Music Monday - Rhythm and Rhyme – working creatively with young children.

Both rhyme and rhythm are patterns in sound – in spoken sound as well as sung sound.

The wonderful work done by biggerbetterbrains.com highlights the importance of these skills in early language development. I have written about this in previous Music Monday posts and it continues to fascinate me, especially now that we have a pre-schooler grandson in our lives.

Yesterday (almost) 4 year-old William came to our house for the day. As usual he was excited about what activities we had planned for his visit. The hot favourites always include cooking, picking up the dog’s poop (yes, really) and music. The last always includes a very short period of hand positions on the piano, and a longer time singing songs, accompanied by me with William playing random notes in rhythm at the top end of the keyboard. Yesterday his attention was caught by the rhyming patterns in one particular song and I wondered whether we could play further with this idea, especially after he volunteered, “The rhymes are words that sound the same, aren’t they?”

We got out William’s scrap book and started writing down rhyming words. Of course, ‘poop’ featured – loads of good rhyming words with that one! 

Next we made up short phrases, each one ending with one of our rhyming words. After 8 phrases and 4 pairs of rhymes, we tried clapping each phrase. One of William’s made-up phrases started with an upbeat so we talked about that, and although he didn’t really understand the concept, he was able to clap it with the stress on the first beat of the bar. 

We then played a game where I clapped the phrases out of sequence and William guessed which phrase I was clapping – mostly accurately. We talked briefly about the words being the rhythm – that time-honoured concept of primary music teachers. 

Finally we invented a tune for his song. William was inclined to stick to a monotone and focus on the rhythmic patterns, but I guided and coaxed him towards a simple tune contained within the doh-soh range.

All up this song-writing activity took about 30 minutes.

Later, when his parents arrived for dinner, he was keen to share his song. As before, he clearly enjoyed stressing the strong beats, clapping and singing enthusiastically. He felt ownership of both the process and end product.

So much of what we do in music classes tends towards recreating. Sometimes it is fun – and beneficial – to be creative instead.

Music Monday - The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee on zoom.

On Saturday evening I drove into WAAPA at Edith Cowan University to see a production on zoom of the musical Spelling Bee, performed by Diploma of Music Theatre students under the direction of creatives Nicole Stinton (director and co-ordinator of the Diploma course), Tim How (musical director) and Jayne Smeulders (choreography). 

 I was curious to see this production. Very unusually, the audience were to gather in a lecture theatre on campus while the performers remained at home, ready to perform live over zoom. Across Perth, cast members farewelled their parents and families as the latter prepared to drive to WAAPA, and then the performers themselves settled in front of their laptops at home, ready to perform. Strange times indeed.

I confess that I was hoping that this might be the last zoom performance I would watch for the foreseeable future. Over the past few weeks I have seen several plays on this platform and although each had its merits, it was always hard to ignore the unfavourable comparison with a live performance. Spelling Bee would certainly be different in the sense that the performance was to be largely live – with some pre-recorded backup vocals and a couple of film sequences.

In the lecture theatre the atmosphere was that of excited curiosity – how was this going to work?

We were instructed to feel comfortable applauding after songs -although the performers at home wouldn’t hear us, the creative team had allowed for applause breaks.

And so the show started. 

It was certainly more comfortable to watch on a large screen rather than home laptop. That was my first observation.

The premise for this production was ‘that due to Covid 19, the annual spelling bee had been forced online. The rules would be the same as usual, with one additional rule being that spellers must have both hands visible on screen as they spelled.’

In this production the four audience members in the original script became additional characters – the exchange student from Australia who had become stranded in the USA due to the pandemic, one of the speller’s Dads, and so on.

Solo songs were performed to backing tracks played in the singer’s own space. Back-up vocals had been pre-recorded. 

The rehearsal process had clearly taken care and time with playing to the camera and to finding visual and aural clarity in dialogue between characters. There was a strong and vibrant energy in this performance -and a clear sense of ownership of and commitment to the production. There was some vocal pushing (perhaps because it was the final show) but there were also many memorable moments – one was the Dan Schwartz character who spent the performance cooking in his own kitchen, while manning the bell in the spelling bee.  A convincing variation on how it is usually played. An unscripted (I think) but hilarious moment was when the family pet dog started barking. Even on the zoom platform, live performance throws up the unexpected!

At the end of the show the audience were clearly delighted with what they had experienced.  I enjoyed every moment.

I spoke with Nicole Stinton afterwards and confirmed that she had chosen the musical before Covid 19 struck. It is hard to imagine a musical better suited to an online production.

I imagine that there will be many post-grad dissertations in the coming years about performing online during a pandemic. This production and its creatives would certainly have much of value to lend to the conversation.

Bravo to all.

Music Monday - Embodied Singing

This is the final week of what has been a long and challenging semester in high schools across Australia and the whole world. In my own little world of a performing arts high school in Perth, I have a tradition in the final week of allowing the younger music theatre specialist students to sing an ‘own choice song’ of any genre, purely for the fun of singing -  the only provision being that the text is suitable for a school environment. I work at the school on Mondays and Fridays so today was the first of these ‘own choice song’ days for this year.

Predictably, today the year 10 girls chose music theatre songs from current favourite shows – think Wicked, Frozen, Beetle Juice, Bring It On.  And the year 8 boys, after asking, “Miss, is it okay to do a rap song if we don’t sing the rude words?”, sang lustily, with a nudge and wink at each other at all the (silent) offensive moments. 

What was clear in all the fun song performances today was that every student was relaxed. There was no sense of assessment or preparing a song that would at some point become an assessment task. Their bodies were relaxed and when they inhaled it was with relaxed abdominal muscles. There was a bit of bopping around to the backing tracks and a much greater unconscious grounding of their lower bodies. These are all qualities that as a singing teacher, I strive for every day. All the singing today was embodied.

Greater embodiment is something we often observe in a masterclass when a singer, after instruction from the master teacher, sings very much better on the second attempt. This can be due to valuable help from the master teacher -  but can also be in part, a more relaxed performance after settling into a performance situation.

At my other workplace – a music theatre department at tertiary level – we have a series of ‘audition performance practices’. Lately these have of course been online, but when we are all in the space together, students so often fare much better in the singing task set at the ‘call back’ than in their actual performance. It seems that getting an endorsement of their initial performance in the form of a call-back allows them to relax into their bodies for the ‘call back’.

What does this all mean for us as teachers of singing? 

I think we need to take every opportunity to learn from the expertise of psychologists working in the field of performance. And we need to constantly search for the warm-up strategies which help students unlock their own bodies. In performance, we need to encourage students to embrace the character and story and lose themselves and their complete focus on technique.

As always, I invite and thank you for your comments.

Music Monday - Performance Confidence

I spent Saturday accompanying year 11 and 12 singers for their semester one performance exams – individual recitals of around 10-15 minutes in duration. (We are fortunate in Western Australia to be easing restrictions now that we have no community transmission of Covid-19, so these exams took place live in the room, with everyone appropriately distanced.)

As usual there was a range of performance confidence – from the super confident singers who love every audience (including exam panels) through to the singers with borderline performance anxiety. Each exam had its own dynamic in that respect alone.

Most of the singers I accompanied that day are also my own voice students, and so part of Sunday was spent finalising their semester one in-class results. During the period that we were all self-isolating at home (the end of the 1st term and first few weeks of this term) these students submitted performances to me in the form of self-takes via email. I then emailed comments and feedback. During that time in lockdown, I often mused on how much more confident one of my students was on camera, as opposed to in the room with an audience. On Sunday as I again watched one of her emailed videos from earlier in the semester, I reflected on her live performance the day before and how, using the same marking rubric, her exam performance could never achieve the same result as one to the camera.

Now of course, live performance is the lifeblood of music – and aren’t we bursting to get back to it?  However, is there a step, we as teachers could take, to build performance confidence via the camera for those students with some degree of performance anxiety? And importantly – what would the steps towards confident live performance entail? Could it be the sharing of confident self-takes with their peers to ‘prove themselves’ before performing live in the class?

Do you have thoughts on this? Please share!

Music Monday - Don’t sing ‘Fah’!

Yesterday morning our friend John sent us a link to the recently -gone -viral Dustyesky Fake Russian Choir from Mullumbimby on the northern coast of NSW in Australia. Here a bunch of Aussie blokes, who speak no Russian but have a love of vodka, Russian music and song, have formed what they claim to be ‘the largest fake Russian choir in the southern hemisphere’. In that mysterious way that things go viral, they have become an internet sensation and were actually invited to visit Russia (before the pandemic put a stop to their plans). Instead they sent to Russia a video collaborated through social media. 

And that video has been popping up all over social media.

(As an aside, a Russian choir responded by sending a performance of Waltzing Matilda – in that wonderful way that choirs unite people across cultures).

Anyway, later yesterday I was driving from my school to another campus when our local ABC radio conducted an interview with the conductor of the choir. And then later still, when I was finally home in the evening, ABC television was doing a feature on the same choir. 

I was saturated with fake Russian choir singers yesterday!

Now what was of particular interest to me – and the point to today’s post -  was that, at the end of the TV report, a disclaimer was flashed across the screen alerting viewers that singing in groups at this time is not considered safe.

And so back to our previous Music Monday post where we alerted you to the disturbing findings by NATS in the USA.

In the fortnight since, the Guardian has published another finding which many singers and singing teachers - and possibly wind instrument players and teachers – have seen as a glimmer of hope.

But then a few days later, the highly regarded Australian Gondwana National Choirs hosted a webinar with a leading epidemiologist and an aerospace engineer with further findings. As one of my colleagues commented, “It seems we need to stick to pentatonic scales for now – or at least avoid singing fah.”

This evening ANATS (Australian National Association of Teachers of Singing) are hosting a ‘coffee and conversation’ webinar (for members) on health and hygiene in the singing studio.

Where do those findings leave us? I think that at the very least, we should be cautious about observing a safe distance between us and our singers. Many usual teaching studios and rooms will be of insufficient size. 

For the past 2 months I have been very aware of how dirty my laptop screen becomes after zoom lessons and classes. I demonstrate directly to the screen and aerosol droplets collect on the surface. The days of the singing student reading music over the shoulder of the pianist are sadly over - at least for now.

For so long we have recognised how beneficial singing is to all aspects of health (for example: https://ideas.time.com/2013/08/16/singing-changes-your-brain/). Singing is also immensely pleasurable and fun. 

We all owe it to ourselves to search for the safest ways forward at this time.

Music Monday - COVID 19 + Singing

This report was brought to my attention a few days ago. It is definitely worth a read. (NATS is the highly respected professional association of singing teachers in the USA; the American equivalent of ANATS in Australia.)

Now while it must be remembered that the viral load is very much larger in the USA than here in Australia, the report gives us much food for thought:

Adequate spacing and distancing between singers in any ensemble, choir, class or individual voice lesson will be the only safe way to teach and rehearse for the foreseeable future.

Some of our traditional singing warmup practices of touching our faces and feeling for vibration will be only possible within the most stringent of hygienic practice.

We singing teachers need to be vigilant in watching for and calling out students touching mouths, noses and eyes during our lessons.

As Australia moves towards easing the Covid-19 restrictions over the coming months, we face a challenging time ahead as we all work together to find ways to continue making music safely and with artistic integrity.

Music Monday - ANZAC Day

Anzac Day

Anzac Day 2020 was like no other before it in the many years since 1915.

In Australia, with gatherings banned due to covid-19, the usual services and parades were cancelled  - except for one at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra attended by only the few dignitaries who conducted it, telecast to the nation.

Instead, at the tops of suburban driveways across the country, Australians gathered just before dawn, holding lighted candles, and sometimes waving to acknowledge their neighbours without approaching or speaking to them.

 In quiet reflection Australians remembered their Anzacs  - and all who have suffered and perished in war – and as the skies softly lightened with the dawn, the morning chorus of magpies and crows was augmented by players of music – student brass players, music teachers, amateur and professional musicians and singers – each contributing to an extraordinarily moving tribute.

On my own driveway I could hear from the next street the hesitant sounds of a student trumpeter playing “Lest We Forget”. Further away there was the faint sound of the Last Post with its tricky high notes for beginner players. 

In the couple of days since Saturday the papers have carried letters from Australians suggesting that the dawn driveway tradition be kept and commenting on how moving it was to have their own silent contemplation accompanied by the sound of live music. My music teacher friends as well as non-muso neighbours have all said much the same.

Music is SO important in our many life rituals. When we work on the tedium of music theory, or teaching the singing and playing of scales, it is worth remembering how important our job is. We are contributing in our way to the rich tapestry of our country’s unique culture.

Music Monday - COVID 19

I’ve been joining many online meetings and discussion groups for the past week in the quest of finding the most effective ways to structure teaching and learning in music during these pandemic days.

What follows is this week’s discoveries. Use them, add to them, discard them. Whatever works for you:

1. Zoom seems to be the universally favoured platform for music classes, especially for sound quality. (Of course not all institutions or systems use zoom so we are all bound by our individual situations.) By checking out the various functions on zoom (especially the ‘disable background noise’) you can greatly enhance its capability.

2. Microphones which plug straight into your laptop greatly enhance your sound quality. One example is the Yeti Blue (about $AUD180). (It doesn’t need an audio interface.)

3. Many studio music teachers are speaking very highly of the My Music Staff app. 

4. Group classes which involve any unison singing are best done with the participants’ microphones on mute. Not ideal I know but they can model from your singing.

5. Call and response has become my new best friend. In normal face to face teaching I use it with younger students and in group classes. Now I find that I am using it in almost every situation, particularly when teaching new song repertoire. I play a phrase. I then sing the phrase. The student sings back and I can check musical accuracy and tone placement and technique. I imagine this would work with most instrumental teaching too. In group classes, although I would have the students sing ‘back’ with mics on mute, they could then email individual performances of the material (audio or video) for checking by the teacher.

And to finish this week’s post, something to make you smile – with thanks to drama teacher John Foreman.

From Science Humor

Music Monday - COVID 19

Well what a fortnight it has been. As the Covid-19 pandemic escalates, schools have closed across Australia and higher levels of social distancing brought into force across the country. Stores have lines and markers on the floor to indicate where the customers can move and stand.  All of society is impacted. When I visited a music store last week the entrance was secured until the staff member had asked me the reason for my visit. 

And in the midst of this, music teachers at primary, secondary and tertiary levels are on a very steep learning curve as they try to figure out ways of teaching their classes, individual instrumental and vocal lessons, vocational courses and everything else in between.

One of my primary music specialist friends shared that she had taken all day to figure out a plan for online pre-primary music learning – in a school where a number of families do not have access to internet at home.

My singing teaching colleagues are finding that the lag on platforms such as Zoom, Webex, Facetime etc means that the standard practice of playing warmups and song accompaniments live while the student sings simply doesn’t work anymore. (It seems that instrumental teachers have more success where they are less reliant on an accompanying instrument.)

My teacher friends who are also parents of school-aged children now find themselves juggling music lessons online with their own kids’ schoolwork.

There is also a real risk of a further social divide during these times – students of more affluent parents being more likely to have greater access to online resources while at the other end there will be students who slip through the net.

Here at StagePage we are committed to bringing you a weekly update on what we have learned and sharing any resources we think might help during the pandemic.

We welcome your contributions too- either through the comments section below or by email or private message. We will always acknowledge you.

Many musicians and music teachers have lost all or part of their income. Let’s look out for their presence online and support it where appropriate.

We look forward to hearing from you. 

Stay safe and well – and keep making music.

Music Monday

Covid 19. It is impossible to open a newspaper, turn on the television, scroll through social media or visit a supermarket without being confronted by the fear being experienced by so many in communities across Australia and the world.

As music teachers we face our own challenges- Our teaching is very hands-on. Many of us teach in relatively confined spaces – in which it is very difficult to implement the recommended 1.5 metres of separation between students. In the primary music classroom musical instruments are shared. Our students are increasingly anxious. And there is uncertainty about whether schools will close with online lessons a possibility.

While all the above is understandably stressful for music teachers, spare a thought for our freelance, sessional and gigging musician colleagues. Usually unsalaried, our colleagues in this sector (along with other performing artists) face months of cancelled gigs and significant loss of income.

If you are a salaried music teacher please consider:

1. Instead of claiming refunds for cancelled concerts, donate your ticket money instead.

2. Use the opportunity to hire a freelance musician to record backing tracks for your classes.

3. Ask your freelance musician friends and colleagues if they are okay; if there is anything you can do.

Stay well everyone. Wash your hands and don’t touch your face!