1. In aural skills class, a student of mine--a sophomore music major--just finished singing a melody. She sung it quite well: pitch and rhythm were quite good. My only complaint was that the melody was marked Adagio and she sang it at a fairly brisk pace. I asked her if she knew what Adagio meant, to which she responded "I have no idea."
Surprised by that exchange, I gave the class a quiz the next day:
Arrange the following tempo terms in order from slowest to fastest:
Presto Adagio Allegro Allegretto Largo Andante
The results worried me: about half the class earned 100%; the other half, not so good (to put it mildly). I had just assumed that they would've been exposed to these terms in ensemble, or private lessons, or music history, or any number of other places. Clearly they have not been, or if they have been, they certainly didn't stick.
2. On the sophomore harmony midterm, I asked students to describe briefly the texture of a movement for string quartet by Webern (op. 28, II, for those of you playing along at home). I had a spectacularly wide range of answers that touched on everything but (what I understand as) texture. Students mentioned dynamics, instrumentation, rhythm, rests, set classes, and more.
When I think of texture, the words that immediately come to mind are monophonic (a single, unaccompanied melodic line); homophonic, which I break down into song style/melody+accompaniment and homorhythmic (i.e., Bach chorale); and polyphonic (multiple independent lines sounding more or less simultaneously). I offer "imitative" as a sub-category of polyphony. As we went over the test, I asked my students if they had ever encountered any of these words in their musical travels. I was met with 27 blank stares. Whether or not they encountered them, clearly they didn't stick.
Here again is a concept that I don't know is the domain of "music theory," per se: I learned about it in music history class (heck, Kamien's music appreciation textbook--as well as many others--teach this early and very clearly).
Should we be teaching the students about tempo terms, texture, putting verbs in sentences, etc., etc., etc.? If not, where else are they going to get it?
I'm thinking more and more about the possibility of a first semester intro to musicianship class that would be required of all students and that would get some of this business out of the way (along with the putting verbs in sentences, general issues of responsibility, and the like).
It seems to me, too, that students are very compartmental. If I learn it in theory class, how could it possibly relate to music history class, or my private lesson? Those are, after all, different things that take place in different rooms with different people at different times.
Thoughts? Similar experiences?
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5 comments:
That's a good idea, but rather than making it required of all music students, you might consider having a placement test. That's what my school does--it calls the introductory course "pre-theory."
And the idea of not carrying ideas across different courses seems completely foreign to me. I attend a liberal arts college, and attaining interdisciplanary knowledge is the entire point.
"I'm thinking more and more about the possibility of a first semester intro to musicianship class that would be required of all students and that would get some of this business out of the way (along with the putting verbs in sentences, general issues of responsibility, and the like)."
This (especially the latter half of the sentence) is precisely what we address in the MUSI1200 "Introduction to Research and Style Analysis" class. I would put forth, however, that metronome markings and interpretive indications are/can be *precisely* the purview of music theory as well as music history.
And yes, they do compartmentalize.
One of the things I'm implementing next year is five days a week of theory. I'll be using the additional time to:
(1) Reinforce concepts
(2) Provide more in-class time for analysis and discussion
(3) Talk about literature, style, all those tangible and intangible aspects of music and musicianship that somehow get lost in the shuffle
(4) Beat the kids into submission (I'm kidding - mostly).
I really do believe it all depends on how your teachers have been up to the beginning of college. There is a disturbing number of completely inept band/choral/orchestra directors and piano teachers out there. The best we can do is to teach kids the good stuff, and hope it takes when *they're* the ones teaching.
WF
I am a teacher with over 37 years of experience. One of the first things that I learned was never to assume that students KNOW anything. It was reinforced this year when one of my students started walking on the tables in the classroom. It was determined that he never had a classroom experience and no one ever taught him that you don't walk on the tables. Now wouldn't you assume that everyone knows that?
This reminds me a of a couple things we're talking about in my music theory ped. class this semester. One is that a lot of schools separate classes into written vs. dictation vs. sight-singing classes, and other variations, and that everyone assumes kids are learning _______ in their other class. Rhythm was our class's example of this - for intro students, is it covered in written class? Or in ear training class? How do you teach it in the first place? Texture seems like a prime example of one of those things, instrumentation or timbre might be another.
My other comment is that, one thing I love about teaching aural skills is that you can ask them to use their "written theory brain" and their ears at the same time when they get stuck. If my students have a harmonic dictation and they can't figure out which chord their hearing, I can ask them to think of the context, the phrase model, and what they think would logically come next - predominant, dominant, etc. I'm sure you things like this, too. It can be challenging to intertwine class materials like that, and I share your frustration when my students say "I can think about that and try to hear it at the same time when I'm in ear training class."
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