I'm writing from my comfy couch, looking out on an April snowstorm....not an uncommon occurrence in Colorado, but always a shock to the system when it follows an 80-degree day -- although that, too, is not uncommon.
This week's blog post subject material is courtesy of a conversation from yesterday with one of AKI's own...with a little help from church this morning.
In yesterday's conversation, we were discussing our respective "fatal flaws" -- the thing we just can't stop doing, even though we'd like to change it. Everyone has one (or several...), and chances are that you know about them in both yourself and other people. In fact, to some extent, we are even known by our flaws, and they actually become a part of our identity....it happens in choirs and classrooms all the time. You know the part in X piece where that one person always makes a mistake, and you can take a good guess at which kid turned in a paper without a name on it by looking at which answers are incorrect.
In a sense, when we Kodály types talk about going from the known to the unknown, we're dealing with an outward manifestation of an inward process: as we know ourselves and our strengths more thoroughly, we are better able to ascertain when we understand a concept, and we're able to demonstrate what we know in varying ways. Group dynamics and blind luck can disguise what is understood and what is not, and in the classroom, this happens all the time -- in fact, it is infrequent to be observed from the outside in a way that is identical to what's going on inside. If this is true, then all education is really self-education, because only the individual truly knows what he or she understands. And, similarly, when I teach you, I'm bound to start by teaching you as if you were me with all the flaws and strengths I recognize in myself. Hopefully, over time and by watching others, a teacher cultivates a more extensive bag of tricks than only what is effective for him/herself, but we all probably default to using ourselves as a point of departure. We are always our own first student.
So, all of that being said, I invite you to plot your own course for this week's assignment. Do what you know you need to do to be successful with this material. Make a note of what works for you and what doesn't. Be creative. Increasing your own self-knowledge is the name of the game.
Rising Level 2's
Take a look at this bicinia by Orlando di Lasso:
....and this lovely Brahms piece (you may know it in another form, with German text, as the second movement of his motet "Warum ist das Licht gegeben")
What is easy about each piece? What is difficult? Do they behave how you expect them to behave? If not, how will you cope? Creativity in practice is encouraged.
Rising Level 3's
Take a look at these pieces:
Sometimes you'll want to be in the key notated, sometimes a fifth away...I'll leave it in your capable hands to decide.
Rising Level 4's
Take a look at the chromaticism in these pieces:
What can you do to make the chromaticism seem less forbidding?
Now get out there, and show your flaws who's boss!
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