The Red Sea

Happy Easter!  Happy Passover!  Happy Spring!

Predictably, it's been a crazy week -- not only was it Holy Week (meaning that I have spent large portions of the last seven days here, working with some of the best people I know.  It's been exhausting, but also wonderful -- Holy Week in high church mode has always felt so full of magic to me, so rich with imagery and drama, and it never really fails to capture my imagination.), but....

I passed my final DMA orals this past Tuesday, which means that my five committee members have agreed that I will be graduating on Thursday, May 10....and they officially gave me leave to start calling myself "Doctor".  !!!!!

So, now I have many loose ends to tie up (revisions, finishing up editing projects, etc.), but my trajectory towards graduation has been confirmed.  This, in turn, means that I need to figure out what's next -- I need to find a job, figure out what to do with my living situation, and generally prepare myself for life after my terminal degree.  GULP.

To be honest, I guess I started thinking of the completion of my DMA like my own personal Red Sea somewhere along the line.  I got so wrapped up in the student life I've known for many years now that I guess I never quite expected it to end -- I mean, I did, but I convinced myself it'd happen to a me that would be much wiser and more prepared than the me I am currently feels.  This theoretical person would be ready for all that post-student life demands and offers, and she would step proudly across the graduation stage and listen as her advisor announced her extremely well-conceived future plans to the people in the auditorium, and smile serenely, knowing that all was as it should be.  The reality is that for me, everything is still very much up in the air.  It's early yet, and I made the conscious decision to focus first on finishing, and second on finding a job for next year, which is all very logical -- one has to be certain one will have a doctorate before one applies to positions that require one to have a doctorate.  But now, the Red Sea is parting....the miracle of graduation is about to occur, and I have no idea what awaits me on the other shore (not to mention the chariots who are giving chase....in my case, they're not people, but student loans and my perceptions of others' expectations of me).  It's time for me to walk through, and I don't know what's going to happen, and sometimes this makes me extremely anxious.

So, Holy Week came along in the middle of my misgivings, accompanied by a flare of an old back injury that slowed me down enough to remind me to be careful and make me think.  Holy Week, with all of its stories and rituals -- all of which I've heard and seen before, but part of the Red Sea story really sucker-punched me this time around.  In the story, the Israelites have made their escape from slavery, and they're up against the Red Sea, and now all of a sudden, they're being pursued by their former captors.  They do what we all sometimes do: they freak out.  They start talking crazy.  They start saying they wished they never tried to leave.  Then, in comes a message: RELAX.  They get that call that I really wish would come in for me -- they get told that all they have to do is keep still, and that their battle will be fought for them.

I don't really expect that someone else is going to find me a job or pay off my student debt or any of that (although if anyone out there would like to make either or both of those things happen for me, I will not say you nay!).  However, the story still rings true, and it's true for everyone.  If you're in a situation that you know to be unsustainable, and you make a choice to change it, it's true that it might be really difficult for awhile.  It is also true that unsustainable is unsustainable, and when it's time to go, it's time to go.  There's no getting around it, and no point in trying to beat yourself up for not being willing to stay where you don't belong.  I have no doubt that now is the time for me to graduate and move on with my life.  The fact that I'm not sure exactly what that looks like does freak me out, but the fear doesn't change my certainty that I'm doing what I have to do.  I wish I could do more to ensure my future, but for now, this is it.  I'm doing the work to go to someplace unknown, even though it's unknown and scary, and I have to trust that I wouldn't be so certain if something wasn't going to come meet me halfway.

Ok, so now for the big solfa tie-in...why do we sometimes stagnate in our musicianship studies?  Well, I think sometimes it's because we're afraid of what we could do if we didn't have the obstacles we've come to rely upon as compass points.  We've convinced ourselves that we need limitations, we need to be afraid of harmonic dictation or Roman numeral analysis or sight-singing or using the keyboard, because those limitations tell us who we are.  And, these kinds of limitations are self-fulfilling prophecies -- if you tell yourself you can't play the piano, you're right, you probably can't.  However, if you were willing to start chipping away at the thing you believe you can't do, if you started making friends with your abilities as they are right now and doing careful, thoughtful, compassionate work in order to build upon them, you would grow.  You would become someone new.  You might not even recognize yourself....and believe it or not, that could be ok, because you would recognize yourself again in time.  You could re-draw your own borders, and make a whole new map of what you can do.

All Levels:


Spend your first 15-minute practice session doing a little soul-searching.  What is it that you think you can't do in the world of musicianship?  Write it down.  I challenge you to be vulnerable and honest in your diagnosis -- no one has to know but you.  If you can't get your head around it the first day, sleep on it, and come back to it.

Once you know what you'd like to work on, look back on some old posts:

http://49weeksofsolfa.blogspot.com/2011/09/body-remembers.html

http://49weeksofsolfa.blogspot.com/2011/09/like-cures-like.html

(etc.)

 to find some concrete suggestions for activities, or feel free to design your own course of study.

In even just a week's time, I bet you'll find you were able to make some headway.  Give it more time, though.  Don't be afraid.  The you you never thought you could be (the you who does flawless sing-and-plays or lightning-quick analysis or crackerjack sight-singing) is waiting on the other shore.

Balance

Welcome, dear readers!

Spring-like weather is tentatively continuing here in Denver...I am attempting to remain skeptical, but all these sunny days have my hopes running sky-high for real spring!  My journey to Phoenix later this week will probably only make it harder to keep my spring fever at bay, since they're expecting high 70's and 80's.  I plan to bask unapologetically the entire time I'm there -- will any of you be joining the big OAKE party?  If so, let me know, and let's catch up!

Thinking about the weather is an extremely pleasant distraction from the rigors of degree-finishing and future-forging that occupy most of my head-space at the moment.  It's an interesting time, and my hopes are high -- I'm lucky to have good support from my faculty, and I believe that good things are on their way, employment-wise.  Keeping the sense of urgency at bay is hard, sometimes too hard, and panic kicks me around the schoolyard and steals my sleep (like so much lunch money) and makes me feel like I'd better get my hands on a refrigerator box ASAP.  And then, I'm lucky again...my dear friends help me piece my sense of well-being back together and remind me that sometimes I just need a good night's sleep and maybe an afternoon off...and having those things will not prevent me from getting everything done.

I'm sure I am not at all alone in this.  The middle path is difficult to keep track of, and I'm not really sure why.  It's just too easy to run to extremes -- enough somehow usually doesn't seem like enough.  It's too big an issue for one little blog, really.  But, a funny thing I caught myself doing two times today is sort of the inspiration for this week's assignment.  Immediately upon both church services finishing, I made for the out-of-doors and immediately did something extremely silly -- skipping in my choir robe, quoting this movie, maniacal giggling, you get the idea.  Why?  Not because I disliked the services (I actually like the services and the music quite a bit), but because I had to behave myself just so for a certain period of time, causing a backlog of silliness that demanded to be set free the moment such a thing became possible.  It felt good (like the proper resolution of a V7 or a 4-3 suspension), no one seemed to be the worse for wear, and balance was restored to my little corner of the universe.  So, in that vein...

Rising Level 2's


Here's a little gem for you:

http://www2.cpdl.org/wiki/images/5/53/Praetorius_-_Wie_schoen_leuchtet.pdf

We've dealt with this tune before, so hopefully it sounds a little familiar to you, though the rhythmic language of this setting is a bit more complex than what we've worked on before.

Therefore, start with the lowest line (extra points if you can tell me a little something about what "Bassus generalis pro organo si placet" means), just so you're not distracted by melodic material.  Determine what meter you're actually in (hint: the top number in the time signature is NOT an 8, and neither should you count in 8), then tap or clap your way through.  Once that feels comfortable enough, sing that bottom line (note the clef changes -- you may choose whatever octave you want to sing in).

Now, go do something silly for five minutes.

At your next practice session, look at the top line and clap/tap your way through.  Try tapping the rhythm with one hand while you conduct with the other.

Now, go do something silly for five minutes.

Next time, sing through that top line.  Note that the B-naturals are just a little chromatic inflection that you will call "fi" -- they shouldn't pose much of a problem.

Guess what?  Go do something silly for five minutes.

Now, tackle the rhythm of the middle line....it's probably the most rhythmically challenging, and conducting along with your tapping is a good idea.

Done?  Good...time for your five-minute break!

Try singing the middle line...like the top line, it has a "fi" here and there, but no worries.

And one more five-minute break!

If you can, find a friend or two to sing through this with....it'll be fun, and then you can take your silly breaks together!

Rising Level 3's


And here's a piece for you:

http://www2.cpdl.org/wiki/images/sheet/scar-exr.pdf

Note that there's a rhythmic error in the next-to-last measure in the alto part -- that last C-sharp should be a whole note, not a half note.

You're going to follow the same general practice-break scheme as the 2's, but your learning procedure will be a little different.

First, look over the piece up to m. 45 and find what material Mr. Scarlatti used imitatively -- basically, you're hunting for motives or themes.  The first one is easy: the opening of the soprano part, which I think you might call Theme A.  Does it happen in other parts?  Is it transposed?  Find and label any repetitions.  Then, find a few more themes like that in between the beginning of the piece and m. 45.

Now, what changes at m. 46 (hint: think texture)?  How are you going to deal with the chromaticism you encounter?  Go back through the whole piece and locate any places you suspect you may need to change keys.

Now, just tackle one vocal line per day.  If you whip through that easily, do a solfa chord analysis of m. 46-end.  Again, singing through the piece with friends could be a lot of fun....

Rising Level 4's


For you guys, something very Lenten and fun:

http://www2.cpdl.org/wiki/images/f/fe/Battishill_o_lord_look_down.pdf

You're also on the alternation-of-work-and-fun plan, like the 2's, and your learning process is going to be rather similar to the 3's.

Begin by looking over the whole piece, noting any divisi and marking any homophonic sections.  Do a cursory examination of the accidentals you encounter, and decide where you might want to change keys.

Now, look over the text and see if you can associate particular themes or motives with textual sections.  Label these motives if you discover them.

Sing through the lines one at a time, paying special attention to intonation in any minor seconds or augmented seconds you encounter.

For fun, using the keyboard score (which is essentially a simplified reduction of the vocal lines), do a Roman numeral analysis of this piece.  Or, if you don't have time for the whole piece, focus on these spots:

mm. 71-86 (in C minor)
m. 107-end (trust the key signature)

Enjoy!

Holding steady

Hello, stalwart solfeggists!

It's been a crazy week in my world, and the weekend has left me with very little room to breathe.  So, this week's installment will be short, but (hopefully) pithy.

In your Ottman book, chapter 18 is all about forbidding-looking rhythms, specifically, those that use very small divisions of the beat.  Recently, I've been teaching some rhythmically challenging pieces in choral contexts, and it's once again come to my attention that many folks use a repetitive physical gesture (foot or hand-tapping, usually) when they encounter any sort of rhythmic difficulty, and they usually try to tap to a pretty small rhythmic value.  I understand the inclination to do this, but I'm quite opposed to it.  Why?

-We tend to be taught as children that our western rhythmic system is based on mathematical operations, and that's not really true (I mean, it's factual in a way to say that rhythm is mathematical, but math is not nearly as influential on our experience of rhythm as we think it is).  Our rhythmic system is extremely influenced by hierarchy, and it is hierarchy that makes a rhythmic pattern feel how it feels to us.  Therefore, if we don't reflect hierarchy in any aid we use to read a rhythm, we're sabotaging ourselves.

-Tapping a small rhythmic value as your "beat" the same way over and over (without any kind of hierarchy) is a recipe for getting lost.  Your brain barely has a fighting chance of keeping track of all that repetitive motion, despite what your sense of security might be trying to tell you.  We tend to feel like we're being more accurate because we're doing something, but the something we're doing in this case is likely to just distract us from inaccuracies.

-Rhythmic patterns aren't made difficult by speed, they're made difficult by unpredictability or unfamiliarity.  So, slowing something far past the point of its intended tempo is probably less useful than we think -- the composer heard it inside her/his head as a pattern that made sense at a given tempo, and if we get too far away from that tempo, the pattern doesn't feel the same way anymore.

-Our brains aren't wired to perceive quick notes as isolated incidents, but rather as elements of a pattern that has a specific interplay within an established hierarchy.

Now, these rules start to fall apart if you start working with some types of early music or 20th/21st-century serialized rhythms or rhythms chosen through chance operations, etc., but the Ottman examples we're dealing with here definitely play by these rules.  So, I'm going to insist on a few things:

1. Conduct.  This doesn't necessarily have to be a traditional hand/arm pattern, but you have to do something with your body that shows the beats of the measure in distinct places AND gives a sense of which beats are strong in the hierarchy of the meter and which are not.  For example, if you were to use your foot in a 2/4 meter, you could decide that your heel touching the ground would be beat 1 and your toe touching the ground would be beat 2.

2. Don't stray too far from the notated tempo.  A conservative tempo is one thing, but if you're thinking in 32nd notes, the rhythm you think you're performing has nothing to do with the actual piece of music the composer wrote (unless it's in 3/32 or some such craziness).

3. If you're struggling with notes and rhythms together, isolate the rhythm.

4. Think in groupings and phrases, not in isolated note values.  Start to see that the last sixteenth note of a beat will feel like a pickup to (or a decoration of) the beat that follows, etc.  Just like in the world of pitches, the magic of rhythmic patterns has everything to do with the relationships being expressed.

5. Trust your body.  Before you begin reading each example, take the time to really ground yourself in the the meter by moving (see item 1).  Once you've started reading, if something seems wrong, see if you can figure out a reason -- it might just be a mistake, or it might be a misplaced metric accent, or an unusual phrase length, etc.  Trust that your body knows how a good, solid 4/4 ought to feel, even if it's slow, and if something happens to upset your expectations, be a good detective and figure out why.

Rising Level 2's

Try your hands/feet/voices at these...ignore any grace notes:

18.1 & 18.2
18.12 & 18.13
18.16
18.17 (make sure you look carefully at the key)
18.22
18.29

Rising Level 3's


Give these your best shot:

18.18
18.19
18.21
18.23
18.25 (don't let the sixteenth rests freak you out)
18.26

Rising Level 4's


Your examples are longer and more complex, so you can spread them out over multiple days as you see fit:


18.30
18.31
18.32
18.34

So, hold steady and don't let the little notes scare you -- they're just a decorative part of the whole, and if you approach them calmly, they'll fall into place.

PS: It looks like I lied about this post being short...sometimes that happens when we get going, I guess...my apologies!

Higher Ground

Hello, Solfa People!

So, courtesy of the 2009 Conspirare holiday album, I've had Stevie Wonder's "Higher Ground" stuck in my head for days, especially the chorus:

I'm so darn glad he let me try it again,
'Cause my last time on earth I lived a whole world of sin,
I'm so glad now I know more than I knew then
Gonna keep on tryin' 'til I reach my highest ground.

It's a good general walking-around tune for sure, and possibly an even better one for this time of year full of freshly-made resolutions.  I get especially black-and-white about my resolutions sometimes, and one little slip-up on one lofty goal or another causes me to abandon the whole effort.  This is more than a little childish, but I think this happens to everyone -- we get terribly dualistic and hard on ourselves, and we sabotage our own best efforts by believing that we have to be completely successful or completely unsuccessful.

So, this post is especially dedicated to those of you who maybe haven't worked on solfa in months and months, or who did it for awhile and got behind, and even to those of you who have been pretty consistent.  It's ok to miss a day, a week, a month....and even missing more than that doesn't mean that you should abandon any idea of working on your skills between now and July.  You can try it again any time -- falling off the wagon can be just an isolated incident.  It doesn't have to be the end of the world.  Every moment is a new chance to start reaching for your highest ground.  In fact, it is only in each moment that we have the chance.  So, forget about what you didn't do yesterday or last week or last month.  Right now still belongs to you.

All Levels


Seek out your Ottman and your tuning fork, and put them someplace visible -- a coffee table or end table might be a good spot.  Remember, you can get your daily 15 minutes of solfa in during the commercial breaks of an hour-long network television show -- you just have to hit the mute button.

Rising Level 2's


Check out these longish examples, and work through one a day.  Be sure to find the key from your tuning fork, and to work intentionally on any snags:

8.44
8.46
9.3
9.15
9.36
9.37

Rising Level 3's


You have the same marching orders as the 2's, but with these examples instead:

14.26 (the D-sharp is "di")
14.28
14.29
14.31
14.32 (despite its ending, this piece is in D)
14.33

For all examples above, I stay in the same key, but you're welcome to experiment with changing if that helps!

Rising Level 4's


Your instructions are also the same as the 2's, and you also get your own examples to play with:

14.38
14.40
14.41
14.42
14.43
14.44

In each case, the choice of whether to change keys or not is up to you!

Carpe diem, my dear students!  It's time to try again.

Bit by bit

Greetings!

It's the first post of 2012, my friends, and I've proclaimed this the year of "One _______ at a time."  As in:

Q. How do you eat an elephant?
A. One bite at a time.

Q. How do you finish a doctorate?
A. One project at a time.

Q. How do you improve your musicianship?
A. One practice session at a time.

There's more, but you get the picture.  You see, January has felt pretty heavy so far, in part because I'm such a future-tripper.  You can probably guess what future-tripping is (I'm borrowing the term from a friend of mine, who wisely advises against it....against future tripping, that is) -- living in some imagined reality that hasn't happened yet and is based on all manner of predictions, assumptions, words we've put in other people's mouths in imagined conversations that have yet to take place, etc.  When I choose to live in this kind of projected reality (a choice I usually don't realize I've made right away), I take on burdens that aren't yet mine to carry...which frequently results in mental exhaustion.

Just to be clear, I don't mean that planning ahead is a bad idea, nor do I think that flying by the seat of one's pants (under the supposed banner of "living in the moment") is the way to reach one's goals.  I believe in long-range planning, in setting out a course and following through.  But, while looking toward the future is one thing, a good thing, living in it rather than the present is a one-way ticket to stress and frustration.  We are best equipped to move toward the future when we live in the present.  This isn't easy, and I haven't met many people who can do this consistently without ongoing reminders.  I know I can't.  I generally have to wear myself to a frazzle with worry before I realize why everything seems so hard -- and it's usually because I'm trying to do everything at once and worry about everything at once instead of taking it one day and one project at a time.

The applications to solfa are pretty obvious.  In fact, this philosophy is a big part of the motivation behind this blog: nobody undergoes a total transformation of their musical abilities in a three-week summer session, no matter how intense.  So, I encourage you to work incrementally and consistently throughout the year, and if you do it, you'll get better.  I don't know this because I can see the future.  I know it because it happened to me, and I've watched it happen to others, bit by bit.

So, let's tackle a biggish piece of music and take it on a little at a time:

Rising Level 2's


Look at this piece:

http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Scores/BWV037-V&P.pdf

Scroll down to page 23 and look at the chorale.

First, look at the melody.  Despite the key signature, I'd advise you to begin in D major.  After the first fermata, A major should work well.  Sing through the melody a phrase at a time, then all the way through.  Sing it through a few times, until it starts to really feel like a melody to you.

Next, look at the bass line.  Lest your eyes go buggy with looking at all the accidentals on the page, realize that D-sharps are "di" in the first phrase only, and "fi" thereafter.  C-natural is "ma" & it only happens in that little chromatically descending passage.  All the other accidentals are either for courtesy or a return to regularly scheduled programming.  Sing it through a few times, until you can follow the melody line out of the corner of your eye while you sing it.

Alto and tenor are next on the agenda, whichever you'd rather sing first.  The alto line is pretty challenging to begin in D, so experiment with A, and possibly also E minor (remembering to call the C-sharp "fi" if you sing in E minor).  Notice all the non-harmonic tones Bach uses...in my opinion, their artful placement is really what separates an A+ four-voice part-writing assignment from truly beautiful music.

Once you get through all four voices, call up a friend and sing through two at a time.  Or, sing one and play another.  Or, if you'd really like to warm the cockles of my heart, get a quartet together and sing through all four parts together!

Rising Level 3's


You'll be working from the same piece, but you'll start on page 9.

http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Scores/BWV037-V&P.pdf

First, the rhythm....you see, J.S. Bach sometimes used a kind of shorthand when notating complicated rhythms in compound meter.  Sometimes this shorthand leaves some room for interpretation, and this piece has several incidences of that.  With few exceptions (and I challenge you to find them), if you think of the dotted quarter as being the beat, but a beat that can sometimes be divided into two equal eighths instead of three, you'll be fine.

Next, look at one voice at a time -- it might be good to start with the one that sits most easily in your voice (octave exchanges are acceptable).  Notice that both voices begin somewhat simply and become more elaborate as the piece continues.  I stay in D major the whole time for both voices.

Once you have a handle on one voice, switch to the other.  If you run into a strange rhythmic snag, see if you can use the other voice to help you decide what to do.

Notice the patterns Bach used in the melismas....they're a lot less predictable than Handel, are they not? It's tricky to get them to sit in the voice....I'm in the middle of learning that the hard way (I'm singing the soprano part in a concert on Jan. 21...say a little prayer for me!).

Rising Level 4's


You, too, will be drinking at Bach's musical font, but you'll start with the opening movement -- the choral bits begin on p. 2.


http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Scores/BWV037-V&P.pdf


Because you all are advanced, I'll leave the key changes up to you.

Begin with the bass voice, and only go as far as Rehearsal B to start with.  Then, look at it in relation to the tenor, alto, and soprano voices.  Is this a strict fugue?  Why or why not?

Cover the ground from Rehearsal B to C next, beginning with the soprano voice this time, and going through the same comparative process.

Finally, work from letter C to the end, again using comparison as you go to help you navigate each line with information from the other lines.

If you like, use the alto/soprano duet at Rehearsal C as a sing/play, and if you had fun with that, do the same with the tenor/bass duet that follows.

Enjoy, my friends, and remember to take it one little bit at a time!

Spellbound

Hello, long-lost solfeggists!!

I've missed you all!

So, the long-dreaded written exams are behind, and the oral exam lies ahead, but I can't start studying up for it just yet because I'm still waiting for the written exam to be read and evaluated.  Part of me is inclined to be extremely anxious about that, but...well, to be honest, I'm just too darn exhausted to work up the energy for a real academic tizzy.  Which, by the by, does not preclude other kinds of tizzies, it seems...

This afternoon, I had the decidedly less-than-pleasant dental experience of my first crown (or as I've euphemistically called it, "tooth tiara").  In the abstract, I am one of those people who really, REALLY dislikes the dentist, but I actually like my current dentist a lot because she takes the time to explain what's going on, and this helps with my generalized anxiety.  So, today, shortly after she numbed me up, my whole body started to tingle and my heart started to race and I had that weird panicky feeling that comes with really bad stage fright or getting caught speeding or using an albuterol inhaler....

And then I realized what it was.  Dental anesthetic contains epinephrine (they use it as a vasoconstrictor to minimize bleeding), and my dentist had told me about it the last time I was there, but only after the shot had caused me to freak out to the point of nausea and to mistake my reaction for my own emotions about the situation.  But, it wasn't my emotions that started the reaction -- I just couldn't rescue myself once I'd already gone over that edge.  And it wasn't my emotions this time either, and I remembered before the physical sensations hijacked my higher processing skills.  I consciously told myself what it was, and was able to ride it out by taking some deep breaths and listening to my iPod.  I caught it before I lost my marbles.  I broke the spell.

A deep satisfaction came over me with that realization, and I got to thinking about how we get ourselves all worked up about things because we forget that our problem might actually be caused by something external or easily fixable or temporary, and we invest so much in the freakout that we can't even use the solution when we see it.  We're afraid to confront it, afraid to take control, because the emotion of the situation has tied our hands, and we can't see that if we simply chose to be present, the power to change things would be ours.  So, for me (and maybe I'm just slow on the uptake for this one), today was a little victory -- Panic may still have a lot more points on the scoreboard, but I know I chalked one up for Team Me today.

Now, like I said above, I might just be a slow learner, but I suspect that most of us struggle with these kinds of emotional spellbindings.  In the world of solfa, one of my goofy classroom quotes is:

"Solfa is just like therapy.  When you talk about your problems, it makes them a lot easier to solve."

I know that's a little silly, but I think it's also a lot true.  How often do we plow over and over and over the same musical ground, refusing to stop, step back, and analyze what's really going on?  It takes discipline to do this, but more than that, it requires presentness.  Your whole brain and heart and body need to be in it together, in the moment.  This is an unusual level of focus -- we don't require it of ourselves very often, and to do so may seem extravagant, wasteful, unnecessary, or at least that's what your rebellious ego might tell you, as it often prefers to be off someplace else, diverting your attention to how you look in your pants today, whether or not you are smart enough, who might think you're talented, blahblahblahblahblah.

So, this week's assignment is a little abstract, which might be a little annoying, but I have a feeling that this might be very worthwhile...

All Levels
In your musical tasks this week, whatever they may be:

Be present.

If you have trouble, stop to assess early, before frustration rears its ugly head.

Rest in the knowledge that you have what you need to be successful.

If you need help, reach out.

Recognize the judgmental voices in your head for what they are.  Listen to them when it's appropriate (in the moment of performance or teaching is probably not the time), but be in charge of what you do about them.

If you need to freak out, freak out.  That's ok, too.

Guest blog!

For this week's blog post, click here:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/9878872/blog%20A.pdf

Enjoy!

The Pilgrim's Progress

My dear fellow travelers:

First, an exciting announcement!  Next week, The Other 49 Weeks of Solfa will host its first appearance of a guest blogger!  Our guest is none other than my own much-loved and revered teacher, Dr. Cetto, who has graciously agreed to cover for me during the week of my dreaded exams.  We're in for a treat, and I'm so grateful for his help!

Over the course of this week, I've continued to immerse myself in exam materials, working with all my might to permeate my poor little brain with everything there is to know about the things I'm supposed to know.  And, I can already tell that it's going to be a tremendous relief in some ways to just finally sit down at that computer in the music library and start typing....I'm sure it'll be a relief to all of you when I finally stop talking about it (insert sheepish grin here).  In the meantime, I'll keep walking my path and doing my work for a few more days until it's Wednesday, and the only thing to do is open the floodgates and see what comes out.  It's sort of like a five-day performance, I guess.  I'm on the spot, I know what I know, and I just have to do it.

This is the nature of a test, and this is the nature of performance.  Perhaps this is why some of what we do as musicians makes us seem so insane to the non-musician world.  We lock ourselves in little rooms and play/sing scales and arpeggios for hours.  We go over the same 4 measures 97 times.  We go over those same 4 measures 97 more times in our private lesson with a person we pay a lot of money to tell us how those 4 measures really ought to sound...97 times!  The outside world has a point: this behavior is pretty darn crazy, but it's for a purpose.  We are on a journey unlike that of a lot of other people.  We live by what our minds and bodies can do to pay homage to the past, create beauty, and evoke emotions in other people, and often we must do it from memory, all alone on a big stage with only our instrument and our wits while a crowd of people sits across from us, waiting to hear and see what we will do.  This is extreme.  This makes Survivor look like a piece of cake.  This is our pilgrim way.

In order to be successful on our journey, we not only have to learn how to do something (for example, play a scale) once, we must learn how to accomplish that task in an infinite sea of musical variables (tempo, key, articulation, fragmentation, ornamentation, dynamics, register, etc.) as we swim in the infinite sea of extra-musical variables (room temperature, crying babies, head colds, low humidity, cell phones, performance anxiety, newspaper reviewers, bad lighting, etc.).  Knowing this makes us the neurotic people that many of us are, and it also means that over-practicing the basics is almost never a bad idea.  It's just part of our pilgrim's progress -- sometimes we're on the Hill of Difficulty, scrambling over boulders and scraping our knees.  Sometimes we're in the Palace Beautiful, putting up our feet.  Sometimes we're in the Slough of Despond, and we have to get a friend to come pull us onto dry land.  But all the while, we know where we're going.  We must keep to the narrow way, the pilgrim way, and trust that we got on the path for a reason.

All of that being said, I want to keep the workload simple and fairly light this week.

Rising Level 2's
Dig up your copy of "Our Tuning Forks, Our Selves" (if you can't find it, you can print yourself a shiny new one from the link on the right side of your screen), and locate your tuning fork.

Take a day to re-acquaint yourself with the methods for finding each key -- if something doesn't make sense, shoot me an email.

Then, on a daily basis, check yourself and your key-finding ability.  Sing songs in your classroom in odd keys that are more difficult to find.  When you're listening to music, get out your fork and see if you can figure out what key it's in (sort of the inverse of the key-finding process).  Ask a friend to randomly test you throughout the week (over the phone works just fine for this task).  Immerse yourself in the world of tonality, and make A440 your mantra for the week...just for fun!

Rising Level 3's
If you know that you have troubles finding keys in a logical, consistent fashion when you're put on the spot, use the same assignment as the rising 2's this week.

However, if you're completely confident in your tuning fork skills, check this out:

http://www.cpdl.org/wiki/images/9/9c/Moza-intr-kyr.pdf

Most of you will recognize this piece by reputation, if not by having sung/played/heard it lots of times.  What you may not know, however, is that the soprano solo (starting in m. 21) and the choral soprano line that immediately follows (mm. 27-32) have everything to do with pilgrimage: they are each a statement of the tonus peregrinus, or the pilgrim tone.  Tonus peregrinus is a psalm tone, used in Christian churches since the middle ages for chanting biblical psalms (a Google search will get you lots of interesting information, I'm certain).  This psalm tone differs from others because the reciting tone (the note used to articulate most of the words in a psalm, usually the same note in both halves of a psalm tone) changes from the first half of the tone to the second half, so those fanciful medieval types gave it a name (peregrinus, the Latin word for "pilgrim") describing that very characteristic.  So, sing through these two passages in a comfortable octave (I recommend B-flat do for that section), then tackle the remainder of the Introit movement (notice that it's a sloooooow movement).  What keys do you expect to visit?  Does the journey in fact take you there?  If you're feeling ambitious, feel free to check out the Kyrie that follows -- it's SO cool, and that way you can try your hand at something a little zippier.

Rising Level 4's
If you have any doubts on the tuning fork front, please avail yourselves of the rising 2's assignment.  However, I have another pilgrim-y treat for you:

http://www2.cpdl.org/wiki/images/0/0e/Bach-suscepit.pdf

If you don't know the Bach Magnificat already, I recommend that you stop whatever you might be doing and go listen to it right, RIGHT now.  I like the John Eliot Gardner recording (though his tempo on this movement is soooooo sloooooow and his "Omnes generationes" might singe your eyebrows if you stand too close to the speakers....though it's really fun at that tempo!).  Anyhow, this piece provides plenty of fodder for sight-singing and key analysis fun.  It's not terribly straightforward, to be honest, and you'll probably find yourself moving within some odd key relationships.  Definitely take the time to listen to at least this movement, as it does all sound beautiful and make sense at the end of the day.  Now, how does this relate to the pilgrim theme?  Well, check out that oboe line.  Compare it to the soprano solos in the link listed for the rising 3's.  Any correlation?  Yup, this, too, is a tonus peregrinus sighting....isn't that neat?

All right, my little pilgrims...good luck to you, and I'll be back in the blogosphere in two weeks!  Cheers, and wish me luck!

Going Through the Motions

Welcome, Solfa Slayers!

Many of you may already know that I have tremendous appreciation for all things Joss Whedon (and I am not particularly concerned with outside judgments of this appreciation, so if you need to roll your eyes, know that it doesn't bother me -- I am, after all, a graduate of K-12 homeschooling AND a person who blogs about solfege on a weekly basis, so coolness is obviously not a central part of my life), and in particular, I LOVE Buffy the Vampire Slayer (the TV series, naturally...I've actually never seen the movie).  Many of you also know (because of my running commentary here and elsewhere) that I'm in the midst of preparing for my written comprehensive exams, which are now 10 days away.  If you've been through this process, you can probably make a good guess about my head-space at the moment, and if you haven't...well, I am in no place to have great perspective right now, but I can tell you this:

I'm doing a lot of stuff right now that feels like it's not accomplishing much.  I'm looking at pieces of information, reading a lot, typing a lot, trying to make sense out of many things, and feeling like I have a skull full of Malt-o-meal rather than a functioning brain.  In fact, I feel like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tO7J2knk4Ew

[For the uninitiated, here's the backdrop.  Buffy (the singing woman...she doesn't usually sing, this is just a special musical episode, for which someone has diligently taught her Julie Andrews' approach to internal r's in English diction) is a vampire slayer, meaning that she was born with super-human strength and fighting ability and it is her sole responsibility to save the world...a lot.  Well, a few months before the time of this episode, Buffy saved the world and died in the process, but then her friends used a powerful spell to resurrect her, because they thought she was trapped in a place of unspeakable torment.  However, Buffy was not where they think she was when she was dead, but instead in a state of bliss and rest, and now she's been yanked back into her daily grind of world-saving and demon-fighting and isn't too pleased.  She hasn't told her friends any of this, though, and none of them can figure out why she seems so disengaged from life.]

My point is that I feel like I'm going through the motions, too.  Unlike Buffy, however, I am not a once-in-a-generation chosen one.  I have the advantage of knowing lots of people who have gone down this road before me.  So, I already know the moral of the story, even though it pains me to admit it:

Just keep going.

Work doesn't always feel satisfying.  Pushing through is sometimes lacking in any kind of immediate reward.  The point is to have faith that the reason you set out down this road is still there someplace, just beyond where you can see.

And, while this is all particularly applicable for my specific situation at the moment, I suspect everyone has been through this kind of thing before.  It can be a real drag...I mean, none of us became artists because we cope well with the feeling that we're just slogging through.  Probably we all hear a lot from folks who work outside the arts that we're lucky, and I agree that we are.  However, that luck does NOT exempt us from this kind of trial-by-sweat-without-much-satisfaction.  Inspiration can be flighty.  Rewards and reinforcement can come too infrequently.  And in those times, sometimes you have to go through the motions, let your body and your discipline take over when your spirit and your emotions are dragging, and trust that your mind and heart will ultimately work themselves out.  What's inside is always changing.  What's outside is always changing.  Even when it doesn't seem like it, what you do in the meantime still always matters.

Rising Level 2's


Begin with a little set-up exercise:

Using your tuning fork, find the key of F major and sing a tonic triad.
Then, sing a V7.
Then, sing the resolution of everything in that V7 that needs to go someplace:
f-m
t,-d
s,-d


Repeat this process in F minor, still remembering to resolve your tendency tones:
r-d
si-l
m,-l


Now, go to Ottman, Chapter 11 and sing through one major (section 1) and one minor (section 2) per day, setting up each example you choose with the exercise above, first in solfa and then in letter names. Believe me, this will make these exercises seem like a piece of cake, and it'll go a long way towards helping you think in fifths, which will come in very handy when we start talking about chromaticism next summer.

Rising Level 3's


Begin with our favorite chromatic scalar exercise:

d   d t, d   r    r di r   m   m ri m  f....etc.,

Sing both the ascending and descending versions, with "wringing" motions at the half steps if you have any trouble with intonation.  If you have lots of trouble, find a friend and get him/her to sing a major scale in long notes along with you to help you stabilize your chromatics.  If you don't have a singing friend handy, as a last resort, you may play the tonic in octaves along with yourself.

Now, try singing the exercise from la instead of do...shazzam!  It's a minor chromatic exercise!

Look at the following Ottman examples:

15.86
15.90
15.92
15.94
15.95

Before you begin singing each example, set it up with the appropriate incarnation (from la or from do) of the chromatic exercise in the key of the example you're singing (if you want, you may use letter names, but that might be more trouble than it's worth).  Scan each melody ahead of time and pay attention to what chromatic syllables you'll need and how they resolve.  Remember to anchor yourself in the diatonic, because (after all) chromaticism is just a splash of color!

Rising Level 4's


Use the set-up exercises outlined for BOTH the rising 2's and 3's, but use these more challenging Ottman examples:

16.39
16.41
16.42
16.44
16.51 (look at the end so you're not tempted to pick too fast a tempo!)

Go through the motions, my friends...sometimes it's the only way to get to the end.

Leadership

Hello, solfa sentinels!

Shorts and sandals begone!  I looked out my window this morning and saw...

the first snow of the season.

No kidding.  The switch has flipped.

So, my mug of mint tea and I got to thinking about this week's blog, and this is what came up:

Leadership.  I find this topic interesting, maybe because so much of my time is spent not being the boss, but definitely being in a position where I feel responsible for the way things go.  I'm the TA, the big sister, the assistant conductor, the section leader, the Girl Friday.  I have come to believe that there is quite an art to this, and while I've spent a good number of years in this kind of role, it's only more recently that I find myself able to comfortably analyze it and cope with everything it means.  At the moment, I count myself very lucky to be spending the majority of my professional time in situations where the person in charge really is in charge, both in name and in the way s/he chooses to behave.  In this kind of model, it's easy to be a supportive sub-leader -- I just get to do what is asked of me...no fussing, no mind-reading, no power struggles, no secret compensating.  And, it's probably quite obvious from the list at the end of that last sentence that I've definitely been in situations that were less copacetic.  There are many ways of getting around in such environments, and sometimes those getting-around behaviors stay with us unawares, even when things are better and we don't need them anymore.  The upside is that having a whole palette of sub-leader behaviors should theoretically give a person a lot of options in any given situation....and options are powerful when we are able to recognize them as such.

And, since I've grown up in a world where computers have always been present, I tend to think of behavioral choices in terms of a Control Panel -- meaning that there are choices we make actively on a case-by-case basis, but there are also "default settings"...presets that make certain functions automatic.  Over time, I think we become more acquainted with our own default settings, we realize that we have the power to change them, and through experimentation and blind luck, sometimes we come upon what works best for us.  For me, that has had a lot to do with patience, slowing down, and realizing that consistency and small bites are usually the best way to go.  As it turns out, the way I am slowly learning to treat myself is also the best way to lead and to treat other people.

This is perhaps one of the biggest themes of my own pedagogical philosophy, though I don't know if I've ever stated it in so many words before: the best thing I can do for you is convince you that you are your own best teacher.  Or, stated another way: I can only make a series of guesses about how any person learns and set up contexts that get at them, but if you know how you learn, you hold the keys to limitlessness.  It's just a matter of becoming conscious and then taking the time.  In this sense, every student must be a leader.  Hopefully, the teacher is capable and the activities and instruction are sound, and just following directions will get you close to where you want to be.  However, the last step is always for the student to take -- translating what is outside into what lives inside.  That takes guts and patience and knowledge.  It takes leadership.

All of that being said:

Rising Level 2's


Take a look at this lovely piece...only as far as the first measure of p. 3, unless you're feeling more adventurous:
http://www.cpdl.org/wiki/images/2/24/Pergolesi_09_Sancta_mater.pdf


You can take a listen here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zw4GfuclCc

If you only look at the solo parts (up to the top of p. 3, as indicated), you can use the key of E-flat for the entire soprano solo and B-flat for the entire alto solo.  This will mean that you have to cope with one little chromatic syllable (the same one in both parts), but I bet you'll be fine.

I'd advise you to work through the rhythm first, one vocal line at a time - conducting is your friend!

Are there common motives between the soprano and alto lines?  What makes them easy?  What makes them difficult?

If you do decide to go on to the true duet section, be advised that you'll be traveling in the flat direction around the circle of fifths, and that you'll need to watch out for excursions to minor keys.


Rising Level 3's


Look at this little gem:
http://www.cpdl.org/wiki/images/7/79/Pergolesi_08_Fac_ut_ardeat.pdf

I know it looks long, but I bet you can work your way through it little by little...

You can listen to it here (at ramming speed, but with a wicked countertenor!):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SnOmk_wAo8c

And here (with a boys' choir, at a much more moderate clip)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=afPj4dSuR1Y&feature=related

I'd advise you to print out the score and listen first, then mark the places where the material is repeated.
Once you've set up a little form scheme for yourself, check out the key centers....it does travel a little , but never very far afield.  I bet you can puzzle it out.

From there, use your tonal and form schemes to guide your study of the piece.  How will you break it up?  Would working backwards be a good approach?  Are the voice parts roughly equal?  Will you count in 4 or in 2?  Will going slow actually be helpful or not?  You're in charge!

Rising Level 4's


For you, something a little different:

http://imslp.info/files/imglnks/usimg/9/9e/IMSLP42945-PMLP33670-Strauss--Op_37_6_Lieder.pdf

Check out the first song in the set.  You can read the incredibly sweet translation of the text here:
http://www.recmusic.org/lieder/get_text.html?TextId=10228

And you can listen to a recording here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QRNbjDzBBGw

Once you've had a listen, try your hand at figuring out key areas for the vocal line.  If you get stuck, looking at the piano line might be somewhat helpful.  There's definitely some enharmonic and remote stuff going on -- and isn't it magic how it all works out in the end?

Make some decisions about the solfa, and try to sing through sections unaccompanied.  Once individual key areas feel reasonably secure, try stringing them together.  See if you can make it through the whole piece unaccompanied, but in the right keys -- it's a bit of a feat, I must say!

Enjoy!

Knowing what to ignore

My dear solfa friends,

Greetings! I hope the ravages of Irene have run their course for all you east-coasters, and that life is quickly getting back to normal.

My last first week of school as a student is now behind me, and predictably (as all students know), it came with a few bumps in the road. In fact, there's kind of one central bump I've been wrestling with quite a bit lately. That bump is a combination of two related issues:

Getting tied up in negativity -- about myself, others, political situations, you name it

and

Not knowing where to put my focus.

These are fairly standard human problems, I think, and maybe they're even more standard for artist types -- because we tend to be sensitive souls, and many of us are basically hardwired for perfectionism because we notice a lot of subtlety and feel responsible for it. I think folks who grew up with parents, guardians, or teachers who tended towards the strict side also relate strongly to these issues because we're used to operating from a diagnostic perspective -- the main reason we heard from close authority figures was because something was wrong, and basically, there was (and is) always something that could be better, so we're conditioned to constantly seek out and weed out problems. The probable result of either (or both...heaven help us) of these situations? Harsh, constant self-criticism that gets translated into the ways we relate to other people and situations. It's exhausting. I'm exhausted just from writing all of that.

So, what does one do? Especially when the criticism inside gets echoed by criticism outside, and then it seems like the entire world is against you. What do you do?

Well, first off (and this is so difficult to do, and even more difficult to gauge when you're actually doing it), make a friend. That friend is yourself. I'm not saying that self-criticism is a bad thing, nor am I saying that we all ought to walk around in the world feeling like we're always right (because if you did, the entire world would turn into Boulder, CO....jes' sayin'). I'm saying that, when the chips are down, things are looking ugly, and the oxygen masks start falling from the panel above your seat, you have to care enough about yourself to put on your own darn mask. Have your own back. In the heat of the moment, practice non-reaction as much as possible, and then go away and think about it. That's the great thing about being a musician rather than a brain surgeon -- if you choose not to make an immediate decision about something, or if you change your mind later, probably no one is going to die. Probably. If, upon reflection, you want to change the way you handle a similar situation in the future, that's a choice for YOU to make for YOU on YOUR time.

Second, read this. Seriously, read it. It's pretty genius.

Finally, use non-emotionally charged activities to train yourself to ignore things that aren't helpful. That might sound either abstract or kind of silly, but I have a feeling it works. Why? Well, because I have the easiest time following all of my own advice (see above) when I am in the head-space I use for sight-singing or analysis. You know the head-space I mean...non-emotional, task-oriented, strategic -- still human, still musical, but not so busy with myself that I can't be present with the task (or the person or the conflict or the difficult conversation) at hand. Try this:

Rising Level 2's

Take a look at this:

http://oliver.prygotzki.de/privat/imc/cpdl/praetorius-wachet_auf/Praetorius%20-%20Wachet%20auf%20a%202.pdf

This little piece has a lot of visually forbidding things about it that might get you all hot and bothered....however, don't worry. Ask yourself:

What is familiar and easy about this piece (it's in C major, it's in 4, there are only 2 parts, the melody is very singable, etc.)?

What is the best way to isolate small parts of the piece and deal with a little bit at a time (i.e., isolate the rhythm, look at only one section at a time, etc.)?

Notate on your own score the parts of the piece you personally find easy. That way, when you're reading through, you'll recognize when you're in friendly territory.

Each day, choose one or two difficulties within the piece and come up with a creative solution that makes the difficulty seem easy. If you get frustrated, walk away for a few minutes or look at a different section, and come back to the tricky bit. Change tactics. Don't beat your head against a wall. Play to your strengths.

Rising Level 3's

Look at this piece:

http://www2.cpdl.org/wiki/images/7/77/Weelkes_-_Hosanna_to_the_Son_of_David.pdf

Before you do anything else with it, listen to it here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FC2WTqIbp5Y&feature=related

Cool, isn't it?

Take another listen with the score (use the first link, even though they're singing it in a higher key in the recording -- the score is just a little nicer to look at than the one in the video), and make a little textural map for yourself -- where is the homophonic material? How much imitative material is there really? Is texture tied to text in some important ways?

If you try to visually determine from the score which solfa to use at any given moment, you may wind up a bit frustrated, because there are some funny twists and turns in the piece, and the key signature is sometimes profoundly unhelpful. Instead, I'd recommend that you give yourself one more listen to the recording with score in hand and circle the spots where you hear definite cadences. Then, work backwards from those points to determine your solfa choices.

Try to sing through each part and mark which keys/modes are in play. For fun, you may even want to do a solfa chord analysis of the homophonic sections -- you'll have to make some key decisions in order to do that, but who knows? Your harmonic analysis may actually wind up informing your key area/mode decisions, and thereby your musical decisions. That's right folks, I'm suggesting that musicality can and should be informed by analysis and vice versa. It's a two-way street, and it doesn't even have to be unpleasant. You can even change your mind. Who knew?

Rising Level 4's

Look at this piece....Rheinberger, if you've not heard of him, was a contemporary of Brahms.

http://www2.cpdl.org/wiki/images/4/4b/Rheinberger-Abendfriede.pdf

Now, I'm not going to give you a recording like I did for the 3's....if you find one, please feel free to use it like I had them use it, if you wish. However, there's no need for panic with this piece either, even without the aid of a recording.

Scan your way through the piece. Take note of the places where accidentals appear, especially where they are repeated. If you had to guess, what key(s) do you visit? Do the cadences reflect your suspicions? In general, how does the bass line (and therefore, the harmony) move?

Using your own musical discretion, divide the piece into manageable sections. Sing through each part -- if you can, sing one part and play another. Once you've sung through all the parts and made some solfa decisions you feel comfortable with, do a Roman numeral analysis. Do the numbers behave like they're supposed to? Do you think you might want to reconsider some of your key area choices in light of the information the analysis gave you?

So yes, I think solfa and analysis can actually serve as a backdrop to positive behavioral changes that can have a lot of impact on the way you feel about your life as both a musician and as a person. The fringe benefits of a musical life aren't just for our students -- they're for us. The music can be our refuge, too.

Enjoy!

Our daily bread

Hello much-missed students!

....yes, it's true....I miss you all!

So, I have spent this past week house/dog-sitting and re-acclimating to life at high altitude after my long sojourn on east and west coasts, respectively. School starts up for me a week from tomorrow, and like many of you (I'm sure), I've started to get anxious about it. This is supposed to be a big year -- the year of comprehensive exams, dissertation projects, final orals and GRADUATION....and the thought of all the work standing between me and that goal (see word in all caps) is staggering, and it makes me want to freak out.

There, I said it.

Many of you had a similar reaction to reading Kodály's "Who is a Good Musician?", and I think I can safely say that this feeling of freak-out is a common human phenomenon. It happens to everyone, and I think most of us tend to think our freak-outs are some sort of secret flaw that no one else has, and that's not true.

We also tend to think that only special people will live to achieve monumental things in their lifetime, and that you have to have been born with some kind of one-in-a-million genius in order to do so. Part of that is too much TV or something...

No, seriously...

At pretty much every major milestone in my life, I've had this irresistible urge to wander the streets looking for a phone booth that contained my unitard, cape, and superpowers, all of which I clearly needed in order to check off the next item on my list....and you'll probably be as disappointed as I was to discover that there is NO phone booth.

Anyhow, I think another part of it is a refusal to acknowledge our own empowerment, our own human ability to transform ourselves through transforming our behavior. We'd rather not believe that work is just work. I'm not saying that there aren't things in life we can't do, and probably we have a much better shot at prowess in some things than others, just from our genetic predispositions.

But, the truth is this: for the most part, it's just work. The daily grind is the path to greatness. There may be some kind of miraculous transformation or unprecedented revelation waiting for you in the wings, but do you know how it'll reveal itself? Day by day, in the business of doing what needs to be done, probably with very little fanfare, and probably when no one else is watching and when you yourself have perhaps forgotten why you've bothered -- that is when the magic happens. It doesn't live in some big genius/talent storehouse. It comes to you like your daily bread, and you have to trust that each day will bring its proper allotment as you do your daily work in order to earn it. Some days you'll feel like you're going hungry. Some days you'll feel too tired or depressed to put in the time. But, if you're patient and diligent and gentle with yourself along the way, you'll discover that you can transform yourself, and that no one can take it away. That's why I'm so serious about this weekly blog business...it's an investment that cannot fail. There's no way not to make good on the time you've spent and the effort you've used.

So, this week:

Rising Level 2's

In your Ottman, sing through:

11.24, 11.25, 11.26, 11.27, & 11.28

Identify any tricky spots after your initial reading of each melody, isolate those spots and creatively problem-solve your way through them. Hint: look for arpeggiated harmonies, melodic and rhythmic patterns, and places to strategically use your audiation chops.

Once you've sung through all five, do a little phrase/form analysis of each melody. How are the melodies similar to one another? Does the national origin of each melody seem to be reflected in unique phrase structure? Are melodies from areas geographically close to one another more similar?

Finally, choose one or two of these melodies and harmonize them. Sing and play, by yourself or with a friend.

Rising Level 3's

Take a look at these Ottman examples:

13.19, 13.22, 13.25

From an initial scan, determine if you'd like to change solfa at any point -- my advice would be to change if you sense a cadence in the new key, or if you do multiple arpeggiations of a chromatic chord in the original key (i.e. something that looks like a major II, aka V/V). Did your solfa choices work for you? If not, is the solution more practice, or is it to change your approach?

Additionally, look at examples 13.20, 13.23, and 13.24.

Sing through each, and then harmonize portions of the melodies as indicated in the textbook. Do you agree with Ottman/Rogers' harmonic choices? Did you come up with an alternative you like better? What's the easiest way to figure out what a V/V in the key of D is (hint: see parenthetical statement above or look at your secondary dominant planet handout to spell in solfa, then translate into letters)? How would you harmonize the final cadence of 13.24?

Feel free to share your findings!

Rising Level 4's

DISCLAIMER: I avoid this chapter of Ottman during the summers, mostly because the question of modulation in such short passages often causes tremendous confusion or bitter arguments, while studying modulation in longer chunks or imitative contexts is usually easier and less emotionally draining. If you experience distress from the following exercise, please submit a complaint to the management.

Look at the following Ottman examples:

14.5, 14.6, 14.17, 14.19 (note that the fi in the last line isn't a modulatory fi), 14.24, and 14.30

In each case, determine where each modulation occurs in each piece, noting that you should only need to move in either the dominant direction by one fifth or the subdominant direction by one fifth (meaning that you're looking for fi and ta). Note also that some of these excerpts modulate away and some end in the new key. Devise a solfa change plan for each example before singing through it. After the initial reading, decide whether you think your initial assessment was correct or if you should strategically alter it. Try to reach a point of fluency with each example.

Enjoy, my dears, and remember...in order to gain mastery, all you have to do is put in the time to make solfa your daily bread.

Knowing your role....

Hello, my beloved solfeggists!

First, a note to my dear Baltimore students.....I sent you an email this morning/afternoon. If you didn't receive it, please let me know! It contains important stuff!

This is a strange time of year for many of us -- we find ourselves in the position of needing to change up our daily routine, either because we're winding up the school year, the weather is changing, we're getting ready to move to a new place, we're trying to cope with having more time to think....or any combination of the above. It can be stressful...this is definitely the time of year I tend not to sleep well, and it's the part of the year I tend to torture myself the most over whatever I am or am not doing to finish this, start that, etc. I hypothesize that the change in role has much to do with my feelings of anxiety, and I strongly suspect I'm not the only one.

So, as we move into the part of the year where teachers take a break from teaching (and some turn into students!), some students become teachers, performers become listeners, and all of us hopefully slow down a little, here is your assignment:

All Levels

Take a walk.

Write in a journal. Don't judge what you write. If you want, burn the pages afterward.

Pet a dog.

Spend a morning in your PJ's.

Have a cup of tea.

Listen to some music that refreshes you, or moves you, or reminds you of who you are.

Look at pictures from a trip that you loved taking.

Call your best friend.

...and...

Each day, read through one of these:

http://www3.cpdl.org/wiki/images/0/0f/Schubert_Duette.pdf

Look at both parts, transpose at will. If at all possible, meet up with a solfa colleague and practice singing together, switching up who takes the melody.

Enjoy!

Fluency and Immersion

Hello, my faithful readers!

Well, I missed another week....naughty, naughty. I have good excuses, related to Holy Week, the Bernstein Mass, and some annoying health-related woes, but nobody likes a whiner, right? Onward and upward!

During aforementioned Holy Week, I was privy to some quite good sermonizing on the part of the clergy at my current gig....and I must say, the speakers at this gig really are a cut above. You know it must be something kind of special if I keep on stealing material...sincerest form of flattery and all that jazz, yes?

Anyhow, at Easter Vigil, the preacher talked about language acquisition, and naturally, my ears perked up. His language up for discussion was Spanish, and specifically, how he really wants to learn Spanish, and he can decline and conjugate and memorize vocabulary with the best of them (being, as he is, a scholar and teacher of Hellenistic Greek), but what he feels is the missing link in his linguistic learning experience is immersion. Immersion is the gateway to fluency.

The speaker went on to tell a story about a friend of his who learned formal Castilian Spanish in the classroom, and considered himself quite accomplished in the language, and then he up and moved to Nicaragua and guess what...all his vocabulary and skill was essentially non-functional in that environment. He toughed it out, but had an incredibly hard go of it for a long time -- months, maybe longer. Then, it's the part of the story you already know if you've had an immersive linguistic experience: he woke up one morning, and he suddenly understood. He was thinking, speaking, even dreaming in the language of his surroundings. Having had a small taste of that experience myself, I couldn't stop smiling through that part of the story, even though I knew it was coming. Why? Because that feeling of finally getting it, of finally fitting into the rhythm of what is around you, of not having to struggle for every word anymore feels SO GOOD. I remember it as euphoric, no exaggeration, and my own experience was just a small transition from idiot American to barely functional temporary expat. But, when my teeny-tiny functional Hungarian vocabulary became second nature, I was completely delighted, and I have a suspicion that a linguistic neophyte has kind of an advantage in these matters, because the jump from one plateau to the next must be similar each time, and the joy must be just as wonderful and just as surprising each time.

You probably already know where I'm going with this.

Why do I fuss at you for writing in all your solfa or for wanting to read things on a neutral syllable before you "add solfa" or for not keeping tuning forks on your person, etc.? Why am I so picky about things that don't seem to matter? Because it's about immersion. And, the difference between learning a language and learning to be fluent in solfa is that you have music to interact with everywhere, all the time, all around you. It can certainly be helpful to have other people around you to help reinforce the immersiveness of your experience in daily life, but you can actually opt to be immersed in solfa anytime you want.

Really.

I know it for sure...because I was the kid on the trampoline in my backyard with a hymnal and a Casio keyboard to give me starting pitches (this was before my first encounter of the tuning fork kind). Granted, that's a little extreme, and definitely very homeschooled of me, but I know that's the time it took for me to get from stumbling over re, fa, and la to being able to apply the syllables instantaneously. The same thing happened when I was in college and struggling with dictation -- I just made myself solfa everything I heard and then write some of it down. I opted in for an immersive experience in my daily life, and it took some mental discipline and some time, but mostly it just took me making the decision. It didn't cost me any money. It took a lot less time than I thought. It just took me committing to it, buying in, deciding I wanted it, and choosing to pay attention to what I heard all the time. And the best part of all? Once you have it, it's yours. You get to keep it, and it doesn't go away, and no one can take it away. The more you do it, the happier and more empowered it will make you. Check it out: personal fulfillment, happiness, and empowerment, courtesy of Guido d'Arezzo, a dude who's been dead for 1100 years. It doesn't get any better than that.

So, this week:

All Levels:

Make an immersive decision, just one, every day this week. Stop yourself when you hear a tune you like (even if it's something you already know), solfa it, and write it down. Pick up a piece of music, any piece you like, and read it in solfa. Then read another part in solfa. Then tap one and read the other. Switch.

You can do this. It just takes time, and making the decision. Who knows? You might become addicted! Don't say I didn't warn you!