Helping Students Sing on Key
Found in: Musicality, Pedaling, Technique
Annette S., California
Can you please give ideas for helping students learn to sing on pitch? My student is seven years old and in Level 2. She loves to sing, and her singing is very off pitch. Are there ways that I can help her? Are there other resources you would recommend? I know of local voice teachers, and am happy to give a good referral if that is the best way. But I wondered if I might be able to offer other ideas as well.
Dixie C., Washington
In my experience often this will occur just through exposure.
However, I have had a few students who never match pitch, but that’s not the purpose of Simply Music lessons. I had a student who pretty much spoke his way through songs in a monotone. His mother also “sang” the same way. But after about two years of lessons, Mom began matching my pitch, and actually has quite a pleasant singing voice. Her son still doesn’t match pitch, however, and, in fact, still couldn’t hear differences in tone on the piano as of last spring. Everything he played was learned strictly by patterns, etc. His ear seemed to play no part at all in the learning, and he eventually dropped after 4 years in favor of basketball. His younger brother is just the opposite and has an amazing ear for music. Go figure.
In the case of your young student, I strongly advise not to make a big deal of it, and just keep singing along with her. If you bring attention to her not matching pitch, it will most likely make her self-conscious, and what could occur naturally through exposure may never occur due to inhibition. Voice lessons at this early age are inappropriate. Just enjoy singing with her and eventually she will most likely begin matching pitch with you. If she doesn’t, well, she’s there to learn to play the piano, not to get vocal instruction.
Gillian
I’m a singing teacher as well as a Simply Music teacher. I don’t have all the answers to the voice question but have taught a few people with major pitch problems. The assumption is that if someone can’t match pitch then they must be tone deaf , but that is a myth. The majority of people out there who can”t match pitch often have not been surrounded by music growing up, and also usually don’t listen (research shows that people who have learned to shut out others talking to them, i.e. parents telling them what to do etc, have pitch problems).
So asking the child to listen to what they are singing is one thing you could do. As the student is only 7 I don’t think that pitching is really important. Just listening more may be enough, and even if it isn’t, to correct is a slow process. I have SM students who can’t match pitch but I don’t draw attention to it as the fact that they are singing at all is great.
My daughter at this young age was not too good at pitching, but as an 11 year old now, is fine. Just encourage her; that’s the best thing for any child.
