So, have you ever wished you could listen in on what happens in a typical Music for Young Children™ class? My classes have ended for the year, but I could tell you that, in my MYC classes, we sing songs, play rhythm ensembles, play keyboard solos and ensembles, play theory games, play scales (harmonized, in [...] Read more »
Do you have a practical exam coming up soon? Here are some tips to help things go smoothly: 1. Complete your Examination Program Form, which you printed out at registration. 2. Plan to arrive fifteen minutes early. 3. Wear proper shoes (pedaling can sometimes be difficult with some types of shoes.) Before the exam, practice [...] Read more »
It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so. Mark Twain. The other day, I printed out the online directions for how to get to a dance studio an hour away. I thought I’d be extra careful and print out the reverse directions [...] Read more »
Children in the Music for Young Children™ program know that “Fireman Fred” is the “critter” who represents the letter “F” on the keyboard and staff. Back in February, several Southern Ontario MYC teachers, including myself, decided to help Fireman Fred: we ran a four-week practice incentive to have our students raise funds for Camp [...] Read more »
When my children were young, we spent many leisure hours playing Nintendo Games. Super Mario, in particular, comes to mind. We ran through virtual grassy meadows and tip-toed through gloomy dungeons. By playing those games repeatedly, we learned to anticipate where danger lurked and what to do to avoid it. We memorized the location of waterfalls and [...] Read more »
Take your needle, my child, and work at your pattern; it will come out a rose by and by. Life is like that – one stitch at a time taken patiently and the pattern will come out all right like the embroidery. ~Oliver Wendell Holmes Many people may have fond memories of the bedtime stories [...] Read more »
“When you tend a rose, my lad, a thistle cannot grow.” – Quote from The Secret Garden, by Frances Hodgson Burnett. When I read this quote this morning, everything suddenly came together. You see, the last several days, I have been spending my precious spare time out in my back yard pulling up dandelions [...] Read more »
Congratulations to my students who participated in the Brantford Kiwanis Music Festival last week! You had a wonderful grand piano on which to perform, a nice hall with great acoustics and lighting, a supportive audience, fellow competing students, and a kind and insightful adjudicator. So, what have you learned from such an experience? Maybe you [...] Read more »
Many years ago, I had a picture posted in my studio that I had pulled from a magazine. It was a reproduction of a painting that had been used for a Tabu perfume advertisement. At the bottom of the picture, I added the words, “Always remember to acknowledge your pianist.” It made me smile whenever I [...] Read more »
