By Alyssa Cowell Today’s blog is meant as an introduction to a rather clever author with a complete lack of reverence for the subject of music history. If you’ve ever considered reading about the great composers but fear you don’t have the attention span for Grout’s History of Western Music (if the amount of times I fell asleep while reading this venerated tome in college is...
Read MoreWe appreciate your continued use of Studio Helper services, and want to assure you that your satisfaction is our highest priority. Recently, Yahoo.com implemented a policy change on their email servers that immediately affects not only all Yahoo email users, but also third party email servers such as Studio Helper. Yahoo has changed a single setting on their email servers that prevents SH and similar list servers from sending an...
Read MoreBy Julia Kossuth As a young teacher, and thus lacking years of consistent teaching in one place, I've been able to consider what works and what doesn't work to motivate my students. This has also been largely influenced by my own piano teacher through high school, who I maintain contact with to this day. I think the key to student success is lots of performance opportunities. At...
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Ok- I am a BIG fan of Nancy and Randall Faber’s piano method books already, so when I saw they came up with a series for kiddies under 6, I was so excited. I’ve had students in this age group for a few years, and I have always used LITTLE MOZARTS by Alfred’s. It was OK. But just OK. That is a tough age group to teach if you don’t have the right equipment, and I’m pretty stoked that I finally do.
The Faber’s have taken their talent for composition and have created a series that includes a CD of top-quality productions of all the songs in the book. It sounds like a good Children’s music CD you would buy anywhere, but it just so happens to be a learning supplement. This is brilliant. We all know children learn music by singing and listening, so of course it makes sense to make a great CD of music to help them learn. (Why didn’t I think of this??) And the songs are good. Witty and cute, and true to the Faber’s nature, catchy. Unlike some books, the songs are actually enjoyable to play and hear. By playing along with the recordings, the young students become stronger at rhythm and sight reading. I have been using these books with 2 students now, and I am in LOVE.
The lesson book also comes with a writing book. They work in sync with each other, and I find it best to teach the lesson first, then immediately do the writing assignment. It really helps the kids get the concepts down. I can usually get through 2-3 lessons in one 45 minute class.
Because of these books, I no longer dread teaching pre-school age lessons. I totally recommend them.
If you want to see a video of someone playing along to the CD, go here.
By Julia Kossuth As our end of the year recital approaches, a mere two and a half weeks away, it is my goal to maximize the time I have with each student so they are truly prepared for their performances. I've found that with only two recitals a year (Christmas and May) it can be difficult for students to maintain hard work and preparation, as there...
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