Today when we went over the warm-ups the students sang with much better tuning than the very first time I had heard them six weeks ago. The excersise which they began on was "bim bom" where the students sing each on a member of a triad and repeat the syllables "bim bom" with a staccato articulation. I don't know if I find this exercise the most useful because if the students wanted to work on developing their ears, switching between vowels may not be the most condusive to this process. Sustained notes may be the best so that they have more time to hear what they are singing against another singer rather than doing quick notes. If their ears were a little more developed I may find this to be much more useful.
The interesting thing that has happened over the course of the past few weeks is that the sopranos would improve their tuning as the exercise would get higher. Luckily, they stayed fairly together this week in comparison to previous ones. This may be an example of their ears and voice adjusting to the range they are not normally using in the other times of their daily life.
Bethany was also an example of when you are unable to use a piece you had orriginally planned. Their concert is not til the end of their school year. So there was time to go back on what was already chosen. But she made a concious decision to take out a piece and to go with another one. She said that they were trying to decide between two and they went for the harder one. I think it was a smart decision to have another one just incase the piece would be too hard. Also, the way she approached it to students was very good. By saying the PIECE was the problem it let the students know that it wasn't their fault at how they were progressing making them understand that things are a progression rather than blaming themsleves for their inadequate skills.
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