Learn music theory in an
innovative way that uses your whole self: mind, soul, and body! tinyurl.com/b2b3l94
Elevator Pitch:
Are you tired of endless rote exercises
to memorize things you don't even understand? Good news – there's
hope! Now you can learn music theory in a more comprehensive and
creative way then you ever thought possible. Begin with a playful
introduction to music, through listening, coloring, and dancing.
Rhythms can be learned using physical items you can manipulate,
intervals can be learned by creating your own song using different
intervals, learn the significance of analyzing chords and how this
can effect your music, sympathize with your audience by creating a
story to share within your music, and learn to play with your music
through improvisation.
White Paper:
Here in the music education world, we
run into a couple of major problems. First, there's the teachers
who, for whatever reason, don't teach music theory to their students.
Maybe they don't understand it themselves, or maybe they're tired of
their students not making any progress in it. These teachers produce
students that are incapable of thinking about their music and how to
create their own. The result? A generation of musically-stunted
individuals, with perhaps less music being written than previously in
history. The other problem are the teachers that try to teach music
theory, but they do it in such a way that emphasizes rote
memorization rather than understanding, creating musicians who fail
to see the magic and inter-connectivity of music theory. What's
needed is an entirely new curriculum for music theory, one
emphasizing creativity and connections.
My curriculum begins with a playful
introduction to the joys and language of music. Students are given
blank paper and coloring utensils, and asked to color what they think
of when they hear music. This is a simple activity that can be used
with any student, of any age or ability, but it helps get them
thinking about music. Does it sound happy or sad? Angry or wistful?
Is it fast or slow? Complex or simple? These are all questions
that can be answered without them having to be asked. After we have
colored to a few pieces, we then begin dancing to the music. This
helps us think using our bodies, which is called embodied thinking.
It gets us thinking about tempo, rhythms, and style.
Next, students are introduced to
rhythm in a completely new way. Rather than being represented with
marks on a paper that are either completely, or mostly, meaningless
to students, rhythms will be represented with colored strips of
paper. By representing rhythms physically with pieces of paper, the
time each note takes is translated into physical space each note
takes up. This provides a different way for my students to experience
rhythms, in a way that enables deeper understanding. Through
manipulating the rhythms, students can directly experience that each
dotted quarter note gets as much time as three eighth notes, and that
having a dotted quarter note and an eighth note is a different rhythm
than having two quarter notes, though they take up the same total
amount of time.
After my students have gained some
more proficiency with their instruments and music, it will be time to
introduce intervals. Intervals are basically very simple, but they
require practice. Rather than beating the poor intervals to death, I
would like to have my students study one interval at a time, and
start by finding those intervals in their music. Next, they will get
to compose their own piece, using mostly that interval. Other
intervals will be present, but it should keep coming back to their
target interval. To really drive home the point, in addition to
composing a melody, they will compose a harmony that is mostly their
target interval lower than the melody. It would really help them get
to know each interval, how it sounds (some really don't sound
great!), and it would be great practice harmonizing with a melody.
When it is time for students to start
analyzing chords, rather than simply analyzing the chords, they will
use what they find to help inform their own playing. They will try
emphasizing the root of the chords, then the third, then the fifth,
and experience how this effects their music. Students also in the
studio orchestra will have the opportunity to analyze one of their
orchestra pieces, and use what they find to interpret the piece in a
different way, indicating to the other members of the orchestra which
parts should be emphasized when.
When working on a piece, students will
also use their bodies to help learn it, by dancing (or at least
moving) with the music. They will be able to use their entire bodies
to help them learn and understand the rhythm, style, and feeling of
the piece. They will then video record themselves, and watch the
recording. Video recording my playing always makes me look at it
from a different perspective. When I am playing, I have an internal
vision of what I think I look and sound like. By recording my
playing, I am able to experience what the audience actually
experiences, rather than just what I think they will. I see all of my
awkward movements and facial expressions, then can work to make them
better. It generally takes several tries to get a satisfactory
recording, and both movements and facial expressions need to be
modified. In the end, students are able to finish with a much more
meaningful performance that conveys a lot more to their audience.
Students will also find photos or
videos that represent what they want to portray to their audience
while playing their piece, in order to emphasize the importance of
going beyond the notes. I like to tell my students that the notes,
rhythms, and bowings, while important, are the boring parts of music.
It really gets exciting and fun when you can actually use your
instrument to communicate with your audience, which is what I believe
the whole point of music is. Music truly is the universal language.
So, to that end, I want students to explicitly display what they are
trying to communicate, by finding pictures that are similar to what
they are thinking and feeling while playing.
Finding these photos requires students
to explicitly define what they are thinking and feeling. Usually,
when playing a piece, I have a vague idea of what is going on,
emotionally. But just like trying to talk or write with only a vague
idea of what you are saying, playing with only a vague idea is not
nearly as productive as it could be. So in finding photos, students
will be forced to really know what they are trying to tell their
audience. Sort of like writing an outline before you start writing an
essay.
Next, students will begin
incorporating music history, as well as world history. Oftentimes,
what is going on in the world around the composer has a large impact
on what sort of music they write. Learning about a composer's life
and motivations can help bring perspective to the process of learning
a piece. With all of the complexities to be found in advanced music,
it is all too easy to get lost in all of the little details and
forget to take a step back, but this reminds us of the importance of
doing just that. Students can use a variety of methods to explore
their composer's life and world events, from timelines to pictures to
books or articles to movies. Any of these media will allow them to
identify key events that may play a part in their piece.
Finally, throughout a student's
musical education, they will be encouraged to explore what they are
learning through improvisation. Improvisation occurs when a student
makes up their own song on the spot, so it is different from
composition in that it is not planned. As students learn new notes,
rhythms, dynamics, bowings, or keys, they will be encouraged to play
with these new ideas, and connect them with old ideas, through
improvisation. This final step is vitally important to a full and
complete musical education. Just like you can't argue that you know
a language unless you can hold a conversation in it, you can't argue
that you know a musical idea until you can use it in improvisation.
Students can develop any idea through improvisation, which has the
added benefit of being a safe and risk free activity. If they hated
what they played, there's nothing there to remind them of their
perceived failure. If they loved it, then they know what sort of
things they really like in their improv and can use it again.
Through creative activities designed
to foster students' creativity and encourage connections between
ideas, students can once again receive a meaningful education in
music theory. From a basic music listening exercise that even
toddlers can participate in, through a new perception of rhythms,
using intervals in compositions, using chord analysis to influence
their playing, playing pieces not just with their instruments but
also using their bodies, empathizing with their piece and audience by
finding photographs and videos that represent what they are thinking
of while playing a piece, incorporating world history into their
interpretation of a piece, and using improvisation to play with and
develop ideas that they are learning, students will be asked to form
connections and think about their music in new and meaningful ways.
