Book Guide

Instrument Basics are quick tip reminders of what students learn in the majority of the instrument video lessons.

The Musical Alphabet is spoken through forwards and backwards at the beginning of instruction. It is reinforced that forwards = up and backwards = down.

Rhythm Patterns are chanted on the word “BAH” (with inflection) before ever seeing or discussing music notation. This is done as a call and response. A simple description of one circle (notehead) equals one “BAH” is all most students need to recognize these patterns.

The First Five Notes and visual aid are used to relate the instrument to the musical alphabet.

Duple & Triple Songs ideally are learned aurally/orally on “BUM”, then on solfege syllables, and finally on the instrument. This happens before seeing them written in solfege.

The Chromatic Scale should also be learned about the midpoint of the first year and by rote without this visual aid. Once students have an idea of it, the fingering chart will assist them rather than being a dependent tool. When using this page, students should look at the letter while hearing and feeling the tone. By learning this, students begin to understand how music works (this leads to the circle of 4ths in year 2), they begin to learn their instrument and not just how to decode notation, and their ears begin listening more closely to pitch discrepancies. By the end of the first year and into the second, students begin learning the major and minor scales. This is a simple task once they already know how to play most tones on their instruments. It is just a matter of organizing them into specific ways.