Music Teachers Blog

“… When samurai warriors train to perfect a deadly technique with the sword, they come to understand the fleetingness of life. This is why master samurai speak of wielding a “life-giving sword…

Understand and respect the depth of your instrument’s power. The guitar has the capacity to save lives; it has given many a desperate person reason to go on. Use it’s power wisely.”

- Philip Toshio Sudo, “Zen Guitar”

We used to have a local monthly student open mic at a music store I teach at. Students were encouraged to form bands and perform in front of their peers and teachers. The open mic grew, and due to the event’s popularity, the students were limited to two or three songs.

As my students’ bands stayed together and continued practicing, their set lists grew. Several bands eventually had set lists that were 45 minutes or more. These bands needed to be challenged. I started taking a few select bands to a restaurant in Northern Virginia to play at open mic events, and mix with adults. This got me thinking about the kids playing shows in better venues. With those experiences in mind, I decided to create a “Kids Rock” program, a program to get youngsters gigging in better venues.

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Dr. Foley, I forgot my notebook again. Can you just email the lesson notes to me so I can read them on my phone when I practice?

Often students arrive without their notebook, still expecting lesson notes to magically appear. If you’re able to use a laptop with an internet connection, it’s a snap to use Music Teacher’s Helper to type lesson notes that can be sent to the student and/or parent the minute they leave.  It’s relatively easy to wire your home studio with a reliable internet connection. However, many institutional and corporate music teachers work in studios without the benefits of ethernet or wifi connections. What to do? (more…)

February is Black History Month. This is an excellent oppurtunity to teach your students some history of American Music. Our own American music style goes back to the days of slavery when Africans carried over their own folk music and merged it with the European classical and folk music that was brought here by the white folks. This is an awesome opportunity to teach a little history in your lessons.

I grew up in the southern part of the US, and Black History Month was always a very important time in our schools. Because of this, I grew up singing and playing many important songs from the pre-civil war era as well as the jazz age. I’ve compiled a list of songs you might want to consider teaching your kids this month, in honor of this special time: (more…)

As I ponder my blog entry today, I’m in the process of scheduling new monthly jam sessions for my students!

In the past, as a summer workshop, Keyboard Jam proved to be very successful in stretching the students abilities, as well as giving them experience and enthusiasm for playing with other musicians! Have you read Nate Shaw’s two most recent articles on this very blog site? (If not, I hope that you will! I have added the links at the bottom of this article!)  Nate has some great ideas that I am definitely going to implement into my studio jam sessions, private lessons and recitals!

All of my students will be invited (pianists, singer, other instrumentalists). As the jam sessions become a huge hit, I will use them as an incentive, and extend invitation first to top practicers, best scales for the month, etc. All of the students will have fun creating music together, and learning how musicians work and play together. It works best to have separate sessions if you have a  large variance in ages and level of students. We will use the grand piano, a few keyboards, hand drums, shakers, my electric bass, and any other instruments that show up with the students.  There are so many different directions a class like this can take, but here’s a session plan that I have found to work extremely well!  (more…)

It’s an exciting time at Music Teacher’s Helper. We hope your year is off to a good start and that your studio is running well.

We’re working hard right now to bring you some awesome improvements to Music Teacher’s Helper, including a brand new graphics design, and several features that we know you’ll love. The new design will look more more up to date than our current site, and will also make the program easier to use, especially for those just starting out.

We’re also giving you a brand new calendar, with a week and day view that actually show the duration of tevents visually (like Google calendar or Outlook), along with the ability to e-mail all students on a given day. These improvements and much more aren’t quite ready yet, but we’re getting closer and will keep you posted to let you know when they’re done.

Here are the recent changes (more…)

Prepare Your Students For A Different Kind Of Recital

Working on 'groove' with my students

Last month I discussed a different kind of recital (I call it a gig) I have implemented for my students. It takes place at a jazz club. Uses professional musicians to back the students, young and old. And is very casual for both family and students. See the previous entry for more info on that. This month I wanted to discuss how I prepare my students for this type of show.

I teach from the very beginning a reverence for the groove. Whether it’s a classical piece or a blues or even just the simplest beginning 4 measure ‘song.,’ I approach all music with the idea that rhythm and pulse…ie. Groove..is essential. Way before I discuss any musical terms, note names, technique, etc. my students are playing rhythm games. My belief is that all music flows at its base level from a pulse and students need to be aware of this from the beginning. So, the gig creates a real opportunity for them to share that groove with other musicians. But in order for them to feel ready to play with other live musicians, I need to simulate the experience in the studio.

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One of my favourite features of Music Teacher’s Helper is the Lesson Notes. I imagine that teachers use this feature in a variety of ways. Perhaps you use the notes as a practice reminder for your students, as a way of communicating with their parents, or as a reminder for yourself. I use them in all three ways.

When I first started using Music Teacher’s Helper, I was surprised at the number of parents who commented on how much they valued the weekly feedback (despite the fact that I had been sending lesson notes home in a notebook for years prior!). I suppose the ease and immediacy of an email is decidedly better than relying on the parent to find & read the student’s notebook on a weekly basis. (more…)

I am odd amongst my local voice teachers in that I DO accept extremely young voice students for private lessons.  My studio policy is a minimum of 10-years old and MUST be self-motivated, but I will take (and currently have in my studio) a highly-focused 9-year old.  The first question I ask a parent (usually a mother) who says that she wants her young child to have voice lessons is “Do THEY want the lessons?”

Even so, the way that I teach these students is different from the way I teach my “older” students (14-years old & up), largely because of how their brain functions.  The analytical skills and the ability to dissociate yourself from your sound are not present in the pre-pubescent brain.  My teaching style is generally VERY technically based.  I strongly believe that my students need to know exactly why we’re doing certain exercises: how the exercise is affecting the voice, what physical action is occurring in the larynx, what the result “should” be. (more…)

I hope you enjoy this series of fictional scenarios about teaching music, and find it at times thought-provoking, familiar, and even humorous.  We look forward to reading comments by yourself and other teachers at the end, about “what would you do?”

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To follow this story, you should first read Janina’s story (#9), if you haven’t already.  Below are a few scenarios that might result from what happened in that story.  Read them and tell us what you think you might do in these situations!

…OK, so you let Janina participate in the recital.  Her sudden keen interest and responsiveness and determination to learn the tune in the lesson convinced you to give her some more rope and see what she can do.

You explained verbally and by email to her and her mother how the recital works.  You do not have a lot of time between students to explain verbally, and you never know how carefully people read emails.  In this case, you explain that the recital will involves mostly beginners of varying levels, all playing together, rather than by themselves.  They will play a number of tunes all in a medley, one after the other, with students joining in on the tunes they know, and listening to others continuing with the ones they don’t.  The final tunes in the medley are the most basic tunes so that everyone can end up playing together.  Janina’s new tune comes last.

Before the actual performance, (more…)

I really enjoy having the option to send out lesson notes after a lesson through the Music Teacher’s Helper website. I find this is a great way to recap a lesson, reiterate the main theme of that lesson, and to remind me of what occurred in the student’s previous lesson, as the notes appear on my daily summary. As I teach solidly with very few breaks in between lessons, I keep a notebook on my piano that I jot notes into for lesson notes. When I sit down at my computer (sometimes that evening, and often times the next morning) I have a reference to go to on what happened at a student’s lesson and what comments I would like them to take away from that lesson.

When creating lesson notes each week, I always try to touch on something positive that happened in the lesson. Sometimes that may be as small as “Nice job being on time three weeks in a row!” or as large as “Great improvement! You are on to a new level!” I also have my students keep a “Voice Notebook” that I write in, as well as they write in. (more…)