Klarinet Archive - Posting 000368.txt from 2003/11

From: AnneLenoir@-----.net (Anne Lenoir)
Subj: Re: [kl] Flats, Sharps and ligatures!
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2003 08:00:54 -0500

More about Flats, Sharps & Keys

Recently I was trying to think of a way to get all of my younger
students to memorize most of their scales, without reading them. Just to
be able to play them without having to think about reading them. I
started out with a copy of the circle of 5ths from "Foundations of
Musical Excellence" and decided to approach the circle moving to the
left, which actually made it the Circle of 4ths. I was trying to get a
10-year-old to start on middle C playing "do-re-me-fa-sol-fa-me-re-do".
My students said, "Miss Annie, That is wrong. You're playing "Mommy Made
Me Mash My M & M's". I said, maybe you've got a point there. Maybe we
should start the M & M's club and put an M & M sticker up on your Circle
of 4th page every time you learn one of the 12 M & M's.
On my particular page of the Circle of 5th's (we call it 4th's)
there is a little treble clef and key signature on each key, so I
pencilled in the starting note of each "M & M" passage to be memorized.
The passage that they play, "do-re-me-fa-sol-fa-me-re-do", is repeated
several times, the first 2 times with a rest (They're Smashed!!!), then
3 times non stop, then 5 times as fast as they can play it.
At first I try to keep it simple and have them play it in the lowest
register on the clarinet. The next week, I let them push the register
key on F to play the same thing in the Clarion Register in C, or G
Chalameau in D Clarion. So far, the results are that about 5
ten-year-olds can play starting on the Circle on low G, moving on to C,
F, Bb, Eb and Ab. This also gives me an opportunity to teach them how to
practice working on fingering problems in diatonic scale playing on the
clarinet, like going from Eb to F (you always have to pick up 3 fingers
and put them back down).
I ran through the Circle with my Jr. High and High School students
just to see how fast they could get around the circle, and to smooth-out
everybody's rough spots; and it was a lot of fun to work with everybody
on finally resolving some of those annoying fingerings, like Db to Eb in
the low register. (I say they are "exchanging their pinkie and ring
finger on the left for their index finger on the right. Then we practice
making this 'exchange' slowly) Everybody, including myself, benefitted
from the experience in terms of feeling more comfortable in all the
keys, and I got sick from eating too many M & M's the day after
Halloween. I had a plastic pumpkin full of packs of M & M's to give away
as prizes. I also emailed m&m's and received a cute little M&M's
container filled with stickers. The stickers are all gone and I need to
order some more. ANNIE

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