Curriculum
Jazz Program Questions
I just watched most of the Jazz program teacher training. I cannot find the answers to some questions in Simpedia. I have a question about using Jazz clue 2. For example, in the Mirron there is Chord that is just ‘F’ and no 7th. What does the student…
Jazz Clue Questions
I have a question for all you wonderful Jazz experts!! Is it possible to look at a piece of music and predict which Jazz Clue would work better? Do you mean for dropping in, specifically? Do you mean what notes to use in the LH…
Jazz Chord Questions
See individual questions with accompanying answers below. Q. What does the dash in “7-5” or “7-9” chords mean? A. The dash (I think of it as a minus) means to flat the relevant note, so a C7-5 would have a flatted fifth (Gb instead of…
Unfolding The Jazz Program Level 1
“…. (Do) we learn every jazz piece first as a solo with the JC1, then go back to the beginning of the book and learn every piece with JC2, and then again start at the beginning of the book and learn ensemble playing for each…
Introducing Jazz 1
I’ve watched the intro. to Jazz 1 program twice, but I’m a little confused as to how to proceed with presenting the program to my students. Are we supposed to introduce them to the scale formula? Or are we supposed to go directly into Jazz…
Student Composition
At Neil’s suggestion, I’m sharing a wonderful experience I had last week. I had assigned a 14-year-old boy to compose a song using the chord progressions from Honey Dew in the pattern from Dreams, Arr. 3. I told him that lots of repetition of simply…
Remembering Compositions
As students work on compositions, is it ok for them to write notes in a Simply Music fashion to help them remember their pieces (starting notes, patterns, form, etc.)? When I began encouraging comp, I started to see students coming with a scrap of paper…
Encouraging Composition
Most of my students have composed their first song recently, even if it was writing their own sentence 1 and 2 for Dreams. However there are some students who are resistant to composing and show no interest or inclination to do so. Should I continue…
Need Comp and Improv Ideas
I have been teaching SM for about two months now and I am already struggling to think of composition and improv projects for my students. Besides using the LH and changing up the RH and of course the ideas on the TTMs I really don’t…
Improvising on Night Storm
I’ve had some fun with students improvising on Night Storm. For the Lower Part we use Arrangement 1. For the Upper Part we firstly play the Night Storm melody followed by improvising on white notes. Rocking the Lower Part chords can add interest whilst the…