Teaching Composition (Book Review)

I am excited to implement ideas on composition that I found in Carol Klose's book "Piano Teacher's Guide to Creative Composition."  Her book is designed for elementary students, but includes a wealth of ideas for the advancing composer.  I think I will be able to use it for years to come.  She also lays out a simple outline for helping a student begin and complete their work.  She suggests five weeks worth of lessons that should only take 5-10 minutes to introduce and assign which lead the student through finding inspiration, mapping out their piece, choosing the form, adding details, and refining the composition.  I have one young student in particular who loves to "doodle" at the keyboard, so I am hoping this will give him some way to channel his energy and focus him on achieving a final product.  We have a Ribbon Festival recital in March which features a composition category, of which winners will be selected for the state Oregon Music Teachers Assoc. recital and even published in a book of winners.  So this also provides motivation to compose a complete work.  I am also looking forward to everything I will learn through the whole process!

Toning Up

One of the biggest challenges to me right now is teaching and demonstrating to the student how to produce a rich tone from their playing.  Rhythm is improving, note reading is getting there, fingering isn't too bad.  But they still play with low and locked wrists, no matter how many times we lift with the helium balloon.  I tried today to explain how the sound was actually made in the piano.  I was a bit surprised that one of my teenage students had no idea how the sound was produced.  Maybe it seemed a bit like typing on a keyboard, you strike an "a" and suddenly an "a" appears.  So I explained the best I could how the key moves hammers which strike actual strings.  The way the string is hit produces the kind of sound - whether short and quiet or loud and full.  Then I reminded her that hitting the notes is more than just pushing the correct key.  We need to let the weight of our arm help us get that louder, richer tone to bring out the melody with, and that raising and rotating our wrists is the key to getting the energy where it needs to be.  I also encouraged her not to be shy, to exaggerate the loudness, let it really stand out and contrast with quieter parts.  [Interesting to note, it's usually the opposite problem with many boys, who tend to unbearably pound out the sound!]  She has several duets she's working on right now, and I think she did bring out her part better today.  Hopefully with practice she'll tone up and develop a rich, lovely sound!