Klarinet Archive - Posting 000041.txt from 2004/02

From: Anna Benassi <acb@-----.is>
Subj: [kl] rhythmic help needed
Date: Thu, 5 Feb 2004 05:24:31 -0500

Dear Howard,

I teach beginners and intermediate students, many of whom are quite
insecure with rhythm. I have to second Annie Lenoir's advice about
perhaps switching to more accessible materials before you tackle
things requiring advanced counting. There are, of course, tons of Rose
etudes that are rhythmically simple, if you are otherwise ready for
them. The Denmitz method is concise and not too complex rhythmically;
some think it's a little on the dry side, but it might be a nice
complement to the Randall Cunningham book Annie mentioned. I hope your
teacher will be open to such suggestions.

About two years ago, a flute student of mine was in real trouble with
counting. Her general approach was to play everthing more or less the
same length unless she was playing by ear. I was truly puzzled about
what to do to help her read rhythm better - no one method book made
any real sense, as far as I could tell - so I resorted to collating a
bunch of materials from many many sources; the first pieces I chose
consisted solely of quarter and eighth notes, first in simple
combinations and then in more complex combinations. Only when she had
mastered these did I even give her materials using dotted quarter
notes followed by eighths. After that we progressed to sixteenths -
first 4 sixteenths in a beat and then eighths and sixteenths in
various combinations. You get the picture.

Two years later she is considerably better off, and I'm relieved that
I took her down a path that might have made her feel a bit dumb at
first. She is still quite insecure, of course, and still needs intense
rhythmic training. What helped her most, however, was playing music
that stretched her abilities a little bit, but no more than that, and
having to master the concepts at that level before progressing on to
the next. BTW, you mentioned the 32nd rests in the Rose etude. I have
found that my students are much slower at counting rests properly than
they are at counting played notes properly. Their brains seem to go on
autopilot when they're not playing, or something. This supports my
suspicion that the Rose etude in question is not right for you at
present.

Having said all that, elementary music teachers here in Iceland (and
elsewhere) have a set of unique syllables that symbolize each note
length. At first I laughed at them, but I have come to respect this
method of teaching rhythm. You may prefer intelligible words to these,
but the principle is the same. I don't remember them all, but here's a
sample:
whole = ??
half = tamm
quarter = ta
eighth = tee (2 eighths, of course = tee-tee)
sixteenths = ti-kee-ti-kee
eighth + 2 sixteenths = tee-ti-kee
2 sixteenths + eighth = ti-kee-tee
and so on.
For anything that is a beat and a half long, I break away from this
system and tell the student that he must say "eitt-og-hálft"
("one-and-half" in English) IN TEMPO while playing the dotted note. He
may not go on to the next note until he's done with his little
"one-and-half" recitation, but once he has said it, he's GOT to got
off the dime and play the next note. This usually helps a great deal.
What they're doing, of course, is subdividing the beat and a half into
three half-beats, but I generally don't bother them with that during
their first assays.
For 32nd notes I tend to say tee-dle-ee-dle-ee-dle-ee-dle or some such
nonsense, though it doesn't fit the system. Luckily enough, most of my
students who play 32nd notes have gained enough facility to count them
without too much syllabic intervention. As I said above, however, a
true understanding of rest lengths usually seems to come later and
often requires extra focus.

I remember a similar syllabic "system" from my youth in the US; this
is in common use and may be quite familiar to you. This system has the
distinct advantage of naming the beat numbers, which helps the player
to position the rhythm within the bar:
eighths = and (8 eighths in 4/4 were thus 1-and-2-and-3-and-4-and)
sixteenths = ee-and-a (1-ee-and-a, 2-ee-and-a, and so on)
and the logical patterns that one can derive from these.

As for simple (non-dotted) triplets, in Icelandic I say "tree-o-la"
(tríóla is the Icelandic word for triplet), and I remember having used
"tri-pa-let" (or "1-trip-let, 2-trip-let, etc.") when I was a teenager
in the US. The trick, of course, is to make sure all three notes are
of equal length.

Sorry for the lengthy post. Hope it helps a little bit.

Best regards, and best of luck,

Anna

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