Recently, I was directing a musical theater production. As I coached one of the leads in her song, she became excited over what I was having her do with it. Before we started the session, she knew the lyrics and the pitches, and was close on most of the rhythms. But that was it. What … Continue reading Let’s Not Make It Anything Else But Love
Edwin Gordon
Rethinking How We Teach Chorus
Chorus in many ways is the perfect means for providig music making opportunities to non-musicians. After all, except in rare cases, we all have voices and we all can use those voices to sing. Actual inability to sing in tune is extremely rare, and most people in a safe environment free from judgement and negative … Continue reading Rethinking How We Teach Chorus
What Is Creativity and How Do Music Educators Develop It?
When asked to advocate for music education, one of the frequently given pieces of evidence is that music education develops creativity or creative thinking. While this sounds reasonable, at times it can be difficult to find much creative activity in the things that students are asked to do in both general music and music performance … Continue reading What Is Creativity and How Do Music Educators Develop It?
Eclectic Application of Major Music Education Methods
Elsewhere in this blog I have written about the strengths and weaknesses of Kodaly, Orff, and Gordon approaches to music education. Those articles assumed that it is beneficial to grab strengths from each approach, mixing and matching them into a teaching method that is better than strictly adhering to any one of them. In this … Continue reading Eclectic Application of Major Music Education Methods
Sound Before Sight Is About More Than Teaching Songs
"Sound before sight" is a popular way of saying that music is most effectively taught first aurally, and then by associating what has been learned aurally with visual representations, such as standard music notation. Music Learning Theory and the numerous resources that follow it guide teachers in developing musical literacy according to these principles. Generally, … Continue reading Sound Before Sight Is About More Than Teaching Songs
Musical Fractions That Make Sense
The nomenclature for durations we have (except for those who use the quaver family of names) really is not very useful. Whole note, half note, quarter note, eighth note, and sixteenth note are the terms by which teachers, both of music and of other subjects, connect music to fraction arithmetic. As far as it goes, … Continue reading Musical Fractions That Make Sense
The Difference Between Visual Meter and Aural Meter in Music
Of all the structures and elements of music, meter is arguably one the most confusing. This is due at least in part to the fact that unlike rhythm and pitch, and to a lesser extent unlike dynamics and tempo, our Western system of music notation is often vague or imprecise when it comes to representing … Continue reading The Difference Between Visual Meter and Aural Meter in Music
The Truth About Meter in Music
I don't think many of my students think about meter when they are listening to music. They are aware of a melody, of the tempo, of the beat and rhythms, but they are not so aware of the meter, at least not consciously. I've noticed that meter is not so much something that must be … Continue reading The Truth About Meter in Music
The Amazing Human Musical Mind, Part 3
There are practical implications to just the impressive array of musical thinking even the youngest children are capable of. Because young brains are so musical, they must be given every opportunity possible to experience music and to grow in musicality. Edwin Gordon, a pre-eminent authority on music psychology and early childhood music, has emphatically written … Continue reading The Amazing Human Musical Mind, Part 3
The Amazing Human Musical Mind, Part 2
Since Friday, I have been sharing a presentation I gave at two conferences of the Association of Christian Schools International (ACSI). In this session, I gave an overview of what the very youngest human minds can do musically, and how early childhood educators who are not music teachers can still include music in their programs. Today I … Continue reading The Amazing Human Musical Mind, Part 2
mister a music place 
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