 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: diz
Date: 2002-05-07 23:51
There was a recent thread where a young (beginner) teacher was asking input for his/her first years' teaching horror. The advice recieved was excellent (on the whole) but what disturbed me, and having spent copious hours listening to advanced (read age here no ability) was the pupils talk of taking this grade or that grade.
Any teacher out there who teaches following the Royal Conservatory Syllabus - or the Australian Music Examinations Board Syllabus without supplementing their students' music diet is doing their students a BIG dis-service or are they?
For me the most enjoyable time in my clarinet lesson was playing duets with my teacher or playing 2nd clarinet part with her first depening on what opera she was playing at the time (my teacher was once in the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra). Indeed, this diet of ensemble playing helped me with my sightreading (which was good anyway) and taught me a lot about the reality of playing the clarinet - unless you're a soloist (hard nut to crack) then you're going to end up in a band/orchestra or some sort of group where you just have to fit in.
I'd be very interseted to hear about your experiences, both as teachers and students and if you've played two instruments and had vastly different approaches from the respective teachers.
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Author: Corinne
Date: 2002-05-08 01:15
At least the Royal Conservatory syllabus provides a standard whether or not you chose to use the material recommended. There are lots of methods to chose from, likewise solo/duet material. Grades represent an achievement, a goal achieved.
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Author: GBK
Date: 2002-05-08 01:18
Diz correctly mentions one of the most important aspects of early clarinet lessons:
Sightread, sightread, sightread (and then, sightread some more)
Whether it be in the form of duets (where students must think for themselves), unfamiliar orchestral repertoire, or just complex rhythmic/melodic studies, the more music that the beginning student sees will pay huge dividends later on.
We all know how many times a situation arises where something is put in front of you that you've never seen before. It is imperative to have learned an established "plan of attack".
The best teachers are the ones that know from their experience what to expect in the "real world" and convey those well-honed ideas to their students...GBK
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Author: Julie
Date: 2002-05-08 03:03
i agree with GBK
every (live) audition that i've done requires some sort of sight reading (of course that doesnt work well with recorded auditions) but my clarinet teacher spends the last couple weeks before an audition making me sightread anything, and everything that she has
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Author: nzdonald
Date: 2002-05-08 04:05
i played piano for years, with a teacher who only ever taught me the "exam pieces".... i'm a pretty good clarinet player but can't play the piano to save my life, despite the fact that i have Grade 8 (Trinity).... i agree with Diz- esp as i suffered the ill effects.
on a slightly different note, the Royal Schools syllabus is not bad, but the Trinity College syllabus is awful for the early grades.... and there are all these books that TCM support by using them for their syllabus- i forget who publishes them, but they are full of terrible transcriptions that ask kids to do things like hold a b to Csharp trill for two bars etc (i think that's in Evening song on the Grade 5 syllabus)..... even a proffessional clarinet player struggles to make that sound good. i've never looked into the Aussie exam syllabus, but i'm with Diz here- do the exams, but lots of other stuff too......
donald
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Author: Jeff
Date: 2002-05-08 10:42
Diz brings up a very good point with regard to playing duets. I went in to many, many lessons feeling horrible with regard to my tone quality. I always left sounding like a million bucks (USD).......... after playing a duet or two with my teacher. I assume I was developing (slowly) a tonal concept. She always told me a sound wouldn't come out of an instrument until it was crystal clear in a persons head. Among the many other things duet playing teaches, it also reinforces and/or reminds a student of a good tone quality until one is solidly developed.
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Author: gemmaelizabeth
Date: 2002-05-08 10:49
thats all great. But over here in Britain, if you don't have alot of money, then you have to learn your instrument in school. Now I had 40 minute lessons once a week, and there was only time for me to prepare for exam pieces, as i realised very early on I wanted to follow the music path. To get into Music School you need to have Grade 8. So when I started playing, I had to follow the grade routes, 2, 5, 5 theory, 7 and 8 and thats also including my actual music exams in school which there was three of, Standard Grade, Higher and Sixth Year Study. So really it depends what situation you are in as to whether as a teacher you can spend time on duets and such like! Not all of us players were so priviledged. As it turned out, my playing was good, but because I only had 40 minutes a week, my scales were rotten!!! Had MY teacher thrown away the syllabus, I dare say I would not be where I am now!!!
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2002-05-08 12:39
gemmaelizabeth wrote
>
> playing was good, but because I only had 40 minutes a week, my
> scales were rotten!!!
Bad excuse. Most kids here in the US are lucky if their parents will spend the money for 30 minute/week lessons, and many if not most schools do not include private lessons on the instruments (none of the schools my kids have attended have had one-on-one lessons).
And they learn all their scales, etudes, etc. It's called at-home practice.
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Author: janlynn
Date: 2002-05-08 14:10
im not a 'real' teacher (yet but ive been teaching my neices approximately 2 years. can someone suggest a duet book for beginners?
thanks
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Author: gemmaelizabeth
Date: 2002-05-08 17:37
This thread isn't a competition about who gets the least lessons times in the world Mark.... its about whether you should throw away the syllabus and teach kids things they will need to know. Like sight reading and playing together with someone, intonation, tone etc,,,,,, and all I was saying was that this is all very good if you have the time on top of the pieces that need preparing for exams....and in 40 minutes there simply isn't enough time to cover everything. My point about my scales being rotten was - I didn't have enough time to cover everything in the syllabus, therefore I would not have had time to do the things that would have been really important. Such as sight reading and duets etc. To imply that I couldn't do my scales because I didn't do enough home practise is OUTRAGEOUS! Practise works if you know how to. And I did not know how to tackle scales and practise them, because there wasn't enough time in my lessons.
I get hour long lessons now at music school. And when I first started, my scales weren't very good. But then my teacher showed me HOW to practise and they are fine now.
Home practise is needed yes.....but kids need GUIDANCE FIRST!
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Author: Jacy
Date: 2002-05-08 20:28
In the 7 years that I took piano lessons (and the few months that I've taken clarinet lessons), never once has the emphasis of the lessons been on scale skills. All my music teachers have listened to me play one or two of the harder scales, told me what I was doing wrong, scribbled some fingerings in my books, then told me to PRACTICE AT HOME. 1/2 hour lessons have always been adequate for me on both instruments unless there was an upcoming exam or audition; probably because the lesson time was used efficently on actual repetoire and sight reading, not scales. After all, playing scales is pretty much about muscle memory and knowing your alternate fingerings...you don't really need lessons for that.
Back to the syllabus issue...The Royal Conservatory syllabi, in particular the ones for orchestral instruments, are best used to associate certain technical skills with a few pieces so the student and teacher have an idea of what else is appropriate to play. As far as my clarinet teacher is concerned, the syllabus doesn't matter for much else other than metronome markings.
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Author: Ken Shaw
Date: 2002-05-08 22:05
gemmaelizabeth -
My beginning band teacher played the trombone and had no idea what to do with a clarinet, and the scale work he did was confined to the keys of C, F and G. I just hung around with the good players and kept at it.
Young players will play the songs they love and make music if they have the gift for it. I'm sure that's what you do. Talent will find a way, no matter how bad the teacher, and if there's music in you, you will play it at any level.
Best regards.
Ken Shaw
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Author: Katfish
Date: 2002-05-08 22:41
When I was a beginner I was fortunate enough to have an old gentle man who taught as he was taught in Italy at the end of the 1800s.Each lesson after Baermann III, Langenus, and Pasquale Bona, came the duets. To me it was like dessert after eating your vegatables. You learn so much from playing duets, plus they're fun. I was fortunate to have a college teacher who ended every lesson by sightreading duets with me. It taught me to sightread well; that and having played in a high school band that spent half of its rehearsal sightreading.
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Author: diz
Date: 2002-05-08 22:47
If any of you had bothered to read my posting you'll see that my information probe relates to how you are taught, not whether you spend time in lessons playing duets. Further, my comment was are teachers who follow a syllabus exclusively doing their students a dis-service or NOT. I did NOT at any stage state that either approach was good or bad, but asked for your experiences (anecdotes).
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Author: diz
Date: 2002-05-08 22:50
Damn! I should never write a posting until I've had my second coffee for the morning ... I apologise if the above missive sounds a little "surly" - I didn't mean it to.
thanks
diz, sydney
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Author: diz
Date: 2002-05-08 22:59
janlynn ... you wrote asking about a book with duets. Well, I was taught clarinet way back in the 70s and in those days teaching methods weren't as comprehensive as now. But, nevertheless, my teacher (for better or worse) taught me from Tune A Day (3 books) when I was in my first couple of years then Lazarus (also 3 books). The Lazarus has a heap of excellent and challenging duets (as does Tune A Day). My only criticism of the Lazarus duets is that they all seemed to be in c major. My teacher transposed quite a few of them into various other "nasty" keys.
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Author: Bob Arney
Date: 2002-05-08 23:33
Oh, common diz, admit you meant it. After all, do you want me to change my opinion of you? Heh Heh ;-] Maybe you should have put it in verse? People don't READ things anymore, they just grab at an impression and exploit their own ideas (me included). What is it you Aussies say, "English as she should bespoke"?
Bob A
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Author: Bob Arney
Date: 2002-05-08 23:33
Oh, common diz, admit you meant it. After all, do you want me to change my opinion of you? Heh Heh ;-] Maybe you should have put it in verse? People don't READ things anymore, they just grab at an impression and exploit their own ideas (me included). What is it you Aussies say, "English as she should bespoke"?
Bob A
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Author: graham
Date: 2002-05-09 10:52
A series of examinations are useful for:
1. Undermotivated kids who need milestones in order to practice at all.
2. Kids motivated by a competitive environment and must have a scheme for measuring themselves against others.
3. Getting parents to think that something is being achieved and they are not wasting money and time.
4. Making instrumental teaching fit into a school environment.
5. Where upper grades are concerned (e.g. grade 8 in UK) for sorting sheep from goats prior to music college auditions.
That is quite a substantial set of considerations. But for the pupil who is motivated by a real enjoyment of playing, exams and grades are a frustrating distraction, and the teacher that fails to recognise the need for much much more for such pupils doees indeed do the pupil a disservice. I did all my best serious playing development after taking grade 8, and I could not wait to be shot of the wretched exams.
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Author: David Dow Symphony NB
Date: 2002-05-09 11:57
If you have a really good grasp of teaching and instrumental technique the syllabus is a kind of dead end for those who have no imagination. In fact just going at grade level to grade level is only a bust for the musically uninspired, the student/teacher relationship has to also be grounded on the love of learning and making music, much of the time we spend on basics is lost if the student tries things outside his/her level. It is also something of an industry to have Royal Conservatory exams here in Canada, something of a throwback to a more industrialized way of thinking about the aspect of learning. Tests are important, but they are tests, grade level is only good if the student wants to know where they stand....I agree that the whole process is basically good to have Royal Conservatory exams but only in doses that promote real learning and love of the instrument....
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