student composition
Composition Ending Chord
I’ve got a question for you. During each lesson, I have my students do an improvisation or play their composition. I just received a short composition in which the piece doesn’t end on a tonic key. I texted her mom about that, and she said…
Notating Compositions
I’m having my students compose and notate a piece. Of course notating rhythm is a challenge for some, but a wonderful way to have them ‘self generate’ as best they can. We do a ‘back in forth’ where I help them tweak it so it…
Remembering Compositions
Below is an email from a parent. Any advice on strategies I could suggest? This student has been with me for about 6 months. He is in first grade and is moving through Foundation pieces at a just-under-average pace. I have noticed memory is an…
Improv vs. Comp in Tune Toolkit
When you teach projects from Tune Toolkit, are you assigning them as improv projects or composition projects? Do you have the students come back and play something or report on what they did? How do you keep accountability that they are trying the projects? In…
Resistance Writing Lyrics
One of my farthest-along students is pushing back on writing lyrics because she doesn’t want to sing. I assigned composition two weeks in a row–make up a song. Then I assigned to make up words for the song. Mom texted me today (their lesson is…
Starting Tune Toolkit with Advanced Student
Mark S. Meritt, any suggestions for starting Tune Toolkit with a student in level 7? Is there a way to accelerate through each project without impeding the layering process? I’ve been through the program a few times with other students but this particular student is…
3-Note Improv
Is the idea with the 3-note comp/improv exercise that the students are to play three consecutive white notes in the RH or can they be any three notes, black or white? I get them to pick any 3 white notes without telling them about the…
Assignments for Month-Long Break
Would it work, when there is a month-long break from teaching, to suggest that dedicated students (at the appropriate level) work through Tune Toolkit and The Chord Drill on their own? I have the vaguest recollection from the training on those that “students can work…
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…