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	<title>St George Players</title>
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	<link>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au</link>
	<description>Whatever you and I do alone can be even greater - and more fun - together.</description>
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		<title>The wonderful Richard Gill</title>
		<link>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/the-wonderful-richard-gill/</link>
		<comments>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/the-wonderful-richard-gill/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 11 May 2016 03:53:15 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[St George Players]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/?p=2022</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[                                            This is a recent article by the music teacher all Australian music teachers&#8217; love Richard Gill. It was published in the magazine Limelight in 2014   Music education does not just make children more musical; it unleashes their creative powers. This year marks my 50th anniversary as a music teacher. Over the course of the last 50 years I have witnessed many changes to the ways in which music is taught. Not only changes to the teaching of classroom music to infants, primary and secondary students, for example, but also significant changes to the way in which instrumental music is taught. The changes to classroom music teaching are evident in the way in which many teachers of music have embraced in part, or sometimes wholly, the educational philosophies of musicians such as Jaques Dalcroze, Carl Orff and Zoltán Kodály. It is also quite common to see teachers adapting aspects of all three of these philosophies in conjunction with their own ideas, applying to their teaching methods the things that they know work especially well with their own classes. The advent of the Suzuki and Yamaha schools, along with dozens of other approaches to teaching instrumental music, have altered the path of teaching, providing teachers with the guidance they need and often the repertoire they need to teach. What I have come to learn in this time is that there is no one perfect method to teach music and no single solution which suits every circumstance. I have, however, learned that singing should be the basis of all music learning, irrespective of the method chosen. Dalcroze, Orff and Kodaly, were they alive, would offer a chorus of approval for this idea. Before children can hold instruments, even simple hand-held percussion instruments, they can, given the appropriate assistance and examples, sing and reproduce pitch in some form or another. This requires the simultaneous learning of the texts of songs, nursery rhymes, games and the like, from which they build a huge repertoire of music they can perform alone and with others. From singing they can also learn to analyse sound, learn to discriminate ways in which pitch and rhythm are used, learn how pattern and repetition work in music and subsequently build a vocabulary of sounds and ideas which they can use in their own compositions. Every child should have the opportunity to make his or her own music: it is the prime reason for teaching music in the very early years. All this learning should be done in conjunction with movement from a very early age. The use of movement enhances all musical learning, as movement tends to assist the understanding of music’s essentially abstract concepts in a physical way, without having to find words to explain these abstract ideas. In short, singing and moving as early as possible in the life of a child will bear significant fruit in a special way. We learn music because it is good. We learn music because it is unique. We learn music because it stimulates creativity at a very high level. No other reasons for teaching music are needed. If the Federal Government is serious about education then it should mandate music education in the early years of a child’s life. Australia has never been in greater need of creative minds. The lines below from the insightful and erudite author and philosopher, Iris Murdoch, are lines I read often. I apply aspects of this philosophy in saying that music education doesn’t make you musical but may provide you with the resources to discover how musical you are or how musical you can become. “Education doesn’t make you happy – nor does freedom. We don’t become happy just because we’re free – if we are – or because we’ve been educated – if we have, but because education may be the means by which we realise we are happy. It opens our eyes, our ears, tells us where delights are lurking, convinces us that there is only one freedom of any importance whatsoever, that of the mind, and gives us the assurance – the confidence – to walk the path our mind, our educated mind, offers.” A truly educated mind has had music as part of its education. Every child in this country should have an opportunity to have a truly educated mind. &#160;]]></description>
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		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Making the Most of your Practice</title>
		<link>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/making-the-most-of-your-practice/</link>
		<comments>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/making-the-most-of-your-practice/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 09 Mar 2016 06:42:58 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[St George Players]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Practice]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[children]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[education]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[practice]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[st george players]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[strings]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/?p=2010</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Students will be returning to music after trying their heart out during the long holiday, don’t despair, look at this way of practicing. Have you ever been frustrated by the fact that you can take a difficult passage, work on it for a bit, get it sounding pretty good, but return to the practice room the next day to discover that you’re back at square 1? That nothing has really changed? And despite how good it sounded yesterday, now it sounds just as bad as it did before you worked on it? Most of us can live with “two steps forward, one step back.” It’s the “two steps forward, two steps back” that makes us want to tear our hair out. So what are we to do? Are we just supposed to keep at it and learn how to be more patient? Or is there a different way to practice that can make these improvements more permanent? One simple change that could drastically increase your productivity When it comes to practicing, we often think in terms of time: How many hours are necessary to achieve optimal progress? While this is a valid concern, a more important question is how we can make each hour count. What is the most efficient way to work so that what is practiced today actually sticks tomorrow? There is nothing more frustrating than spending a day hard at work only to return the next day at the starting line. Unfortunately, our current practice model is setting us up for this daily disappointment. Repetition Early on in our musical training, we are taught the importance of repetition. How often have we been told to “play each passage ten times perfectly before moving on”? The challenge with this well-intentioned advice is that it is not in line with the way our brains work. Constant repetition is boring and our boredom is telling us that our brains are not engaged. But instead of listening to this instinctive voice of reason, we blame ourselves for our lack of attention and yell at ourselves to “focus!” Luckily, there is an alternative. Blocked practice schedules In the field of sport psychology, the continuous repetition discussed above is called blocked practice. In a blocked practice schedule, all repetitions of one activity are completed before moving on to a second activity. This most resembles the way the majority of musicians practice, especially when it comes to challenging passages. We work on one excerpt for a given amount of time and then move on to the next excerpt until all tasks for the day are complete. A blocked approach seems logical. Muscle memory requires repetition and why wouldn’t we do all of the repetitions in a row? The problem with this kind of practicing, however, is that the positive results we feel in the practice room today do not lead to the best long-term learning tomorrow. Practicing in a way that optimizes performance in the practice room does not optimize learning. Random practice schedules What if we took the blocks of practice on particular tasks and broke them down into smaller segments on each task? Two breakdown options are a repeating order (e.g., abc abc abc…) or an arbitrary order (e.g., acb cba bca…). In either, the net result will still be 15 practice hits of each of the three types of pitches, exactly the same as the net result in the blocked practice schedule. The only variable that changes is the order in which the pitches are practiced. This type of interspersed schedule is called a random practice schedule . In a random practice schedule, the performer must keep restarting different tasks. Because beginnings are always the hardest part, it will not feel as comfortable as practicing the same thing over and over again. But this challenge lies at the heart of why random practice schedules are more effective. When we come back to a task after an intervening task, our brain must reconstruct the action plan for what we are about to do. And it is at this moment of reconstruction that our brains are the most active. More mental activity leads to greater long-term learning. Although a blocked schedule may produce superior performance during practice, study after study has shown that a random practice schedule consistently produces superior retention following practice a day or more later (i.e., the amount actually learned How to use a random schedule in the practice room Rather than spending long uninterrupted periods of time woodshedding each excerpt or section of a piece, pick a few passages you would like to work on and alternate between them. If you want to spend a total of 30 minutes on a particular excerpt, practice in shorter segments, continually returning to this excerpt until you have achieved your 30-minute goal. Experiment with lengths of time. If you are practicing excerpts that are very short, you may be able to switch between them at a faster pace than would be required for longer sections. You can use a small alarm clock to time specific intervals or switch after each repetition. At its most basic level, random practice might look like this: Length Material to Practice 3 minutes Excerpt A 3 minutes Excerpt B 3 minutes Excerpt C 3 minutes Excerpt A 3 minutes Excerpt B 3 minutes Excerpt C Etc. Practicing passages in different rhythmic variations is a great way of introducing contextual interference on a smaller scale. But instead of doing all rhythmic variations on a single excerpt before moving onto the next, do one variation on excerpt A, one on excerpt B and then return to excerpt A for a second variation etc. Technique can also be interspersed into the random schedule, instead of doing all of it in one long block. The permutations are endless and the exact division of time is not important. What is crucial is that you are keeping your brain engaged by varying the material. More engagement means you will be less bored, more [&#8230;]]]></description>
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		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Helpful Hints from the AMEB</title>
		<link>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/helpful-hints-from-the-ameb/</link>
		<comments>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/helpful-hints-from-the-ameb/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 25 Sep 2015 08:40:42 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[St George Players]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Music Lessons]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music lessons]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music school]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[practice]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[st george players]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/?p=2002</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[&#160; Exam season is coming up so here are some very good ideas of how to sail through without any worries. A great article from the AMEB. &#160; HELPFUL HINTS FROM AMEB EXAMINERS BEFORE THE EXAM Regular practice of all sections of the exam ensures the best preparation. Successful candidates often have teachers who conduct small concerts for their students and their families prior to the exam and/or &#8216;mock exams&#8217; in their lessons leading into the exam date. They provide the student with some &#8216;trial runs&#8217; to give both the teacher and student a realistic idea of a candidate&#8217;s exam performance. ACCOMPANISTS Practice with your accompanist as much as possible before the day of your exam. Ensure that you and your accompanist have each other&#8217;s mobile numbers. Provide your accompanist with a copy of your Notice of Examination so they are very clear about your exam grade, venue, room and examiner so you both arrive punctually and well prepared for your examination. ON THE DAY OF THE EXAM • Plan your trip to the examination venue well in advance and allow plenty of time to allow for traffic delays. If you are coming on public transport, check ahead of time for any potential disruptions to your train or bus service (for instance, railway track work on your line or a special event to be held in the CBD on that date.) • Dress appropriately in smart casual attire to show respect for both the performance situation and your examiner. • If you play an instrument that needs tuning or warming up, leave yourself extra time as there is no time in the exam to assemble or tune instruments. It is not the responsibility of the examiner to tune your instrument for you, so teachers should ensure that this is attended to beforehand. • It is important that you take your Notice of Examination into the examination room and give it to your examiner. • Ensure that you (or your teacher) clearly write either Aural Tests or Sight Reading on your Notice of Examination if you are sitting for an examination in a For Leisure syllabus. • Have all original music ready (do not bring photocopies). Placing markers on the correct pages will help you find your pieces quickly. Even if playing from memory, you will need to have all the music with you to answer your general knowledge questions. • Make sure that all the pencil markings indicating keys or other information are rubbed out. Marks for fingering and bowing do not need to be removed. PLAYING FROM MEMORY You are expected to memorise technical work. It is not a requirement in grade examinations to play pieces from memory. DON&#8217;T ASSUME Examiners are invariably also teachers themselves so they appreciate your efforts in preparing for your exam and they want to see you do well. If your examiner asks you to cut a piece short or tells you that your second extra list piece need not be presented, don&#8217;t assume that this is due to a poor performance on your part. It is far more likely that they have made this request due to time constraints or because your examiner has already heard enough of your program to form their examination assessment. EXAMS NEEDN&#8217;T BE SCARY Parents and guardians should ensure that they don&#8217;t transmit their own anxiety about examinations to their child. Be sure to provide unconditional support before the exam and encourage your child in a positive way regardless of the outcome. The best advice for candidates is to practise sufficiently and know your pieces, and then relax and enjoy the examination experience. Examiners know you may be nervous and will take this into account. Remember that the adrenaline released by a little bit of nerves can release adrenaline, which might result in your best performance ever. Above all, enjoy your studies and your performance opportunities, whether your goal is to become a professional musician, actor, a teacher or to enjoy the subject as a hobby and creative outlet.]]></description>
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		</item>
		<item>
		<title>How to Waste Money on Music Lessons</title>
		<link>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/how-to-waste-money-on-music-lessons/</link>
		<comments>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/how-to-waste-money-on-music-lessons/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 25 Jun 2015 02:43:25 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[St George Players]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Music Lessons]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[orchestra]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Practice]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[children]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music lessons]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music school]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[st george players]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[violin]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/?p=1983</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[&#160; &#160; This is part of a blog called Moderately Crunchy. It is so true, read it. &#160; Parents waste a ton of money on music lessons! Don&#8217;t get me wrong- no parent signs Junior up for piano lessons with the intention to waste thousands of dollars and engage in some epic battles. Most parents have visions of brilliant performances in their heads as they start that first lesson. Unfortunately, most kids quit before they&#8217;ve studied for two years and forget everything they&#8217;ve learned within five. And yet, I hear parents saying the same thing over and over again- I wish I had stuck with the (insert instrument here) when I was a kid! So, why does everyone quit and how can you keep it from happening in your family? I&#8217;m going to share with you the biggest mistakes parents make regarding their children&#8217;s musical education. Here&#8217;s how to waste a ton of money on music lessons: 1. Pick your child&#8217;s instrument for them. Really, this is a great idea. Take away the kid&#8217;s autonomy and force them to live out your childhood dream. 2. Let the kid decide when and how much to practice. If I had a nickel for every time a parent told me, &#8220;I just can&#8217;t get them to practice&#8221; I would be a very rich woman. Do you ask your kids if they want to go to bed? Go to school? So, why are you giving them the option of practicing? You&#8217;re spending the money, and they&#8217;re not going to get anything out of it if they don&#8217;t practice. Repeat after me: THEY WILL LEARN NOTHING! 3. Choose a teacher at random. Good music teachers will provide you with references. They&#8217;ll also be able to explain their approach in plain English. But wait, you&#8217;re out to waste money here! So, pick someone at random, entrust your child to them, and hope for the best. Professionalism, studio policies, formal training? Who cares about all that!? 4. Cancel lessons on a whim. Or, better yet, just don&#8217;t show up at all. If the kids are really sick, by all means stay home. But, consistently cancelling or failing to show up at lessons derails my lesson plans and is just plain disrespectful. While you’re at it, forget to send the books with them when they do deign to show up I cannot teach if I have nothing to teach out of. 5. Ignore the lesson notes. I send all my students home with notebooks full of practice instructions and notes. I don&#8217;t write a bunch of stuff down just for fun. By all means, let your kid screw around and play only the stuff they like and then call it practice. They&#8217;ll have plenty of fun, but they won&#8217;t be getting any better. 6. Opt out of concerts. Yes, concerts are not held at your regularly scheduled lesson times, and yes, they do come at inconvenient times like the holidays and the end of the school year. If you want to waste your money on lessons, make sure your kid never gets the chance to show off what he&#8217;s learned. That should efficiently squash any sense of self-motivation! 7. Purchase a sub-par instrument. Music is expensive, more so than almost any sport you can be involved in. Not only do you have to purchase an instrument, you also have to maintain it well, buy books, and pay for lessons. Your child cannot get a good tone on a piece of crap instrument and, if they can&#8217;t get a good tone, they won&#8217;t want to keep trying. If you can&#8217;t afford it, you shouldn&#8217;t start it. 8. Let them quit when it gets hard. Learning to play an instrument is hard- mind-blowingly hard- for a young child. They will get frustrated. They will beg you to quit. If you want to waste your money, and- worst of all- teach your child that you don&#8217;t believe they can do hard things, then let them quit. It takes a strong parent to be a successful music parent. Music parents cannot be their child&#8217;s best friend all the time, but hear me out, if you encourage them to continue, they will thank you for it later. We want the absolute best for our children, and we walk a fine line between pushing them to be great and giving them a soft place to land. However, too many parents I work with take the easy way out when it comes to music lessons, and it&#8217;s not doing the child any favours. Here&#8217;s what happens when music lessons go right: the child learns discipline, precision, determination, follow-through, attention to detail, and fortitude. Studies have shown that children who study music get higher grades and report greater levels of confidence. Musical children live in an enriching environment, where they learn to appreciate the arts and, therefore, the beauty in the world around them. Most of them will not turn out to be concert musicians, but they will be better people as a result of their effort. It&#8217;s worth the effort.]]></description>
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		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Rhythmic Notation in Lego</title>
		<link>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/rhythmic-notation-in-lego/</link>
		<comments>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/rhythmic-notation-in-lego/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 16 Jun 2015 09:05:20 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[St George Players]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Music Lessons]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[education]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music game]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music school]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[rhythm]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[st george players]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/?p=1975</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I often use old fashioned Cuisenaire Rods to demonstrate rhythms, but this blog by Tom MacPherson is very cute and effective as far as I can see. I am dying to try it out. &#160; RHYTHMIC NOTATION IN LEGO Understanding time values can be a bit of challenge for some students. Sometimes measuring the duration of sound by beats or by fractions of beats can get a little complicated for young minds. Really, if you stop to think about it, “half a beat” is a rather odd concept. Beats are precise moments in time, so when discussing fractions of beats, our music vocabulary is rather clumsy and misleading. What we are really doing in music notation is trying to depict different lengths of time, so I wanted to find something to represent that visually. In short, I wanted to create some kind of visual tool to help my students understand the relationship of one kind of note to another. I always liked playing with LEGO as a kid. Among other things creative and mathematical, LEGO was (is) such a great toy to help explore fractions. When building anything out of LEGO bricks, if you didn’t have enough of one length of brick, you could always substitute a combination of other bricks that added up to the same length. With that concept in my brain, so began my experiment with rhythmic notation in LEGO! In this little system I created, when notating any rhythm, an important first step is to determine which blocks represent which time values. The example I’ll be using in this demonstration is the opening of German Song by Daniel Gottlob Türk. It’s in the Royal Conservatory’s Grade 4 book, yet I imagine many students skip over it because the rhythm in it looks a bit too scary compared to other pieces in the List B category. Anyhow, in this piece, the thirty-second note is the smallest time value, so that will be assigned to the shortest brick. Sixteenth notes will be represented by bricks twice as long as those, eighths will be twice as long as sixteenths, and quarters twice as long as eighths. Have a look at the photo below. German Song is in 2/4 time, so each line represents the number of bricks required to fill a complete measure in that time signature. &#160; Don’t be concerned about colours, at least for now. In this system, a change of colour simply means a new note — whether the same pitch or a different pitch. Can you imagine the discussion you can have with your student when faced with a dotted note? Having a dotted note will require using a brick that’s 50% longer. (Be thankful there are no dotted thirty-seconds in this little piece!) Regarding rests: Rests are lengths of silence that correspond to specific lengths of sound. If an eighth rest is required, for example, empty space equivalent to the length of an eighth-note brick must be included. Have a look at the opening melody of German Song… And now have a look at the rhythm as depicted in LEGO… In the printed music, notice that the measure numbers are included in little squares. In the LEGO version, the little blocks periodically placed on top of other blocks indicate the start of a new measure. They’re the measure numbers if you like. Also notice that on the board we used, we could fit exactly two measure of music left to right. This is one way to check for accuracy — all measure must be the exact same length. Also, notice the tie in measure 2 of the printed music. See how we’ve done it in LEGO? It may be hard to see in this photo, but the orange eighth-note brick is followed by an orange thirty-second brick. That’s how we indicate ties — two bricks of the same colour side-by-side. A supporting activity could be to rewrite German Song in 2/2 time. Using the LEGO notation as a guideline, we just need to rethink which time values are represented by which blocks. The first brick will now be a dotted quarter note, and the next two bricks to follow are sixteenth notes, etc. Once German Song is written out in 2/2 time, it doesn’t look as complicated for Grade 4 students. German Song is an example of something in simple time. However, rhythmic notation in LEGO can also work in compound time. In 6/8 time, for example, the dotted quarter will be a brick that is as long as three eighth-note bricks. It’s nice to watch a student discover that two dotted-quarters equal the same length as a dotted-half, and that compound time is no big deal — it’s just that beats are subdivided into threes rather than twos. My students and I have enjoyed using LEGO for rhythmic notation. Since it’s a toy, it’s not at all threatening for them. And I’m secretly happy to go shopping for more LEGO for myself!]]></description>
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		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Music lessons, the best thing a parent can give a child.</title>
		<link>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/music-lessons/</link>
		<comments>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/music-lessons/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 19 May 2015 03:01:35 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[St George Players]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Music Lessons]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Practice]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[children]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[education]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music lessons]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music school]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[practice]]></category>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/?p=1951</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[&#160; &#160; &#160; Music Lessons Were The Best Thing Your Parents Ever Did For You CLASSICALINSPIRATIONALMar 17, 2015 If your memory of music as a child is of your parents forcing you to go to that dreaded piano lesson every week, now you know why they did it. A variety of scientific studies over recent years have demonstrated the positive effect music has on the brain and learning in general. They have been collected in this article by Tom Barnes, who identifies thirteen areas where improvements can be seen among people who played an instrument as a child. music lessons Even if you didn’t make it to Carnegie Hall at aged five like Ryan Wang, taking music lessons as a child brings remarkable benefits. Photo: vancouversun.com Evidence shows that the core abilities that are key for children to perform well in education and life in general are improved by taking music lessons. The reading and verbal skills of young people were noticeably better if they took music lessons, and their capabilities in mathematical reasoning were also stronger. The structure of music itself, where rhythm and the length of notes are determined by intervals that can be applied to maths has been found to be a critical factor in this. In relation to reading, the process of playing music developed several core skills required in both reading and speaking. Taken together, the result is significantly higher grades. Children who took music lessons exhibited higher IQs, and research has also indicated that their linguistic capabilities are more advanced. This goes not just for the mother tongue, but also second and third languages picked up during education or in later life. Language proficiency is assisted greatly by a good memory, and this is something else that comes from music. Taking up a musical instrument, and practising it regularly, does wonders for your working memory. Researchers believe that the improvements to memory are not limited to recalling pieces of music or scales, but should be felt in other areas like remembering information communicated in speeches or lectures. Longer term memory also benefits with regard to visual stimuli. It’s not just immediate advantages that are worth paying attention to. An active youthful musician will not only find that their listening skills are heightened and therefore less likely to deteriorate rapidly in old age, but also that the other signs of ageing will be delayed. Some research is suggesting that a history of playing music can help reverse the cognitive decline associated with dementia. Most people when asked about the influence of music will speak about its emotional effects rather than more logical and academic areas. Research shows that this tendency is justified given the impact music lessons can have on our emotional well-being and creative expression. One study mentioned by Barnes deals with musicians between the ages of six and eighteen. The results showed that they developed a greater than average capacity to cope with anxiety, depression and aggression. Linked to this, researchers have revealed that self-confidence and self-esteem levels were higher among children with a musical background. Last but not least, if your dream was always to get involved in a bit more physicality in a sports team rather than playing the violin, you’ll be delighted to know that all of those hard hours spent practising were worthwhile. That’s because music assists the development of the motor cortex, which is critical for carrying out tasks involving movement and coordination. A particular difference was identified among children who began learning a musical instrument before the age of seven. If your main reaction to this is regret that you weren’t one of the lucky ones who were taught music in the past, don’t despair! There are still numerous advantages to be gained from making classical music a part of your life now. Recent academic studies have also discovered what many students have been saying for a long time: listening to classical music is one of the best study aids around. Against all of those who claim it is a distraction, a French study found evidence that students listening to a lecture with classical music in the background had a better understanding of the content than students who heard no music.]]></description>
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		<title>Practice makes Perfect</title>
		<link>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/practice-makes-perfect/</link>
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		<pubDate>Tue, 19 May 2015 02:35:18 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[St George Players]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Practice]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[children]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[education]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music school]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[practice]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[st george players]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/?p=1952</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[A very insightful article. Compulsory reading for all people learning an instrument. &#160; 8 Things Top Practicers Do DifferentlyBy Noa Kageyama, Ph.D. &#124; Mar 11, 2015 86 10 Share SynopsisWe&#8217;ve all heard the phrase &#8220;practice smarter, not harder,&#8221; but what does that really mean? What does &#8220;smarter&#8221; practice actually look like? A study of collegiate piano majors suggests that the key lies in how we handle mistakes.As my kids were (begrudgingly) practicing their Tae Kwon Do patterns not long ago, I caught myself telling my oldest that he had to do his pattern five times before returning to his video game. My goal, of course, was not for him to simply plod through the motions of his pattern five times like a pouty zombie, but to do it once with good form and commitment. But the parent in me finds it very reassuring to know that a certain number of repetitions has gone into something. Beyond the (erroneous) assumption that this will somehow automagically solidify his skills, it feels like a path to greater discipline, and a way to instill within my kids some sort of work ethic that will serve them well in the future. It&#8217;s true that some degree of time and repetition is necessary to develop and hone our skills, of course. But we also know on some intuitive level that to maximize gains, we ought to practice “smarter, not harder.” But what does that really mean anyway? What exactly do top practicers do differently? Pianists learning Shostakovich A group of researchers led by Robert Duke of The University of Texas at Austin conducted a study several years ago to see if they could tease out the specific practice behaviors that distinguish the best players and most effective learners. Seventeen piano and piano pedagogy majors agreed to learn a 3-measure passage from Shostakovich&#8217;s Piano Concerto No. 1. The passage had some tricky elements, making it too difficult to sight read well, but not so challenging that it couldn’t be learned in a single practice session. The setup The students were given two minutes to warm up, and then provided with the 3-measure excerpt, a metronome, and a pencil. Participants were allowed to practice as long as they wanted, and were free to leave whenever they felt they were finished. Practice time varied quite a bit, ranging from 8 1/2 minutes to just under 57 minutes. To ensure that the next day’s test would be fair, they were specifically told that they may NOT practice this passage, even from memory, in the next 24 hours. 24 hours later… When participants returned the following day for their test, they were given 2 minutes to warm up, and then asked to perform the complete 3-measure passage in its entirety, 15 times without stopping (but with pauses between attempts, of course). Each of the pianists’ performances were then evaluated on two levels. Getting the right notes with the right rhythm was the primary criteria, but the researchers also ranked each of the pianists’ performances from best to worst, based on tone, character, and expressiveness. That led to a few interesting findings: Practicing longer didn’t lead to higher rankings.Getting in more repetitions had no impact on their ranking either.The number of times they played it correctly in practice also had no bearing on their ranking. (wait, what?!)What did matter was: How many times they played it incorrectly. The more times they played it incorrectly, the worse their ranking tended to be.The percentage of correct practice trials did seem to matter. The greater the proportion of correct trials in their practice session, the higher their ranking tended to be.The top 8 strategies Three pianists’ performances stood out from the rest, and were described as having “more consistently even tone, greater rhythmic precision, greater musical character (purposeful dynamic and rhythmic inflection), and a more fluid execution.” Upon taking a closer look at the practice session videos, the researchers identified 8 distinct practice strategies that were common to the top pianists, but occurred less frequently in the practice sessions of the others: 1. Playing was hands-together early in practice. 2. Practice was with inflection early on; the initial conceptualization of the music was with inflection. 3. Practice was thoughtful, as evidenced by silent pauses while looking at the music, singing/humming, making notes on the page, or expressing verbal “ah-ha”s. 4. Errors were preempted by stopping in anticipation of mistakes. 5. Errors were addressed immediately when they appeared. 6. The precise location and source of each error was identified accurately, rehearsed, and corrected. 7. Tempo of individual performance trials was varied systematically; logically understandable changes in tempo occurred between trials (e.g. slowed things down to get tricky sections correct). 8. Target passages were repeated until the error was corrected and the passage was stabilized, as evidenced by the error’s absence in subsequent trials. The top 3 strategies Of the eight strategies above, there were three that were used by all three top pianists, but rarely utilized by the others. In fact, only two other pianists (ranked #4 and #6) used more than one: 6. The precise location and source of each error was identified accurately, rehearsed, and corrected. 7. Tempo of individual performance trials was varied systematically; logically understandable changes in tempo occurred between trials (e.g. slowed things down to get tricky sections correct; or speeded things up to test themselves, but not too much). 8. Target passages were repeated until the error was corrected and the passage was stabilized, as evidenced by the error’s absence in subsequent trials. What’s the common thread that ties these together? The researchers note that the most striking difference between the top three pianists and the rest, was how they handled mistakes. It’s not that the top pianists made fewer mistakes in the beginning and simply had an easier time learning the passage. The top pianists made mistakes too, but they managed to correct their errors in such a way that helped them avoid making the same mistakes over and [&#8230;]]]></description>
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		<title>Contemporary Music</title>
		<link>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/contemporary-music/</link>
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		<pubDate>Fri, 26 Sep 2014 03:28:25 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[St George Players]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Contemporary Music]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[composition]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[contemporary music]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[education]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[guitar]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music school]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[singing]]></category>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/?p=1920</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[As of 2014 St George Players has been teaching contemporary music theory alongside ensemble performance in order to give students a taste of the skills needed to be able to compose. This has been very successful and the participating students have been very enthusiastic about their new composition skills therefore we are keen to expand on this and offer private lessons in contemporary guitar, voice and song writing from the start of 2015. We believe that the most effective way to learn to create and shape a melody is through singing it and the easiest way to learn about how chords fit together is through playing them on guitar. While learning to sing and accompany yourself on guitar you will develop a sound understanding of contemporary popular music from the mid-20th century onwards. As your singing and guitar playing develops you will also learn song-writing skills including how to develop lyrics, how to structure a song, developing a catchy chord progression, creating a hook and finding and developing your song’s groove.  I love offering this as it so naturally follows on from the music we already offer. I have two teachers on staff who spend much of their own time composing and performing contemporary music. One regularly has shows in The Basement and I have included a video of his work below. New students to this will not be able to do such complex work as his, but they will  have the opportunity to perform their own works thus really testing their success as a composer/ performer to a wide audience. &#160; &#160;]]></description>
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		<title>Your First Trumpet or Trombone Lesson</title>
		<link>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/your-first-trumpet-or-trombone-lesson/</link>
		<comments>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/your-first-trumpet-or-trombone-lesson/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 01 Sep 2014 02:37:13 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[St George Players]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Brass]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[band]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[brass embouchure]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music school]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[p bone]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[trombone lesson]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[trumpet lesson]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/?p=1884</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[People look at brass instruments and wonder how anyone could possibly make a sound on them, they are just a tube. The trick to making a sound on these instruments is all in the lips and any instrument that creates its sound this way is classified as a brass instrument. All the slides and valves are just extra, they are not needed for you to make a basic sound. The way your lips are used on any wind instrument is called the embouchure. This controls the pitch and to some degree the quality of your sound and on a brass instrument you must learn to “buzz”. To do this certain things must happen.- The lips must be moist. The surface tension of the water aids in setting up the vibrations. The lips must be touching. (If the air has nothing to fight there is NO buzz.) Use as Little pressure as possible. Pressure only separates the lips and stops the sound. Backing off the pressure will allow you to soar. It is possible to blow air without having the lips buzz, but in order for the lips to buzz, they must remain touching.  Say the letter “M”, but when making the silent “P,” blow air and keep the lips pressing together.  If air comes out without any buzz, then you need to keep the lips together.  If it is very difficult and you feel like your head is going to explode, then your lips are too tight.  &#160; Once you can get your lips to buzz, try doing sirens or “roller coasters” where you buzz higher and lower notes going up and down.  You will notice that it takes firmer lips and faster air to buzz higher and slightly looser lips and slower air to blow lower.  &#160; That is all there is to it. Once you can make a buzz there are all sorts of brass instruments you can start learning…..even the didgeridoo. It does not matter it is made of wood, if you make a sound into it by buzzing, it is part of the brass instrument family too! &#160; Look at this video which clearly demonstrates how to make a sound on any brass]]></description>
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		<title>In Tune</title>
		<link>http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/in-tune/</link>
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		<pubDate>Mon, 19 May 2014 11:17:17 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[St George Players]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Practice]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[childen. education]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[children]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[computer app]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ear training]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music game]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://stgeorgeplayers.com.au/?p=1838</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[How is it that kids all with their bright new woodwinds can sit down to play, press the correct keys to play a piece together and be so out of tune! Some of this is they are brand new beginners and don&#8217;t have enough muscles to play in tune. Some is faulty technique, but why don&#8217;t they notice it? Everyone can sing &#8220;Doe a Deer&#8221; up the scale, but that just deals with basic tones and semitones. It is all the sounds in between that kids that only know the Western system cannot recognise and if they don&#8217;t recognise them, they can&#8217;t be expected to play their instrument in tune. There are various ways to help solve this problem, for little players there is an app game they love so much they play it over and over and of course with repetition they learn to recognise tose tiny intervals. It is called Blob Chorus Ear Training. The game is a silly as it sounds, but so effective. It consists of a series of silly looking green blobs who each song a note. In front is a purple king blob who then sings his note. The aim is to work out which blob sang the same note as the king, and the notes can be the tiniest difference. if the guess is wrong, that blob explodes to gales of laughter from the child playing the game. How simple and effective and for once, the child will be doing something useful on the iphone or ipad. It is Blob Chorus Ear Training by Lumpty Learning Worth every cent of the couple of dollars it costs. St George Players +61 2 9585 2408]]></description>
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