I teach many younger students and decided to find some fun games to play in lessons to teach various music skills. (older students might enjoy these as well.) I set out on a search for games that you can make and games that you can play online. Here are a few of my finds. If you have one that you play in lessons send it to me in the comments section along with the instructions for making/playing the game.

Repeat the Melody- This is a sort of simon says for piano. The computer plays a short melody. You repeat it. Each time you correctly play back the melody it plays another one.

Name the note- I play a note on the piano and the student has to name it. A favorite variation of this game is Stump the Teacher. They sit at the piano and I turn my back and try to guess the note name that they are playing. I don’t have perfect pitch so I am only right some of the time, but they get a kick out of it. They still have to know the note name to tell me if I am right or not.

Hangman with music- You or the student spells a word with music notes. If you need help thinking of words here is a list of words I found using morewords.com You can add letters and vowels that aren’t musical notes by writing them in between the blanks for the notes you have written. Ex. __ __ __ M

I found this lesson plan on lessonplanspage.com. (As a side note, there were a lot of musical lesson plans on this site that could be useful to private lesson teachers.) This is for sight reading and basic composition. Basically the student writes a simple melody and rhythm using sticks and M & Ms. (or any other small round candy. If they can sing what they have written they get to eat (or keep) the candy. To read the entire lesson plan click here.

Another game I found on lessonplanspage.com is called Rhythm Face Off. One person writes and one person sings. (You can do this game with 2 or more people.) The person who writes has 15-20 seconds to write a rhythm. The person who sings has the same amount of time that the writer took to sing the rhythm. If the singer gets it wrong, the writer has a chance to sing it and get the point. If they can’t sing what they wrote, they loose a point. View the lesson plan here.

This next one looks like it would be a lot of fun if you had a large group to play it. It is called rhythm baseball. Set up 4 chairs (or bases) and clap or use sticks to play rhythms for each “batter”. If they get it right, they get a hit and go to first base, if they get it wrong, they get an out. After 3 outs the next team gets a turn. Check out the lesson plan here.

If you have a couple of students (great for one students bring a friend to lessons) you can get out a dry erase board and play this game. The teacher sings a pitch pattern. The students then have to write dashes to illustrate the pattern. Ex. If the teacher sings one low one middle and one high it would look like this ___
___
___
You can increase the number of notes sung or played to increase the level of difficulty.
A recent game I came up with was major minor triad. I play a triad on the piano and the student has to answer by singing La Ti Do for Minor Triad or Do Re Mi for Major Triad. I thought this would be tricky, the first person I tried it out on caught on pretty quickly.

I also spotted a subscription service by Fun Music Company of musical games that you can download and print. They have many to choose from. The service is $69.00 per year.

There are tons of games out there. I spotted these in just a few minutes time. I am really excited to go out and play them with my students. If you have one that is your favorite, I hope you will share it with the rest of us.

During the school year. I host 3 recitals. Most of my students are kids, and I have about 6 adult students. I understandably find that the adults are uncomfortable performing in these recitals. I came across an idea a few years ago online for getting some performance experience for adults. The idea was to create a casual music night at your house (or someone else’s.) The idea is to create a casual, non-judgmental get together where each adult gets to perform one song for the group. I was thinking about also organizing a group jam session that everyone would be able to participate in. I’ve only mentioned this to one of my adult students, and she’s really excited (and relieved about not performing in the kiddie recital.) Of course there will be drinks and food, and it will be just like a party. Students can bring their spouses, and we would all have a good time. I would also play a song on my new instrument: The mandolin. Since I’m new (and I’m not very good), it would be a good opurtunity to see the teacher learning something new.

Do you have any creative ideas for including adults in the performance part of their education? If so, what do you do? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated by all of the teachers here at Music Teacher’s Helper.

As summer approaches, I know my stable teaching schedule during the school year will turn topsy-turvy in a month. With vacations, football practices, and summer musicals, students are busier than ever. This summer I am trying a few new ideas to make summer lessons productive for students and worth a place in their crazy schedules.

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In my last article, I talked about the misgivings that I had about adding pop music to private lessons. Instrumental and Vocal teachers alike deal with adding “popular” music to lessons on a pretty regular basis. The student that only likes to play/sing Disney songs, the student with an upcoming talent show, the student that dreams of being on American Idol. I’ve seen all of these things and more. They hear these songs on a daily basis and they love them. They sing them all the time. You might as well capitalize on all of that passion and put it to some good uses. Here are a few ideas.

1. Work on style. Listen to a recording of the song you are learning and a contrasting song (maybe a classical piece that you are working on) discuss the things that the artist did on the popular song that are different than the classical song. You could also do the same thing with another version of the song that you are working on. If you are teaching a singer, you can talk about the ways that those sounds could have been created in a recording studio and how duplicating those things without the technology can be harmful to your voice. If you are teaching an instrumentalist, try to find ways to recreate some of the vocal sounds with the instrument.
2. Talk about swing style. Most pop pieces use some form of swing style. Explain how to swing a piece. Then have the student play a part of the song exactly as written and then have them play it swung. I find that it helps to snap my fingers in time with the music to emphasize the swing feel.

3. Talk about how to change the classical style to keep good technique but create the correct sound for the style (ex. the twang for country or bending pitches.)

4. Work on learning syncopated rhythms. Talk about syncopation and how it sounds and then learn some rhythm patterns with syncopation. Take a section out of a piece of popular music that has those patterns in it and learn it. This is useful if a piece that a student really loves is not within their grasp musically. They still get to learn a little bit of it. It’ll encourage them to work harder so that they can learn more of it.

5. Because popular music is usually heard first and then learned and played (as opposed to most classical music which is learned first and then played) it is a good thing to use to work on ear training. Play a simple piece and ask the student to try to recreate what they hear. (I usually use something like Lean on Me because of the scale motion in the beginning.) Then pull out the sheet music and see how close they were able to get. (Most of it can be downloaded and printed at home using either Music Notes or Sheet Music Plus if you have an internet connection.
Pop music is not going to go away any time soon. It is always going to be something that your students will have an interest in. Use their energy and excitement to help them improve in other areas and it is a win win for both of you. Plus it’ll keep you up to date on what is THE hit song of the moment. HINT its not “Everything I Do” which was popular when I was a freshman in High School.

I have a lot of students with the desire to create their own music and songs. Over the years, I have been able to get things going, in the songwriting department, by teaching chord studies and then eventually encouraging students to piece the chords together in their own unique ways. I like to start with the C Major scale. After learning the Major scale and the chord progressions that follow (The I, IV, and V7 chords), it’s time to find a song with only the C, F, and G chords (there are so many out there). I first show them how to read the chords in a fake book, and then I give them a little pattern to follow: either the root note in the left hand bass line and the right hand playing the block chords in 4 beats, or maybe just some simple arpeggios.

They are usually thrilled with the beautiful music that they are making without actually reading music. After they have learned how to put 3 chords together, I usually encourage students to try piecing the 3 chords together in a song that they make up. They can either write words to it, or make it an instrumental. If it’s an instrumental, the teacher can always make up a duet part. That’s a good way to show improvisation in action.

Here are some good songs to begin chord studies with:

“Love Me Do” (C, G, D7)
“Iris” (Em, C, G, D)
“Surfin’ USA” (A7, D, G)
“Twist and Shout” (D, G, A7)

It’s the season for seasonal allergies, along with viral infections and subsequent hoarseness and voice loss - never welcome guests for singers. I am not a medical professional, but as a regular sufferer of allergies and other bronchial complaints I have learned a few tricks of the trade to alleviate symptoms.

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When my husband suggested that I add pop music to the music that my students sing, I was a bit apprehensive. After all, I am a classically trained singer and I teach my students to sing largely classical and musical theater songs because I have felt that a good foundation is built on teaching the basics through classical song. My young students (who are 9 through high school age) need to have the skills to be able to go on and sing in productions at school, in choirs and solos. His thought was that it would meet some of their needs and desires and make private lessons more valuable to them (and thus less likely to be abandoned.) I have worked with adult clients on several styles of music as well as classical, so I was open to the idea. However, I did have a few concerns.

1. I needed to find ways to keep the student learning musical and performing skills.

2. I needed to make sure that the student would continue to sing/play with good technique even though it was a pop song.

3. I didn’t want their entire “diet” to become pop music.

For the past few weeks, I have been incorporating pop music into my lessons. Here is what I found. Adding pop music into lessons does a quite a bit to keep the students interest. Students are more likely to practice a popular song that they have chosen because they like it. I make my students sing pop music from sheet music. This forces them to look at the song in sheet music form and creates some really interesting discussions about the differences between whats on the page and what they hear on the recording. It also helps them to learn to read more difficult rhythms. Some pop songs are remakes of older songs or have multiple recordings made of them. It is fun to listen to older recordings to hear the differences in the song and how different performers have made the song their own.

To be continued.

Nervousness in performance isn’t a bad thing; it’s a way of collecting your energy, like a loaded spring. But anxiety, especially to the point of what some call stagefright, is clearly detrimental.

Below are some of the key suggestions of experts who deal with stagefright anxiety. How do you think teachers can encourage the enjoyment of performing, so that this terrible anxiety doesn’t have a chance to develop? I’ve made my own comments on the experts’ suggestions; please add your comments, too!

1. Practice, be prepared. Feeling prepared is clearly an important way to feel comfortable, and to direct energy into producing good music rather than into fearing mistakes or criticism. And yet there are many angles to practicing. If someone practices so as to play a piece perfectly every time, what happens if there’s a distraction in the performance or an unexpected mistake? Many experts recommend not only practicing the music, but practicing performing, to get a chance to adjust to one’s own thoughts and build confidence while playing for various people. We can give students opportunities to perform in enjoyable surroundings, as discussed in my earlier post. We can also give students confidence that they are prepared even if in small sections at a time. We can help them start small and successfully, with easier pieces done well (though this has to be balanced with giving them music that inspires and challenges them).

2. Relax. Some experts recommend meditation, stretching, breathing. I remember a teacher of mine listening to me play a difficult passage and (more…)

It’s spring, and what better way to connect with the budding weather than to sing about it! Here is a listing of easy, intermediate and advanced art songs for soprano, mezzo, tenor and bass/ baritone all about spring.
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Encouraging the enjoyment of performance gives students of every level a lifetime of rewarding musical experiences, not only in their own playing, but also in a better appreciation of performances by others.  This may seem obvious, but it’s sometimes hard to keep in mind when the realities of learning music intervene.

For example, if learning music becomes too much about whether the student can avoid mistakes, or if it becomes a test of whether the student can follow through on a commitment, or is built around whether they can win a competition or succeed at an audition, performance isn’t so enjoyable even if the student succeeds in all these tests.

In this post, I’ll take a look at the benefits of mixing performance with participation.  (more…)