Piano Puzzler Preparation

This section, newly created for the third edition, is a response to the many private piano teachers and classroom music teachers who have suggested that it should be possible to create a fun and useful curriculum based on the Piano Puzzler segment of public radio’s Performance Today, which has been broadcast weekly since 2002. These exercises are necessarily for pianists and composers who play the piano because they require keyboard skills and a working knowledge of modes, harmony, and other compositional vocabulary and grammar. All of the exercises may be approached as improvisations and/or compositions to be notated. The penultimate exercise in this book, “Be a Private Ear,” provides a detailed checklist of the main compositional features that go into composing a piano puzzler. The Private Ear Checklist is a kind of shopping list that reminds you of what ingredients you need to cook something that Chopin, Brahms, Debussy, or Stravinsky might prepare. The final exercise is to use the skills developed in the preceding exercises to compose one’s own piano puzzler.

Sample Curricular Models

By examining degree plans and conducting interviews with faculty and students at various national and international institutions, the authors of this chapter have generated four curricular models that suggest how existing degree plans and/or core music courses might be productively modified. The enhanced core model (1) aims to broaden the scope of existing curricula by emphasizing more diverse, cross-disciplinary content. The pluralist model (2) requires students to diversify their focus during their first two years of study in order to incorporate a greater degree of critical thinking, creative engagement, and broad skill sets into the major. The integrated model (3) emphasizes music making as the primary mode of learning basic skills and reduces overall requirements by combining courses such as ear training, music theory, and keyboard skills into a single class. Finally, the capstone model (4) demonstrates how self-directed and highly individualized projects can be incorporated into degree plans.

Singing in primary schools: case studies of good practice in whole class vocal tuition

Within the context of British initiatives in music education such as the Wider Opportunities programme in England and the recommendations of the Music Manifesto emphasising the importance of singing in primary schools, the current paper explores examples of good practice in whole-class vocal tuition. The research included seven different primary schools in England and combined observational methods and semi-structured interviews with musicians, teachers and headteachers. Results indicate a variety of successful approaches to promoting singing in primary schools. Essential motivators for developing singing include an enthusiastic staff member, a supportive headteacher and support from other school staff. Additional motivators include access to musical expertise within and beyond the school, and a singing leader with keyboard skills. Challenges to good practice centre on the issue of confidence and skill in singing from both teachers and pupils, individually and in groups, recognising and rewarding quality in singing, and the sustainability of externally funded initiatives as pupils move through their schooling and particularly from primary to secondary school. Good-quality support from specialists and external organisations can facilitate good practice in schools, but it seems to be important to integrate singing into children's wider musical learning and development within the curriculum, in the extended curriculum and beyond school in order to help sustain a lifelong interest in singing.