Michael Joviala

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  • Leading and Following

    Because music is often a social activity, the Dalcroze classroom is a great opportunity for kids to experiment with roles that will also be important for them as they move through life. From early childhood on, I like to give them experiences of leading, following, working with a partner and being a member of a large group, all roles good musicians navigate with ease.

    Very young children (3 and 4) delight in performing an action that causes a reaction from the whole group. In our classes, they participate with an adult. After a story about a cat that pounces on a mouse, I can ask the group to watch a single child jump and clap just as she lands on the ground. The expression on the child’s face when she realizes the power she has is absolutely priceless. 

    At ages 4 and 5, children are such natural followers that, when asked to become the engine of a train, they will very often simply end up following the caboose. I gently direct them to create a winding path in the room, so that the train actually goes somewhere. As they go the music matches their movements as closely as possible, giving them a more concrete experience of their own tempo choices. Of course, when they speed up, it is easy for many children to lose track of the ones following them as they become caught up in the thrill of the moment. If their train falls apart, we regroup and I encourage them to carefully lead the cars so that the train stays together, and the passengers safely arrive at their destination.

    Once they become skilled at this, they are ready to lead a partner in a room full of pairs making independent choices. We become taxi drivers and passengers, and an observer stepping into the room would see (on a good day!) many different things happening: taxis driving alone and with a passenger, stopping for red lights, going slowly in traffic or on the expressway, and many other surprises the children come up with on the spot. This might be done without music at first, so that I can narrate what I see, helping the children become aware of possibilities other than their usual favorites. Later we can all synchronize the game to music to give us the experience of phrase.

    Beginning around 6 years old, children become more interested in (and capable) of working in pairs or small groups. I want them to experience the difference between working alone, working with a partbner and working with the whole group. One simple game we might play is to walk alone when they hear a single melody from the piano, move with a partner when that melody is harmonized with another line, and move together as a group when I play with full chords. For older children (7-9) this can be extended in to counterpoint. When the two voices are parallel they maintain the same distance from their partner; when the two voices move in contrary motion they move away from or toward their partner. To perform the activity well, they must be attuned to each other and make many subtle movement choices together. This is actually the essence of playing music with others. 

    I also make time to improvise freely with different combinations of non-pitched percussion instruments in solos, duets, trios and whole ensemble configurations. While I do make time to play specific rhythms we might be working on in class, I also want the children to be able to experiment freely. At 5 or 6 years old, I start with duets with me, allowing the child to choose a preferred percussion instrument (triangle, finger cymbal, claves, etc.) I turn this into a leading/following game with simple prompts such as, “Play only when I am not playing,” or even, “Play only when I am playing.” If I allow freedom, I must accept what they play, but by the time we’ve gotten around the circle, each child has given us an opportunity to hear different kinds of music: loud, soft, fast, slow, careful, reckless… I consider this expression a way of leading, too. 

    Michael

    3/1/13

  • Register And Scale

    Translating musical phenomena into verbal language can be tricky. Most adults are familiar with the use of the words high and low as applied to musical pitch. Specifically, these words refer to the frequency of the musical tone: higher tones have a more frequent wavelength than lower tones. When physicalizing these concepts, we take advantage of the spatial meanings of high and low, which refer to points in space. While adults may take this type of synesthesia (mapping one sense onto another) for granted, these concepts may be beyond the immediate intellectual grasp of young children. In the Dalcroze classroom, physical experiences can draw their attention to this elemental musical phenomenon. Almost immediately, they usually demonstrate awareness of high and low by making gestures that are physically high or low.

    To further encourage this kind of perception, we might go apple picking. As they walk around the apple orchard, accented sounds in the upper register of the piano ask them to “pick” an apple from way up high in the tree. Accents in the lower register ask them to scoop apples up from the ground. This focuses their awareness on the general registers of the piano: high, middle and low.

    We can then branch out from these large categories of pitch. From day one, we stand up as I sing the scale. Eventually, even if they are lying on the ground, I can simply play a harmonized scale and they will stand up.

    For the minor scale, I enjoy using a poem called “The Little Man Who Wasn’t There,” set to the natural minor scale, as a way to apply the idea of scale to a dramatic situation. As the melody slowly ascends the minor scale (this is the version I sing; there are also old swing band renditions of this poem), a mystery unfolds.

    For older children, we can dip our toes into scales other than major and minor. Using the xylophone, they are asked to choose a starting note other than C and climb up eight steps (as the song does). Each new starting point provides a different scale, known as a mode. If I accompany them on the piano, they can get a real taste of Lydian (F to F on the white notes) or Dorian (D to D on the white notes). Each one has a very different feeling, and I like to give children an aural experience of them, even if they are not quite ready to grasp the music theory. As they play up the new scale on the xylophone, the class shows the man “climbing up the stairs.”

    • As I was walking
      • up the stairs I
        • met a man who
          • was not there. He
            • wasn’t there a-
              • gain today I
                • wish I wish he’d
                  • go away…

    (repeat descending…)

    Source: youtube.com via Michael on Pinterest

  • Exploring Meter

    A primary focus areas in the beginning of the year is the subject of meter (with subtle differences this is also known as ‘measure’ and ‘time signature’). Meter can be defined as the grouping of beats into 2’s, 3’s and 4’s. (They can be larger, too!) Usually the first beat of the group is felt as a stressed or accented beat, and in the Dalcroze work we also recognize and explores the qualities of the other beats in the grouping (this subject is referred to as ‘measure shape’).

    For children, I first look for ways to give them an experience of accent: squirrels jump from branch to branch, subway cars bounce, jack-in-the-boxes spring… These experiences lead to activities involving recurring patterns of accent, one of the hallmarks of meter. The 4-5 year-olds mostly work with groupings of two beats, but I often find myself stretching out to three and four with adept groups. A story of giant building a house gives them an opportunity to chop down trees, saw wood, and hammer nails, all with accompaniment in two. Ball passing games in which they raise the ball high before passing to their neighbor give them an experience of not only feeling the accented beat, but also the building energy that leads to the accent (called the anacrusis). After these experiences, the children are given a chance to invent their own patterns with two, three and four parts on percussion instruments.

    5-6 year-olds can also try slightly more advanced games. I might ask them to move alone if they hear no metrical pattern, move with a partner if the music is in two, and come together as a group if the music was is in three or four. This is a challenging listening and cognition task, but with a little coaching, most groups are able to accomplish this!

    In addition to the songs we sing, I regularly slip music from the classical literature into the classes whenever possible (see list below). After the movement stories, we usually have a cool-down rest period, and if they are relaxed enough (i.e. if I have worn them out!), they are often more than willing to simply lie on the floor and listen. I don’t talk about the pieces, but they would likely recognize them if they heard them on a recording.

    Here are some of the pieces I use regularly:

    1. Far Away Places, #1 from Kinderszenen (Childhood Scenes) by Robert Schumann

    2. Entreating Child, #4 also from Kinderszenen

    3. Sleeping Beauty’s Pavanne, from the Mother Goose Suite by Maurice Ravel

    4. Royal March from Carnival of the Animals, by Saint Seans

    I have been using this last selection in a ball passing game that emphasizes the strong ‘two-ness’ of this piece, along with the exciting chromatic swirls that occur in the middle section. This has been a new invention this year! For extra practice, put on almost any kind of  music (jazz, classical, pop – most kinds of music use meter), and try to find first that recurring cycle of beats with your child.

  • Curriculum Focus: Attention

    One of the most important aspects of the Dalcroze work is the training and development of attention. There are many different forms of attention: focused, sustained, selective, divided, alternating have been identified by motor learning researchers. Like many other motor activities, music utilizes all of them, and in the Dalcroze class we attempt to foster the development of all forms of attention.
    When we think of attention and music, we are likely to think of the kind of focused and sustained attention necessary to perform a complex piece of music. But there are other kinds of attentional demands for musicians as well. This week I have been enjoying an activity with the children that demands the kind of attention that might be beneficial if one were reading music in an ensemble. Studies show that experts in a motor activity are better able than novices to selectively attend to incoming stimuli. This can certainly be true in musical endeavors when sight reading, for example, or perhaps when executing a group tempo change while playing in a string quartet.
    This week, I am experimenting with a ball rolling activity with the children, using the famous 2nd movement of Haydn’s surprise symphony with this game. I roll a ball to a student, and simply ask that she roll it back to me. My movements are timed with the phrases, and I attempt to match the way I roll it with the character of the phrase happening at the moment. Many of the students naturally pick up on this, and do the same to the best of their ability. The piece has many changes of dynamics, textures and numbers of instruments playing. To draw their attention to this fact, I introduce a second ball into the group when the dynamics increase, and when there are many things happening in the piece, a third ball. When the music is moving quickly with many voices (contrapuntally active, in tech-speak), the balls are rolling fast and furious, usually to the great hilarity of the children. The kids must be ready for a ball at any time, as I tend not have a pattern, though I do try to make my intentions clear. This is the improvisatory element of the game.
    In any case, their selective focus is hopefully being strengthened while they are being introduced to a great piece of music. If you’d like to put it on at home, it is the second movement of Haydn’s Symphony No. 94 in G major. You could, of course, try this game with any music that has lots of changes of character.
    Experiment and let us know what music you have enjoyed!