Klarinet Archive - Posting 000014.txt from 2002/10

From: Audrey Travis <vsofan@-----.ca>
Subj: Re: [kl] RE: tunes
Date: Tue, 1 Oct 2002 10:35:22 -0400

Kent Krive wrote:
> Perhaps the most bothersome of situations to me, as a teacher, involved the
> simplification of well-known melodies in beginning band books, "setting up,"
> as it were, note-reading errors, as tunes were played as originally learned
> rather than the way they were notated in the book.
>
>
Of course, the challenging part for us as band teachers is to ensure
that they recognize and correct the difference between what they have
played and what is actually written in the music. An interesting
challenge here in Canada is our national anthem containing a section
where certain words are sung as 2 eighth notes but are written for bands
as dotted eighth-sixteenth. It does take time to get them to play this
as written and not as sung. But one of the values of playing some pop
tunes or folk songs they recognize (besides their enjoyment which I
believe is vital for at least a portion of what we work on) is that they
begin to understand that melodies can be manipulated and changed, yet
the melody remains recognizable. This usually leads to a discussion and
playing of variations, and later to improvisation without forgetting
that what is written down must be followed and learned correctly.

Cheers

Audrey

---------------------------------------------------------------------