Klarinet Archive - Posting 000918.txt from 1998/05

From: "Carl Schexnayder" <carlsche@-----.com>
Subj: Re: [kl] Orchestras which sing
Date: Sat, 16 May 1998 02:56:57 -0400

>Solfeggio is also a great way to get into playing by ear, and then into
>improvisation.

I never used solfeggio to sight-sing, or improvise, or play by ear and never
had trouble with any of them. I'm glad I was never required to use it! My
VERY PERSONAL opinion is that music has no words. I know I'll never hear
the end of comments on that statement - so I'll apologize in advance. The
method I used for sight-singing, or inventing melodies in my head is simply
to finger the notes. Now I realize that this may take years, in some cases,
to learn. I remember that I learned to do that by listening to each of the
intervals, (within a key at first), so that I knew how the sixth scale
degree of a major or minor scale sounded. After I knew all of the diatonic
intervals, I went for the chromatic intervals. Of course, I had to come up
with my own method because noone was available to help me with it, but that
always worked very well for me.

Carl Schexnayder
>I was astonished when I discovered that very few of my private students
>had ever heard of the syllable names for the scale. My piano teaching
>style is heavy on harmony instruction, so I make the kids learn
>do-re-mi-fa-sol-la-ti-do, early on. (They balk when I try to get them to
>sing, even when the studio door is closed.)
>
>I thought everybody learned to sing the scale in elementary school. Man,
>was I ever out of date. But time was when there had to be a piano in every
>K-6 classroom, at least in New York State, and teachers had to learn to
>play it to get certified.
>
>Of course, that was during the late Bronze Age.
>
>
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