Your questions answered #1
What method? What notation app? How to do creativity and repertoire in one lesson?
“I don’t know where to start. Is there a method I can follow?”
If you’ve never improvised before I’d recommend playing through Forrest Kinney’s Create First series. These are simple and clearly explained improvisations that come with video demonstrations. Check out my exploration below:
If you have improvised but have never taught improvisation before, then the Duets version of Forrest Kinney’s Create First is a reliable option.
Another excellent method book for creativity is Piano By Ear by Lucinda Mackworth Young.
If you’d like to dip your toes into teaching creatively, check out Alison Mathews’ excellent book Doodles. This is a sight-reading book that has miniature creativity suggestions for almost every exercise. It’s great!
“Can you recommend a notation app that work on iPads?”
Although I like my iPad for reading notation, I don’t use it for writing notation. There are various iPad notation apps, including ones from big brands like Sibelius and Dorico but I’ve honestly not found one that I enjoy using.
If I want to write notation when teaching away from my studio, I tend to use good old manuscript paper. I find that it’s quicker to use. I also find it easier to involve students.
When teaching in my studio I use the free Musescore software on my Macbook with a miniature MIDI keyboard. I like it because it’s free so there are no barriers for students. I appreciate that the note input system is simple.
On top of that, I like it simply because I’ve used it for such a long time that it just feels natural. If there was a Musescore notation writing app for the iPad, I’d be more inclined to use it.* I mention this because if you already have a favourite app for your desktop computer — maybe you just need to try out their iPad version?
(*There is a Musescore app for the iPad but it doesn’t allow you to write your own notation, only to browse the pre-existing scores on MuseScore.com.)
“I worry that if I spend too much time on creativity in the lesson, they don’t learn as much repertoire during the lesson so have little to practice at home.”
I used to worry about this too.
Nowadays I don’t worry about it much because I’ve adopted a less time-intensive method for teaching repertoire. This new method shifts more onus to learn the repertoire onto the student, which:
improves their sight-reading skills
improves their analytical skills
makes them more independent learners
gets them thinking about practise strategy
Most importantly, it frees up more time for creativity.
When I first started teaching I spent a lot of lesson time ensuring a student thoroughly understood all parts of the repertoire we were studying and would often practise the repertoire in detail with them. Nowadays I tend to:
help them briefly analyse the piece
get them to briefly sight-read hands separately whatever section we’re studying, often while I play the other hand. At this point I often write in suggested fingerings
help them identify any tricky areas and suggest a practise strategy for it
demonstrate areas that require specific techniques that aren’t immediately obvious in the notation and assign a short related technical exercise
assign a practise goal, that usually looks something like “be able to play musically bars 1-16 hands separately without mistakes or hesitating, and try playing it hands together”. I often also encourage them to find performances of the repertoire on YouTube and think about why they like their preferred version
This process might take anywhere between 10-20 minutes, depending on the complexity of the piece, but usually more like 10 minutes. In the next lesson I review their work in detail in the next lesson and we discuss the effectiveness of their practise method.
The method is very demanding on the student. It is not suitable for everyone and I use a less intense version with some students. The less intense version gives them more opportunity to have guided practise during the lesson.
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I really enjoyed writing this article. Please do send me your questions!