I’m so pleased to announce that my Composition & Improvisation Prompts for Piano, previously available in Studio-Licensed eBook form, is now available in hardcopy!
Prompts for Piano provides a fun, easy way to guide beginner and elementary students to make their own music. Each of the 20 prompts provides inspiration and direction for the student to embark on a series of creative projects.
Continue reading “NEWLY RELEASED: Composition & Improvisation Prompts for Piano, Now Available in Hardcopy”
Earlier this week, I hosted my summer piano teacher retreat, Retreat at Piano Manor, at a historic home in Manchester Michigan with about a dozen fellow piano teachers. It was such a treat!
Continue reading “Recap: My 2024 Retreat at Piano Manor”In today’s post, I’d like to round up a few of my favorite resources (both free and paid) on my blog relating to composition and improvisation.
Composition and improvisation are skills I love integrating into my teaching. When students show an interest in creating their own pieces, I always foster this and coach them through the process of formulating and notating their compositions. To help expose all of my students to composition, I offer a composition-themed summer camp at least every-other-year. I use improvisation, in simple but natural ways, in my teaching too — although I’d like to get better at doing more!
In this blog post, there are three main sections: (1) First, I will first round up my free printables related to composition and improvisation. (2) Then, I’ll list some blog post links to some articles that discuss how to integrate improvisation and composition into your teaching. (3) Finally, I will tell you about two paid resources from my shop you might find useful for teaching composition and improvisation to your piano students.
I hope you’ll discover — or rediscover — some fun resources you can use in your teaching!
Continue reading “Roundup: Composition/Improvisation Resources for Piano Teachers”
Hello, readers! Summer is gone, and we’re now into the groove of the new school year. My last blog post shared the details of my recent Piano Teacher Retreat, held August 1-3, 2019. The rest of August went like a blur, due to a variety of travel. Here’s a little bit of a catch-up post!
Backing up just a step… The week before the retreat, I attended NCKP 2019. It was a phenomenal conference, as always!
I attended so many great sessions. My favorite was a session given by Louis Svard, presenting on “The Musical World of Infants: What It Can Tell Us About How Children Actually Learn Music.” She has a blog called The Musician’s Brain you can check out here.
I had the privilege of presenting two sessions during NCKP, both on Wednesday as part of the Pre-Conference Seminars. First, I gave a session for the Wellness Track called “Lessons for Piano Teachers from the Alexander Technique.” In this session, I share my experience as a student of the Alexander Technique and how taking AT lessons has impacted me as a musician and piano teacher.
Later that afternoon, I also presented one of my favorite talks: “Piano Method Mining: Gems from Past and Present.” In this session, I provide a survey of piano methods from past to present, highlighting the ones consider most notable and still useful today. The room was full, and I received such wonderful feedback afterwards!
[Click to view Day 1, Day 2, or Day 3.]
On our final day of camp, students reviewed the drafts of their composition that I had updated and printed from Finale the previous evening. We made small tweaks and reprinted as needed.
Students took turns using the piano and keyboard to practice their compositions, so that they could perform them for the group.
A group selfie taken during our snack break.
Then, it was time to share our compositions.
It was fun to hear each student’s piece.
There were a number of other games and activities we used throughout the week, but I mostly wanted to highlight the process of guiding all ten of my students to complete a composition by the end of the week. It wasn’t easy!
What helped was to create daily goals and clearly communicate those goals along the way. I was proud of how the students rose to meet the challenge.
Here are a few of the resulting compositions.
I used guiding questions to help the students figure out how to dictate the rhythm and properly notate their compositions.
I made very little critique of the student compositions. The goal for this four-day camp was to experience the process of expressing something through the piano and writing it down. Honing of their compositional skills can occur during later opportunities! I have no doubt that this group of students will be composing more pieces down the road, sooner rather than later, at which time we can spend more time on refinement during their private lessons.
All in all, I couldn’t be happier with how the week went and with the resulting compositions!
[Click to view Day 1 or Day 2.]
The goal for Day 3 was to have our compositions basically finished by the end of the day. With that in mind, we spent time discussing form (AB, ABA, through-composed, etc.) as well as various aspects of proper music notation.
My cat, Coda, loves to help my students with their compositions.
It is exciting to see our compositions taking form!
Halfway through each day, we enjoyed a snack outside on the patio. On this particular day, one of my students brought in a birthday snack to share: homemade ice cream sandwiches!
Composing is hard work. 😉
That evening, I updated each student’s composition in Finale and printed nearly-completed drafts for students to work from the following day.
[Click here for Day 4.]
[Click here for Day 1.]
On Day 2 of our composing camp, our goal was to get a good amount of our pieces composed and written down by the end of the day.
We used the piano or keyboard to improvise until we found music we liked.
Then, we started writing it down on staff paper.
I had two stations arranged: my piano and my keyboard with headphones.
Students worked at the table and then took turns using the piano/keyboard.
I went from student to student, helping them as needed.
Hard at work, yet having fun!
It’s exciting to see the compositions taking form.
That evening, I took it upon myself to enter each student’s composition so far into Finale. I printed these drafts out for students to work from the following day.
[Click here for Day 3.]
As mentioned previously, this week is the week: it’s composition camp for my students and me!
So, You Want To Be A Composer?
June 13-16, M-Th from 10am-noon
Throughout this camp, students will experience the joy of creation while composing their own music: from the energy of the initial creative urge, following the path of their personal inspiration, then settling it all into a captured vision. By the end of the week, each student will take home an illustrated copy of their composition, printed using professional music notation software. In addition to individual work, students will get to take part in group-based improvisation and composition throughout the week. For students ages 5-14. No previous musical background necessary.
As it turned out, ten students — all current piano students of mine — registered for this camp.
On the first day of camp, our goal was for each student to (1) chose a subject for their musical composition and (2) draw an illustration.
It is so fun to see what each student chooses and how they choose depict the subject matter through their drawing.
Later in the day, each student took a turn improvising at the piano inspired by his/her drawing. This allowed us explore and experience the process of expressing through sound.
The rest of the group provided feedback about how the improvisation made them feel or what the music reminded them of.
This is good preparation for Day 2, when we will start formulating the structure of our compositions and writing them down on staff paper.
That evening, I scanned each student’s illustration so that it would be ready to digitally insert into Finale software later in the week.
Stay turned for more photos of our camp week! [Click here for Day 2.]
The weather is warming, and summertime is practically here! I don’t know about you, but I’m gearing up to offer a couple of music camps this summer.
I first offered a composing camp to my students back in 2012 and have decided it is time to offer something similar this summer. I plan to use my So, You Want To Be A Composer? curriculum while pulling in some newer ideas and resources.
The second camp, Music History Blast From The Past, is one that I have been offering my students for the past four years. We focus on a different historical time period and a specific composer example each day. Students love the hands-on crafting and the discovery of what they can relate to from composers’ lives. I find this camp gives us a great foundation of knowledge for us to refer when learning to play staples of the piano teaching literature. To study each composer, I use the composer lapbooking curriculum that is available in my shop. Check out the general lesson plans here.
Here are the descriptions for the camps I’m offering this year.
So, You Want To Be A Composer?
June 13-16, M-Th from 10am-noon
Throughout this camp, students will experience the joy of creation while composing their own music: from the energy of the initial creative urge, following the path of their personal inspiration, then settling it all into a captured vision. By the end of the week, each student will take home an illustrated copy of their composition, printed using professional music notation software. In addition to individual work, students will get to take part in group-based improvisation and composition throughout the week. For students ages 5-14. No previous musical background necessary.
Music History Blast From The Past
July 11-14, M-Th from 10am-noon
Back by popular demand! This camp gives students a glimpse into the lives of four great classical composers. As we study each composer’s childhood and career, students will learn about the music, fashion, art, and architecture of the time. Every year, students are fascinated to find that they can relate to the life stories of composers who lived hundreds of years ago. In the long run, having this broader context of music history enriches later years of piano study, especially when playing classical piano literature. Each day, students will take home a crafted scrapbook page about that day’s composer. For students ages 5-14. Previous musical background preferable, but not necessary.
What summer camps are you planning this year?
Update: Check out the form I give out to my students in order to present summertime camp/lesson options.
My blogging has been sporadic at best for the past few weeks — I apologize! I have been spending every moment of my free time working on a project with a Christmas-related deadline. 🙂 I will be sharing more details about it later this month.
In the meantime, enjoy this video of my student playing a piece she recently composed. Rania is a very proficient composer. 🙂 Rania has composed pieces based on my “Prompts for Piano” eBook, although this particular piece was inspired by one of the composition assignments in the theory book of the Succeeding at the Piano method books. Rania LOVES using the pedal, as you’ll hear in her piece:
Rania first wrote out her piece using her own kind of made-up notation. After I heard her play the piece, I encouraged her to write it out on staff paper. After that, I notated the piece for her in Finale. She drew an illustration for the piece, which I scanned and inserted into the Finale file. I also like to save the completed score as a PDF and send it to the parents.
Rania enjoyed making the video, too, so that her family members that live outside of the state can see/hear her play!
Last week, I wrote a blog post here describing how I help my students compose their own pieces. Today, I am officially announcing the release of a new e-book resource called: Composition & Improvisation Prompts for Piano!
Continue reading “Now Available: Composition & Improvisation Prompts for Piano eBook”
For the past six months, I have been working on a new resource to help piano teachers compose and improvise with their students. I am going to give you the full scoop on the new resource soon, but I wanted to introduce the resource with this article discussing how composition can be used in the private piano lesson. Update: the new “Composition & Improvisation Prompts for Piano” eBook is now available here in the Shop!
There are many challenges to having piano students compose. For example, teachers might feel that:
Despite these challenges (yes, I feel them too), I have enjoyed having my students compose their own pieces for many years now. Here is how I incorporate composition in my lessons: Continue reading “Composing in the Piano Lesson with Beginner & Elementary Students”
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