Archive for category Teaching Composition
Question #6 – How Do You Deal with Constant Doodling?
Posted by Wendy in Piano Teaching, Teaching Composition on December 14th, 2009
One teacher at the Kansas City workshop in November asked me this question on a comment card. I think this is a great question since at several points in my Composition for Kids lecture, I mention that I encourage doodling. First, let me make a few points about doodling.
I think there is a difference between doodling with a purpose and doodling to fill space or delay working. Some students would doodle their entire lesson for a variety of reasons, but not necessarily to come up with some great motive for a future composition. So, I think it is important to try to determine why this particular student is constantly doodling. Is he bored? Is he delaying what he doesn’t want to do? Is she looking for a creative sound? Is she anxious to create something new? Finding the answer to these questions will help you know how to deal with constant doodling.
If a student is doodling because he is bored, then I would suggest alternating time at the bench with time away from the bench playing a variety of music games. Some great sites for music games are Piano Teaching Resources and D’Net Layton’s Site of music games. You can also find some music games to make and play here on my website.
If a student is doodling because she likes to create new sounds, then it is a good idea to set aside some lesson time to allow her to do this. For example, you could tell her, “Susan if you will do what I ask for the next 10 minutes, then you can spend 5 minutes doodling around the piano. Then, when she applies herself for those 10 minutes, make sure that you indeed allow her 5 minutes and even encourage her doodling by telling her what you like and even how to build on her good ideas.
Another suggestion for the creative student is to encourage them to “doodle with a purpose.” For instance, sometimes after a student has performed a piece, I ask them to doodle around to create an alternate ending for the piece. During that time, I write in their lesson plan book and I know their doodling will have a purpose. Of course, it is important to ask them to play their creation and comment on it before you move on.
You can also ask student to doodle or improvise using the scale they just performed for you. The Scales, Chords, and Improvs book has a great fully orchestrated accompaniment CD which you can turn on for the student while they improvise.
If a student is constantly doodling because they just don’t want to do what you ask, then I suppose an entirely problem is really occurring and some serious conversations with the student and parent need to take place. However, I find that in most cases, the students who doodle just love to create and if you give your student opportunities to doodle and acknowledge their good efforts at and results in doodling, then you may notice the student will then give YOU an opportunity to “have your say.”
To see other questions in this series:
Jingle Bells Variations
Posted by Wendy in Piano Teaching, Teaching Composition, Wendy's Piano Studio on December 9th, 2009
If you have heard the Composition for Kids lecture, you have heard about the Theme and Variations challenge that I have suggested to “encourage creativity.” This last month, I challenged the students in my studio to create their own variation of Jingle Bells. You can read the details of the project and how to do one yourself in this previous post.
My students have finally completed their variations, and I am happy to report that even the students who have never been interested in composition before now participated in this challenge! Some students took off with this idea and knew exactly what they wanted to do and how they wanted to do it. But with most students, I employed a procedure to help them get started which I have detailed under the video.
Though the video is long, I thought it important to keep everyone’s variation together for a true Theme and Variations form. In future posts, I will be commenting on how I coached these students and how I might further coach them provided we had the time. The performances aren’t perfect, but encouraging creativity that was most important. There are 10 variations to Jingle Bells and the student represent a variety of levels from beginning to late intermediate. Enjoy!
Here is how I helped some of the students develop their variation:
1. Pick a mood. You can see the list of moods here.
2. I asked them what kind of things you could do on the piano to create that mood. I would ask them questions about:
- Location of melody (fragile sounds were obviously higher, dark sounds were lower)
- Tempo
- Modality
- Harmony (Many students chose to use harmonies that were in pieces they were currently studying. This was a wonderful sign that their vocabulary of possible sounds expands with the repertoire that they study.)
- Meter (Several had really enjoyed previous waltzes they had studied, so we experimented with how to change Jingle Bells to a 3 beat meter.)
- Texture (though I didn’t name it, we talked about lonely sounds, unison sounds, chords, ostinatos, etc.)
3. After they had a list of possibilities, I sent them home to create their variation. With some students, we were able to tweek the variation in subsequent lessons. With others, we “accepted” their variation because of a lack of time to tweek.
Question #5 – Teaching Form to Composition Students
Posted by Wendy in Teaching Composition on December 2nd, 2009
You’ve heard me say before that the two areas I see student composers struggling with the most are melody and form. One teacher at the Composition for Kids lecture I gave in KC this week asked the following question:
How do you make suggestions about form?
This is such a great question since so many students struggle with form. Let me first explain ways in which students struggle with form.
- Students often have too much material (too many great ideas) and do not understand the need to prioritize and repeat key melodies and motives.
- Students often have too little material and tend to constantly repeat their material with little variation.
- Students struggle to understand how to create a contrasting theme or B section. They often don’t see how these can actually relate to each other and be derived from each other.
If a student struggles with form, you might take a minute to diagnose what the real problem is. Is it too much material? Not enough material? Too similar of material? Understanding the real problem will help you determine how to help them.
If the problem is that the student has too much material, I would suggest doing the following:
- Ask the student which of their motives or melodies is the most important. Then, spend some time talking about the importance of repeating important things.
- Analyze their current pieces and show the student how the composer repeats key motives and melodies. When the student sees how others do it, they will usually understand this concept better.
- Go through a well known piece of music (such as Fur Elise) and ask the student how many times they hear that beginning theme. This is just another way of demonstrating the need to repeat key motives.
- Encourage the student to stick to their favorite 2-3 ideas in the piece. Since ABA is a great form for student composers to use, I often ask students to just pick 2 main themes that they like and use them to form an A and a B section.
If a student has too little material (which is similar to having trouble creating a B section), spending time teaching them how to develop a B, or contrasting theme will be beneficial. Here are a few ways you can do this:
- Analyze the music the student is currently studying to see how the theme in a B section relates to the A section. You will often find that the material used from the B section of a piece is derived directly from the A section.
- Ask the student to circle small motives in their melody. These circles can be overlapping and will often contain new rhythms and seemingly new motives. When a student is forced to circle at least 4-5 small motives within their A section, they will have material for which to create their B section. I will post more on this at a later date.
- Help the student identify the “essence” of their A melody. For example, perhaps the essence is in the driving rhythm or the repeated notes, or the opening large interval. If they can identify what makes their melody interesting, they may be able to create a better contrasting theme for their B section.
I think the biggest favor you can do for a student struggling with form is to analyze music that they are already studying.
- Compare the A section to the B section and ask what is the same and what is different about them.
- Compare the introduction and closing with the main theme to see where the material comes from.
- Analyze how long (how many measures) the A section is compared to the B section.
Though this analysis will not always directy apply to a composition on which the student is working, this analysis will become a part of their “vocabulary” of composing techniques which they will use for future compositions.
To see other questions in this series:
Question #4 Students Getting Published
Posted by Wendy in Manuscript Submission, Teaching Composition on November 30th, 2009
This will be an ongoing series consisting of questions that I have received after giving the Composition for Kids lecture. The first three questions came from members of KMTA this summer. They included:
This post is about the fourth question I have received which Barbara asked after the Kansas City Composition for Kids lecture:
I have a student who writes beautiful arrangements. Can she possibly get these published?
The answer to this question is that it depends on a lot of variables. So, I’ll talk about some of these variables and how you might be able to help her with each.
Variable #1: It depends on how good they are. Every publishing company is going to have different standards of evaluating manuscripts, but here are some consistent standards that most editors would consider:
- How pianistic is it? How easy is it to play? If the pieces fit within the hands easily, that is definitely a plus. Difficult arrangements are difficult to sell, so publishers are less interested in these.
- Does the set of arrangements display an understanding of good voice leading, musicianship, and composition technique? It’s amazing what a semester of 4 part writing will do for a student, even a student composing piano music. For example, I have had students whose RH melody jumps in the most inopportune places (an example of bad voice leading). This would be something noticeable to a good editor which would make them flag the submission as immature and not publishable.
- Is there anything unique about it? There are a lot of piano arrangements out there, so its important for a student to have a bit of an established “voice” that differentiates them from another person.
- One way that you can help this student is to help her polish several pieces and then set up an appointment with a published composer or editor if you have access to one and ask them to critique the compositions. Of course, you will want to pay for this meeting and the evaluation.
Variable #2. How many arrangements are you submitting? Your chances of an editor being interested are better if you submit a collection of arrangements rather than just one or two. Publishers are not interested in whether or not you can write one piece, but whether you can write great pieces consistently. I would submit a minimum of 8-10 pieces at a time to a publisher. They need to see more than one kind of mood in the writing and consistently great compositions.
Variable #3 How old is the student? Since the publishing of music requires that the composer sign a contract, it is probably safe to assume that publishers will be much less interested in a person who is less than 18. There are some composition contests that have taken place in the past that have resulted in single sheets of composers being published (FJH has done this a few times for original solos), so I would encourage a student to look into those opportunities where students are asked to submit. Otherwise, it is wise for a student to wait until they are at least 18, get all the education they can to improve their compositions skills, get some feedback from a published composer, and then submit.
Variable #4. How professional is the student willing to be? Make sure any submissions that are sent are well polished, and are notated using a notation program for a clean printout.
Variable #5. How patient are you? Unfortunately, submitting works to a publisher can result in years of waiting (it takes 3-9 months to get a response) and rejections. If you have a student serious about composing and being published, encourage and help them do the following:
- Hone their composition skills. Use the later levels of Music By Me to assist the student in learning new ways of approaching composition and arranging.
- Contact and get feedback from a published composer. Arrange and pay for a series of composition lessons with a real composer to get their feedback on the student’s work.
- Take theory coarses to learn about proper voice leading and other principles of good writing. This is helpful even when working in piano music!
- Take a general composition class from a local university. Being around other students interested in composition and hearing their compositions will broaden their horizons to the possibilities that are out there.
- Help the student expand their own styles of playing by selecting new books of arrangements in differing styles.
- Instruct the student to research all kinds of publishing companies to see which ones even publish the kind of music that the student is writing. Read the following guidelines from just one of the publishers to which I’ve referred on this site. This document is a great guide for submitting manuscripts to a publisher.
Variable #6 Is the original tune copyright? If so, you probably wouldn’t want to send this to a publisher who does not own the copyright. This is a complicated variable which should be the subject of another post.
These are just a few of the many variables that might need to be considered for a student thinking about submitting manuscripts. These are very general guidelines, so if you have more specific questions, please don’t hesitate to ask.
Kansas City Lecture Follow up
Posted by Wendy in Piano Teaching, Teaching Composition on November 17th, 2009
Thank you to all the Kansas City teachers who came to the workshop I gave today. Here is more information and links to many of the things that I have referenced:
1. Here is Carol Klose’s inspiring quote, along with more of what she had to say about students composing.
2. Here are some articles on this site discussing teaching composition to students. There are 3 pages of articles here, so don’t forget to go to the bottom and click “older entries” to see more.
3. Read about and print handouts from the Theme and Variations Challenge on Jingle Bells I am doing with my studio this year.
4. Watch the video segment for Developing the Ear, the point that we did not have time to cover at the workshop. Print the Ear Pieces handout that I gave out in the workshop today.
5. “Be creative yourself” was one of the points I made to help inspire your students to be creative. I have been a part of several of the many online forums of piano teachers who regularly share their magnificent ideas for teaching piano. Find out more here:
- Pianoteaching.com-This is the Faber’s online piano teaching forum. Here you can post questions or just read all of the wonderfully creative answers that teachers give to others’ questions. This forum is not an email forum, so it does not come directly to your email inbox. You can simply read it online, but you must login before you can post or answer questions. Even if you don’t join, this is fabulous website to visit often (as in every day)!
- Yahoo Piano Teachers – This is a forum that you can read online or have the messages delivered to your email inbox individually or in a bulk summary.
- Pno-Ped-l – This is an email forum only. You can post questions or just read others questions and answers by subscribing. Each question and answer will come to your email inbox, so there may be days when you have a lot of emails and days when you only have a few. Within Microsoft Outlook, I designate that all of the messages from this address (the pno-ped address) go to a separate email inbox so that I am not overwhelmed and I can stay organized in my email correspondence.
6. You can read the questions that were asked by KMTA members when I first gave this lecture.
- When do you have your students first begin writing down their compositions?
- Do you have your beginning students use notation programs?
- How do you get your students to compose outside the scale of C Major?
7. Here are the books I recommended today for encouraging and teaching composition:
Scales, Patterns and Improvs published by Hal Leonard. Available with or without an accompaniment CD.
Music By Me published by FJH. Available in levels 1-5
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8. Here is a list of pieces and books that were showcased today. You can get these at your local music store, or order through Music Dispatch (Hal Leonard), Piano Pal, Prima Music, or Piano at Pepper.
Easy Hymn Solos Level 1, Elementary: HL 00311878
Easy Hymn Solos Level 2, Late Elementary: HL 00311879
Easy Hymn Solos Level 3, Intermediate: HL 00311880
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Twister, Level 3, HL 00296774
Irish Celebration, Level 1 HL 00296803
Piano Recital Showcase, Pre-staff HL 00296784
Check out Hal Leonard’s new “Closer Look” feature which allows you to see contents and pdf samples of the book.
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How Sweet the Sound, late intermediate, published by Augsburg Fortress, available here.
See sample pages here.
All is Calm, All is Bright, advanced, published by Augsburg Fortress, available here.
From now until Saturday, November 21st, you will receive a free CD for every book purchased.
Composition Idea from Bradley Sowash
Posted by Wendy in Composer Interveiws, Teaching Composition on November 9th, 2009
Bradley Sowash, an excellent jazz musician and educator, was one of the composers that corresponded with me this summer about teaching composition to kids. Bradley shared with me that he thought specific assignments with specific parameters were helpful in working with students. One of the suggestions he gave was to have students learn through analysis of another composers’ works. Here was one of his very practical ideas:
Take the Bach G minuet from the A.M. Notebook, have the student fill in the chords and then ask them construct a non-baroque sounding piece that uses the same chords, phrase lengths, cadence points, etc. It drives home the fact that there are still an infinite number of pieces to be written using basic diatonic chords and that Bach was using the same materials as the rest of us.
In this month’s Clavier Companion, Bradley has written an excellent article in the jazz and pop section on teaching students to play by ear. I especially appreciate that he dispells common myths about playing by ear, one of them being that “playing by ear is an innate gift.” Bradley shares that in his 30 year career, having been exposed to hundreds of jazz musicians, only a handful of those began with ”anything other than average musical talent.” Read his entire article in the November/December 2009 Clavier Companion for more about how to help students learn to play by ear.
Carol Klose on Students Composing
Posted by Wendy in Composer Interveiws, Teaching Composition on November 6th, 2009
When I interviewed many prominent pedagogical composers on teaching composition to children, several of them had some wonderful things to say. I thought I’d share one of the quotes from our correspondence:
I feel strongly that piano teachers should encourage their students to explore the creative side of music through composition. If time or experience do not allow it on a regular basis, one can at least invite students to compose and then listen and respond with encouraging words. I have found that composing their own music touches young people in a way that faithful repetition of other composers’ works cannot, and brings out the best in performance and ownership of musical expression.
Carol Klose (a wonderful Hal Leonard composer)
Theme and Variations Challenge
Posted by Wendy in Teaching Composition on November 3rd, 2009
In the Composition for Kids lecture, I mentioned having a “Theme and Variations Challenge” to encourage students to compose. In my studio, we are currently having a “Theme and Variations Challenge” to the Christmas tune, Jingle Bells. Last week in our group lesson, I introduced students to the idea of a T&V through the Mozart’s Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman (Twinkle Twinkle Little Star) piece. I asked all of the students to come up with a variation to the Jingle Bells tune and promised them I would record each variation and post it on YouTube for them to share with friends and family.
My students were very excited about this, and I have been encouraged by how many students are participating (even ones that aren’t normally interested in composing). To make the assignment more straightforward, I am giving them specific assignments each week:
Week 1
1. Practice this Jingle Bells RH or Jingle Bells RH_LH and play it for me at your lesson.
2. On this Theme and Variations Challenge Worksheet, circle 2 moods that you are interested in using for your variation.
Week 2
1. At the lesson, I will listen to their Jingle Bells melody.
2. At the lesson, we will brainstorm about the moods they chose. For example, if a student chooses the mood “happy,” we would brainstorm about how we could make happy sounds on the piano. We explore things like: dynamics, register, tempo, modality, motives (grace notes are great for happy sounds!), etc.
3. The student will be assigned to go home and make a variation using our ideas.
Week 3
1. At the lesson, I will listen to their variation and ask them if they are satisfied with it or if there is is anything else they want to do with it. I might go ahead and make a few suggestions even if they say they are satisfied.
2. We will explore mood #2 that they have picked and repeat the assignment.
Subsequent Weeks
1. We will record their favorite variation. I have told them that their variation must be polished before I will post it on YouTube.
2. After everyone has performed and recorded their variation, I will assemble the videos into a longer streaming video and post it on YouTube and my site.
This is a fun way to talk about composing and the fact that we use a Christmas tune is extra motivating. If you choose to do something like this in your studio, let me know! I’d love to hear about it.
Your Chance to Interview Kevin Costley
Posted by Wendy in Composer Interveiws, Piano Teaching, Teaching Composition on September 21st, 2009
If you are a student composer 0r a teacher of piano students, you will want to take advantage of this great opportunity to submit interview questions to a living composer!
Kevin Costley, a wonderful composer published by FJH, has graciously agreed to participate in an interview for this blog. Students can submit a question for Kevin by simply leaving the question as a comment to this post. Teachers are welcome to submit their students’ questions for them. I will choose the best 5-10 questions, submit them to Kevin and he will write a response. This is a great opportunity to learn how a real composer composes!
Some of the subjects you might want to ask about might include:
- How he comes up with ideas
- How he composes his themes, how he comes up with material for his B sections
- What forms he likes to use
- How he comes up with titles
- How often he composes
Please tell your students to think of a question for Kevin and submit it in the next 2 weeks. Please encourage other teachers and their students to participate! The deadline for submitting a question is October 6th (2 weeks).
If you are not familiar with his music, Kevin has many solos and collections of piano pieces at all levels. His newest book, Summer Portraits, is published by FJH music and is a collection of intermediate piano solos. In the next week, I will be posting about some of my favorite pieces by Kevin. Kevin will also be sharing about his favorite pieces and many more exciting things! Stay tuned…
Don’t forget to leave your interview question as a comment!
Tools for Composing: Moving Scales Out of the 18th Century
Posted by Wendy in Teaching Composition on September 19th, 2009
I’ve been fascinated by a new blog by Elissa Milne lately. One of her most recent posts, Scales as a Form of Propoganda, Elissa asks what musical value comes from having our students learn scales. Of course, we often cite the technical value, but what is the real musical value of a scale? This question caught my eye since the focus of my piano studio this year is to play musically, not just accurately.
Elissa suggests:
Scales are unique in teaching us how to hear. Scales teach us how to hear in pitch patterns, how to anticipate melodic contour, how to predict harmonic outcomes. Knowing the pattern of a scale starting on any one of the 12 semitones in an octave enables a pianist to move between keys almost effortlessly, able to transpose at sight or by ear. An understanding of scale patterns underlies the ability to harmonise a lead sheet, to play from a chord chart or to sight read an accompaniment.
Marcia Vahl, a colleague of mine has been chatting with me recently about how to encourage musicality in students. She made the point that “you can’t play artistically, musically, or beautifully unless you listen carefully.” Hearing and listening is integral in playing artistically and with nuance. This can be done in music and in the performance of scales as well as Elissa suggests.
So, I come back to Elissa’s point which dovetails into my passion for teaching composition to students. Elissa asks why we don’t teach also the scales that students are actually hearing in pop music, television show, and 20th and 21st century “classical” music. We, as teachers are stuck in Classical period (1750-1800) scales (Major, and Natural, Harmonic, and Melodic Minor) and don’t even expose our students to the Mixolydian mode, Lydian mode, Dorian mode, which are used extensively in music today (see her article for examples of TV shows using these modes).
As responsible teachers in the 21st century, shouldn’t we be teaching these scales in addition to the 18th century ones? Shouldn’t we be encouraging our students to improvise using these scales? Shouldn’t scales be more than just technical exercises designed to strengthen the fingers and promote agility? Can’t we teach our students to listen to their scales as predictors of melody and music themselves?
Please read Elissa’s Teaching Scales as Propoganda article. It’s great food for thought and has encouraged me that teaching scales as a method of “listening” is another important tool in teaching composition to my students. And by the way, though her blog doesn’t mention this, Elissa is the composer of the series Little Peppers published by Faber Music. I’ve picked this up before, but now I’ll investigate them in earnest!
