We have a recording of one complete lesson, and also various lesson excerpts with different exercises. We cannot show you all the lessons throughout the year, but if someone is interested, please contact us with questions. We are ready to tell you everything in great detail, as we are sure that this system WORKS. The preparatory group accepts any children, without preliminary testing, from age 2 to 5 years old. The number of children in a group can vary: at least two children, maximum 12.
The lesson lasts half an hour once a week. We are convinced that this is enough for fast progress. The lessons are held without parents, but every two or three months we hold an open lesson in front of the audience so that parents can watch their children's progress.
Watch the final public lesson at the end of the first year.
*Make sure that Close Captions are enabled to see English subtitles.
6 years have passed. Bach, Menuet in D minor.
Warm-up
We do this exercise in almost every lesson. Sometimes it is worth starting a lesson with it, sometimes running it in the middle (if the teacher feels that the children are tired of sitting).
The objective of this exercise is: First, the children must move. But most importantly, the exercises are thought out in such a way as to test and develop the coordination necessary for playing the piano. These movements help children feel their shoulders, elbows, hands, arms, and fingers.
In the first private lesson, we start with the posture warm-up.
Pitch
Basically, the concept of pitch is related to the concept of registers. As a result of our exercises, young children begin to associate words such as "high-low" not only with the sky and earth, with the ceiling-floor, but with high and low sounds as well.
The registers become clear to them, thanks to vivid and familiar images.
Degrees-Scale
(Theory fatigue)
We begin to sing the degrees already in the first lesson.
Pupils look at the teacher and repeat after her (the task of achieving pure intonation is NOT set yet). The teacher shows the pitch with her hand, all the while paying attention to the leading tone (if it is C (Do) major, then B (Ti) is below) goes either up to the Tonic (C) or down to the sixth degree (to A).
The teacher explains that we are just singing the degrees. And we call 8 degrees in a row a STAIRCASE or SCALE.
Sing the C major scale up, then down.
Major-Minor
Music can be joyful and sad, light and dark, hard and soft.
Mozart - Bread and Butter
Schumann - First Loss
In the first lessons, these words can be omitted, but already from about the third lesson we teach to say: joyful music - major, sad - minor (also "light" and "dark"). But, starting from the very first lesson, we sing all the songs-melodies in two versions: in major and in minor.
Major-Minor. Little Fir Tree is Cold In The Winter
Now Kiara will play a "lullaby" in which the right hand plays in the major, and then the left plays in the minor.
Tonic
If you play any song familiar to you and unexpectedly end it with the wrong sound, then everyone, both child and adult, will hear that the song has not ended, or ended in some strange way. And, indeed, that is so.
Only one single note will sound the correct ending. And this correct sounding note at the end of the piece is called TONIC.
If tonic ends the piece, then we can say that it answers all the questions that seemed to come up in this piece.
And this means that the Tonic's function is to ANSWER.
Watch a fragment of the lesson with 3 year old children.
Intervals
An INTERVAL is the intonation between two sounds.
Intervals can be major, minor, and perfect. The major ones have a major sound, the minor ones have a minor sound. Perfect - neither major nor minor, and, therefore, they can be part of either major or minor.
G.I. Shatkovsky proposed a system for how one can remember how each interval sounds easily and quickly. In contrast to the traditional system, where each interval has to be memorized, corresponding to the beginning of some familiar song, Shatkovsky showed, by using the same simple lyrics (for example, "Hey you! Who are you? I do not have a clue."), how the intonation changes depending on the interval.
Now see how, as a result of this method, young children quickly and, most importantly, precisely recognize any interval.
In the first private lessons, we play all the Intervals.
The Third
The third is the ... third interval. The third can be major and minor. Major Third - sounds major, Μinor Third - sounds minor.
Question-Answer
This is a very important topic. Small children (2–3 years old) ask a lot of questions. But when you ask them to "ask a question" they do not understand what you want from them, they immediately begin to answer. This has been noticed by many child psychologists as well.
How we deal with this:
The teacher asks the question, "What do we hear with?" Pupils should answer: "With our ears." For the first time, the teacher can prompt and point at her ears.
By analogy: "What do we looking with?" - "With our eyes." "What do we walk with?" - "With our legs." "What do we write with?" - "With our hands." First, the teacher does the asking. Then we change: one of the kids asks one of these questions and, as a general rule, answers it themselves.
And so, you can apply the following technique: confuse, fool the little guys' heads. That is: the child asks "What do we hear with?", And the teacher answers "with our feet" and stuff like that. The children laugh, but they begin to understand that the answer must be listened to attentively.
This fragment can also be observed in the "complete lesson" (at the top of this page).
There is a single question, but the answers can vary.
Learning the song "about the beetle". The teacher sings:
"Bug, bug, buzz my way, tell me where you are today."
And everyone answers, separately:
"I'm a bug, buzz away, in the BOX I sit today."
".................................. on the STICK I sit today."
".................................. in the HAND I sit today."
And many other answers.
These exercises are preparation for more complex, but very important tasks, namely, how the dominant is resolved into the tonic. (For more details, those who are interested can see these exercises in the "working with adults" topic.)
Phrases based on the question-answer type are found in many musical works. In individual lessons, when analyzing a new piece, we work carefully on this.
Examples:
- A theme from Sonata No.19 - Beethoven
- Second subject in Sonata No.8 - Beethoven
Nudnik (a bore)
We are working on the rhythm in the subgroup according to the Hungarian system of "solmization." (We sing the halves - TA-A; quarters - TA; eighths - TI-TI; sixteenths - TIRI-TIRI.)
There are many useful rhythm exercises in the Hungarian system. We use them, of course.
"Nudnik" is a rhythmic game when children clap and keep an ostinato rhythm, and the teacher plays different rhythms at the same time.
In many works, composers use the repetition of one rhythmic figure for the entire duration of a melody. This is not such a trivial task for a performer.
Our game of "nudnik" can further facilitate the task of coping with this challenge.
It is believed that young children cannot sit in one place - and this is true.
Therefore, we often switch tasks (but in the tempo of the lesson). In addition, kids cannot concentrate, and our material is serious, professional (many people think that it is too difficult).
And so that the students are constantly engaged for the entire half-hour, we try to make the tasks and the pace of the lesson NOT DIFFICULT.
Look at the expressions on our little ones' faces, they are passionate, interested and having fun.