The arrangements are in pdf format and many include electric keyboard midi samples.
A few other sites with elementary level Christmas music that I have found include:

http://www.gmajormusictheory.org/
makingmusicfun.net
susanparadis.com
laytonmusic.com - simplified primary songs

In my studio, I print these off, put them in sheet protectors in a folder arranged according to level of difficulty and allow my students to check them out from my music library during the holidays. Its been fun to see how the boost in confidence for students who check out the same songs the following year and can easily sightread the pieces that seemed like such a challenge for them the year before.
If you know of any other piano Christmas music sites please leave a comment and I'll add them to the list.

Christmas Canon Chords Improv Assignment

I absolutely LOVE Pachebel's Canon in D; in fact its on the CD I listen to each night at bedtime. The soothing repetitive chord progression is so calming. It also happens to provide the harmonic framework for some of my favorite peaceful Christmas songs:
"The First Noel"
"Guard Him Joseph" by Sally Deford
"The Christmas Spirit" by Lindy Kerby
and of course the well known more jovial song
"Jolly Old St. Nicholas."

So this Christmas season I've given a few of my students the opportunity to sharpen their knowledge of chord symbols and experiment with some improv accompaniment using the following chord progression:

I-V-vi-iii-IV-I-IV-V

(Its a lot easier to follow if you draw the chord symbols in relation to their pitch direction with arrows connecting them - but since my technical skills are limited on blogger... you'll just have to imagine)

I (down to )V(up to) vi( down to)iii(up to)IV(down to)I(up to)IV (up to)V

After identifying the letter names that match the chord symbols in the key they are assigned, they begin with a few of the following basic bass patterns:

Low Bass Note (LH) + Blocked Chord (RH)

Low Bass Note (LH) + Broken Chord (RH)

1 8va arpeggio (LH only)

Open 5th + octave (ex: if I is C Major = Bass C, up to G, up to Middle C)

Rolling Open 5th + octave (in C Major + Bass C, up to G, up to Middle C, back to G)

For those up to the challenge, they then vary the rhythm, come up with their own patterns, try transposing it to another key add a familiar melody in the RH or compose their own melody to match the harmony.

For those inexperienced with this type of transposition it is helpful to point out the pattern of the interval changes between chord roots:

Tonic - Down a 4th - Up a 2nd - Down a 4th - Up a 2nd - Down a 4th - Up a 4th - Up a 2nd

No wonder I love this song.......my brain loves order!

It was so invigorating to watch a couple of my students who are sisters play a lively little Jolly Old St. Nicolas duet together after just a few minutes of practice at their last lesson.

The pre-reading and elementary versions of Jolly Old St. Nicholas on Susan Paradis's website work great for the upper duet part for this assignment.

How do you teach improvisation in your studio?

Introducing Cadences with a Country Twist :)

Here's a fun little V7 chord song I stumbled upon while surfing YouTube


The V7 chord often "brings us home to I" and is heard a lot at the end of a song. Moving from a V7 chord to a I chord is known as an authentic cadence.
And just in case your curious....When a V chord does not resolve up by fourth to a I chord, but instead resolves up by second to a vi, it is called a deceptive cadence.

4 Musical Cadences Practice