Water music!

 

Cool off this summer to water music! Have kids create sounds by splashing in the pool or pouring water from one container into another.  Have them plop icecubes into water in different size containers and listen for changes in tone. Water in all its classic forms makes music all by itself. Encourage your musical kids to listen to a stream, the ocean or a waterfall and discover all the different sounds.

 

Jane Austen and her piano

Each morning, before breakfast, the remarkable writer Jane Austen would sit at her piano and practice for a full hour. The woman who gave us Pride and Prejudice, Northanger Abbey and Emma loved her piano and made daily practice part of her routine.

It’s easy over the summer to forget to practice. Valuable progress made during the school year, when schedules are easier to follow, are often forgotten during vacations and the fun, lazy days of summer.

Be sure your child is practicing daily. Make it a fun event. A musical habit can be instilled in even the smallest musician. Set a daily time for practice- even if it’s just listening to and discussing music. Remember playing isn’t all about technique and skill- it’s also listening and learning about musical styles, different kinds of instruments, tone and notes.

Encourage your mini maestros to listen to music all summer long! Listening is part of PLAYING!

 

 

 

 

Summer’s here! Don’t forget to play!

 

 

 

The school year typically means study and lessons. But summer means fun! There are ways to incorporate what your kids learned in music lessons this year into summer events.

One of the most fun ways to remember our music lessons over the summer is to have your kids perform at a backyard concert. Have your musical munchkins create brochures and handbills and distribute invitations to those in your neighborhood including friends and family. Get the whole family involved by building cardboard stage decorations and seating the audience.

Your musical child will love the opportunity to perform for friends and family. Performing helps build self esteem, confidence and charisma!

 

Crafts with a musical note….

 

 

 

Crafting and making things is a huge part of summer fun. Whether kids are attending Bible School, camp or crafting at home, be sure you’re making music part of their experience.

Encourage free painting as kids listen to different music. Note music that makes one feel peaceful or happy and even crazy! It’s so much fun to see what kids come up with listening to music with a paintbrush in their hand.

Create your own instruments! Oatmeal boxes make great small bongos. Cut the front from a cereal box and loop on a few rubber bands and made a guitar. Give drum sticks to your kids and have them (safely) pound on different surfaces around the yard to come up with different tones and sounds.

Sing around a campfire! There’s nothing like a crackling fire as a background to some a capella tunes. Have kids provide a vocal musical soundtrack to a scary story or a fairytale.

Make making music an essential part of your summer fun!

Violin, Viola, and Piano! Matt is an excellent teacher!

Matt earned his Bachelor of Music in Performance (violin) and Bachelor of Music Education with Distinction and Arts Leadership Certificate, graduating on the Dean’s List from the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY in 2012. He was awarded a full scholarship. Matt’s currently pursuing his Master of Music in Performance for Violin. From 2007-2008, he attended the Manhattan School of Music. Matt has performed at Carnegie Hall with both the New York Youth Symphony, as well as with a piano trio, and has performed internationally as a soloist. Most recently, Matt received a fellowship to perform with the National Repertory Orchestra in Breckenridge, Colorado. He is also on the substitute list for the New World Symphony, in Miami Beach, Florida. Matt began teaching in 2004 while still in high school and completed his student teaching, as well a violin teaching assistant for a performing and creative arts school. Matt teaches violin, viola, and piano, and offers classical, pop, jazz, and most contemporary styles.

Music Advice- The Territory

We call an area of land a territory. The word can also describe a landscape of a different kind. Territory denotes sales areas, service areas, boundaries, limits, the unspoken rules of a relationship.

Sometimes territory is a job description. In the absence of a tour or business manager, I encourage bands to develop some sort of job description for each member of the group. The entire task of day-to-day management of the territory (booking, travel arrangements, getting the oil changed in the van, sending posters) divided among four or five people pushes the needle into the “more likely to get done” area of the doing dial.

But what happens when a weak link appears? Do we simply stop doing the booking? Stop advancing the shows?

Probably not. Someone within the organization has to absorb a new position. They have to learn in Bandland there is no such thing as claiming something is not your job.

It’s your job to write music, play music, create sounds in the studio, produce, direct, paint, lay tile, and build a wall. When a weak link appears, understand it’s the universe encouraging you to think outside the lines about your territory.

Simple Rules of Rock- Say Thank You

No matter who we are or what we do, we all like to be told we’re doing a good job. No where is this more important than in the world of music, where harsh criticism and constantly not feeling successful can take a toll.

Today, *Tell someone in your circle or a total stranger they’re doing a good job. Whether it’s the kid at the food mart who always bags your food properly, your boyfriend who encourages your new endeavors, your agent who is busting her tail, or your publicist who pulls media miracles out of thin air. The words THANK YOU FOR DOING THAT SO WELL mean a lot. Use them often.

James has a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Yale

James

James received a Doctor of Musical Arts Degree in Performance from Yale University in 2001 in New Haven, CT.  Before that, James graduated from the University of Houston in Houston, TX with a Bachelors in Music Performance in 1994.   James has been teaching since 1996, and his styles include jazz, rhythm and blues, pop, Broadway, and classical, among other styles.  He is currently on the staff at UCLA as a collaborative pianist and vocal coach for the music department, and over the summer has been on faculty at the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, CA and as opera coach for the Hawaii Performing Arts Festival.  He frequently performs throughout Southern California in well-known venues, piano bars and cabarets.  He has directed and played for numerous Broadway productions and for numerous headlining shows.  James is also a concert pianist, performing concertos with several symphonies.  His awards include prizes in the New York Concert Artists Guild International Competition, the National Chopin Competition, the Washington International Piano Competition at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., the Olga Koussevitsky Piano Competition in New York, the Salon de Virtuosi Awards in New York, the Houston Symphony Ima Hogg National Young Artist Competition, and the title of Top Instrumentalist in the World Championships for the Performing Arts in Burbank, CA.

Melody Music Studios offers a wide variety of lesson options….

Because we offer lessons either in the students’ home or the home or professional studio of the instructor, we never run out of studio space or instructors, so you can depend on an available instructor for you.  Melody Music Studios is continually growing and adding new instructors.

Melody Music Studios offers a week grace period after the first lesson to give the student a chance to take the lessons and decide if that instructor will be a good match for him or her before committing to the 30 day cancellation policy.  Since we have a full staff of instructors, if the one chosen first is not a good match, chances are we can locate the right instructor for you.  Or if the student cancels during this week, the student only pays for the one lesson he/she took.

So sign up for lessons now, you have nothing to lose!  Melody Music Studios appreciates your interest and look forward to starting your musical journey!

Decipher the handwriting. And more.