Instrumental Music Teacher Training For Strings*

Pre-requisite: Teacher training to advanced students, classical string players and teachers

Format: Sundays 10am-5pm (six contact hours) once a month for 6 months.
Two courses run each year:
First Semester: Sundays - 13 February, 13 March, 10 April, 8 May, 12 June, 10 July
Second Semester: Sundays - TBC

Fees: $990 including 10% GST plus booking fee (terms: payable in advance).
All major credit cards accepted.
Course fee does not include any suggested listening, reading reference materials or text books.

Location: Based in a relaxed bush/farm setting in Toodyay Western Australia.
Teacher Training also available world-wide on Skype or Zoom.

Contact: To express your interest in this workshop, please contact +61 0413 265 831 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Description:
Setting out and developing your own vision for your string teaching practice
Setting out and developing your own vision for your string teaching practice, and laying out a fun yet thorough framework (or map) for teaching the sequence of progressive skills and abilities you need students to meet. Then developing a corresponding reference of relevant books, etudes, technical work and repertoire. We will also look at some traditional examples of this, the various approaches used by the more influential schools of string playing as an added support to our teaching practice as needed.

 

How to translate and convey the fundamentals of playing
Including preparatory work, repertoire, styles, ensemble playing, interpretations and technique to students of different levels of ability, learning styles and age groups.

 

Boundaries!
Incorporating into our teaching the parameters of boundaries with students about goals or requirements each term, and the corresponding practice expectations, punctuality and self-discipline required to meet that.

Being accepting and encouraging yet setting the limits for students (and parents as often) of what is and what isn’t acceptable attitudes and behaviour.

 

The role of listening
How to cultivate musical listening with students to deepen and enhance their musical experience and playing. Listening to music whether live or recorded brings a deepening of our relationship with the feelings, stories, drama, suspension, release and general emotional colour of the music. We will explore first hand listening practice for ourselves, and ways we can bridge this experience into many of these areas of value for our students.

 

Building more productive relationships with our students and peers
Learning to accept people as they are and deepen our appreciation of what gifts they do bring, and not to judge or project negatively at them for any perceived shortcomings, yet still challenge them to meet standards expected, and really getting how we all grow, change, and adapt and learn to be disciplined in the process.

 

Teaching, mentoring and coaching
Becoming more aware in our teaching approaches and communication with students, parents and colleagues. We will explore the modalities of teaching, mentoring and coaching, and how to use these different approaches in ways which nurture self-esteem and add value to others’ lives and ours.

 

A culture of inclusiveness
Developing a healthy culture wherever we are, of helping students to feel appreciated, respected and accepted; demonstrate a culture of inclusiveness instead of exclusiveness around whatever our perception of excellence may be in learning, teaching, practising and performing music.

 

Creative problem solving
Creative problem solving in response to obstacles students may face with technique, style, interpretation, history and theory. (We go into this a lot!)

How to recognise faulty technique and reverse-engineer steps for the student, to give give them reliable step-by-step ‘how to” with positive experiences at each step.

How to recognise any gaps students may have in their training, and develop your own preparatory exercises as needed to remedy any existing weaknesses in their playing. Also how this can be applied to preparing students for some time in advance, prior to taking on new technical challenges.

 

Effective communication
Effective communication of ideas, instructions and expectations with different age groups, using age-appropriate examples, metaphors, technical explanations, physical gestures, story-telling and imagery.

Exploring and developing a broad palette of simple imaginative yet clear language, in teaching the steps to each skill and ability, in both technique and repertoire.

 

Ensemble skills
Teaching tips, rehearsal approaches, and arrangement building through listening, for imaginative and creative (and fun) chamber music interaction.

 

How to practice
What to look for in setting practice tasks, and what makes practice really productive (the art of smart practice); recognising the need and correct timing for preparatory exercises, and achieving a healthy balance between technical and musical content and focus, so as to maintain enjoyment and low-stress experiences.

Showing students exactly what to focus on at any moment in their playing. We learn to pay attention to specific aspects of playing, what each step of preparation needs to be to achieve the goal, and how this approach makes everything learned to work reliably at home, in rehearsals, and in performance.

 

Playing music as a feeling and intuitive process
Playing music as a feeling and intuitive process as much as an informed, trained and stepwise one. This is where we explore music as a meditative experience, with more emphasis on following our ability to feel and intuitively sense the nuances in the music, as much as knowing “what to do”.

 

Engaging with the real meaning and value of music history and theory
We spend some time developing innovative approaches to making music history and theory come to life. We explore ways into deepening students’ musical imagination and experience of playing, through imaginative and inspired ways of conveying the human implications of the world and the composer’s life at the time the music was written. We look at how we can express these emotional implications and bring the power of those feelings to life, through being aware of (or emphasising) the use of certain intervals and notes used in the score.

 

Healing stage-fright
This is the big one! We get to play our instruments, explore, and try out practical and encouraging approaches and ways into the music, for more enjoyable fulfilling experiences of practice and performance, even under demanding circumstances.

 

The place of meditation in music study and performance
We explore meditation especially in relation to examples from the martial arts and their understanding of “being in the zone”, how to tune in, develop self-discipline, and a real deepening and maturation of our character. As well, we gain experience in various approaches to meditation which can be used to help clear our minds through the day and gain even a few moments inner peace before our next lesson starts.

 

How to use and teach technique as the vehicle for tone, phrasing and expression
How to use and teach technique as the vehicle for tone, phrasing and expression, rather than merely as “developmental exercises”. Feeling safe with the place of feelings and emotions in music, and how we wish to access and let them express in music is one thing. But also knowing the concrete steps of how to translate each of them into musical magic, through an acute awareness of which technical execution causes what emotional colouration of the music.

 

Experiencing and being able to convey and teach rhythm
The “feel” and timing in playing music is such a make-or-break component of rich music making. We will be playing our instruments while we explore the flow of rhythm in music as an instinctive awareness, arising from deep in the physical body, and the ways the body helps us and registers rhythm instinctively in different shapes of movement from different centres in the body, depending on the tempo.

Communication, inclusiveness and ethics
Developing and bringing to music teaching and performance a culture of professionalism, respect, discipline and good boundaries, side by side with values of listening, nurture, compassion and service to humanity. We explore the role of boundaries in our lives and teaching, and each come to as much clarity as we can around ethical behaviour, responsibility, communication in a culture of inclusiveness, yet which has firm safeguards to protect everyone concerned.

 

Setting up your teaching business
The concrete details of setting up your teaching business. Teaching requires deciding the terms, setting the rules on attendance and payments, what constitutes acceptable practice, and what clearly breaches these standards. Teaching music is a wonderful way to give back to humanity, but if any of those involved don’t uphold their end of the bargain, it can become very lop-sided and even cause personal stress and financial loss. We look at how to create a supportive framework for our music teaching practice, which keeps the real purpose of passing on all the wonderful stuff which we have to younger generations, without unnecessary stress or hinderance.

 

This course is an opportunity to further your ongoing professional development in technical and musical teaching skills as well. Includes exactly how to properly prepare and execute all bow strokes, apply a step by step sequential development through particular technical etudes/studies and concert repertoire, as well as correct preparation and practice for reliable right hand and left hand technique. Includes a reliable framework for posture, bow holds, bow strokes, intonation, shifting, vibrato, double-stops, harmonics and stop-harmonics, and how to teach tone, phrasing, articulation, intensity, and projection, from beginners to a soloistic level. It is suitable for string teachers from primary and high school to university and professional levels.
* All concepts, text, course content, description, including the name Integrated Contemporary Performance are copyright © and remain the property of Sonum Solis Pty Ltd