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Specialised Project PRM-602

Music Education
"A Comparison of Teaching Styles, Which is the Most Effective for
Learning Classical Guitar: The Suzuki Method, Dalcroze Eurhythmics,
or Gordon's Theory of Audiation"
...
from my years at
school, music education wasn't something that inspired me to pick up an instrument due to
improper teaching methods and a unorganised lesson plans
...

Growing up as an electric guitarist, I discovered an interest in classical guitar during my time at
university
...
I have
always had a passion for teaching and imparting knowledge onto others, so this paper is catered
around the two things that I aspire to be successful at in life: teaching and classical guitar
...
This research aims to bring me closer to my goal of becoming a
music teacher and improving the world of music education, starting by finding out the most effective
way of learning classical guitar
...
Special thanks to my supervisor Luke Cook for guiding me through this and
pushing me to achieve my full potential
...

Thanks to all the participants on the classical guitar forum for filling out my survey and for their
continued support through this paper
...

A final thank you to the professionals of my chosen teaching methods for the interviews and for
their time, Jennifer McDonel, Ignacio Barcia, and Frances Turnbul
...


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3

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 - Introduction
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Page 8

Chapter 3 - Methodology
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Page 13

Chapter 5 - Discussion
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Page 22

Appendices
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Page 39

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4

Chapter 1 – Introduction
"A good guitar teacher can save you years of struggling, by showing you how to do things the best
way from the start" (RGT, 2016)
...
The aim of this paper is to bridge the gap between wanting to learn and applying the
knowledge, to outline the most effective teaching method for learning classical guitar
...
I am investigating this topic because as a classical guitar tutor, I
am constantly working around my students needs without formally sticking to a set teaching
method
...
The purpose of
this research is to get more people actively involved in playing classical guitar and help them to learn
in the most effective way to achieve their ambitions
...
I have narrowed the methods down to the
Suzuki method, Dalcroze Eurhythmics, and Gordon's theory of 'Audiation'
...
Popular methods that I have excluded from my research are the Kodály method and
the Orff approach, simply because they are less applicable to instrument learning
...
All children learn to speak their own
language with relative ease and if the same natural learning process is applied in teaching other

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skills, these can be acquired as successfully" (Internationalsuzuki
...
This method was
developed mid-early 20th century by Japanese philosopher Shinichi Suzuki
...
This is the more traditional route for learning an instrument if one was to become
'classically trained'
...
"It is a multifaceted musical
philosophy and a method that educates through movement, refining the body as an instrument of
rhythm and pitch" (Boyarsky, 2009)
...
Dalcroze Eurhythmics teaches concepts of rhythm, structure and musical
expression using movement
...
Its main objective is to get children to learn
music through movement, incorporating dance and other kinesthetic activities into practice
...
It takes place when we hear and comprehend music for
which the sound is no longer or may never have been present
...
Gordon, a mid 20th century educator, revises the
importance of learning music by listening, often comparing learning an instrument to learning a new

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language
...
Gordon Music
Learning Theory Overview Part 1, 2011)
...

While these methods are mainly intended for children, I aim to consider all ages throughout my
research, because as quoted from acclaimed online guitar educator Justin Sandercoe, "You are never
too old to start playing and enjoying guitar" (Sandercoe, 2009)
...
It will also show how my research fits in with the existing studies and
how it is justified
...
Chapter four is the research and analysis section, displaying the results I
have found through primary and secondary sources
...
This paper will conclude with a review of the importance of my topic and the
information collected throughout the previous chapters
...
The teaching
applications for music in general can be extremely varied, due to it being an incredibly broad subject
with many relevant components to it
...
He states: "It’s exciting to play the guitar, but slow down
...
The teaching application of slowing down a piece and perfecting it through repetition is part
of the Suzuki method and Gordon's theory
...
org
...
To paraphrase
Gordon "we recognize the aspects of repetition and any other relevant factors that give the music
meaning to us" (Gordon 1989, 10-14)
...


The Dalcroze method seems less relevant when teaching an instrument, particularly in classical
guitar where the music and body are so restricted
...
Galvao however, stresses the importance of being kinesthetically
involved in playing an instrument through Dalcroze eurhythmics, stating that “playing a musical
instrument involves the accurate execution of fine motor movements which are highly dependent
upon kinesthetic information reaching the central nervous system" (Galvao and Kemp, 1999, p
...

Thomsen explains that once students have approached their instrument, it is similar to transferring
“from the global – the whole body – to just part of the body” (Thomsen, 2007, p
...
Thomsen

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continues to explain that "the learning process can be likened to gaining a repertoire of sensations
which students can then apply, when sitting at a piano, for example, as they bring the sensation that
was with the whole body just to the finger" (p
...
Although he uses the piano as an example, it is
valid for classical guitar too
...
In the
case of learning classical guitar, the required body parts to make the sound, the fingers and hands,
are minimalistic
...


As any musician knows, learning an instrument requires dedicated time to practicing
...
Suzuki famously quoted from his book 'Nurtured by Love' saying that
you should "practice only on the days you eat" (Suzuki, 1969)
...
P, as she states "As parents are well aware, most children
will not practice daily unless they are told to
...
P, 2015)
...
This is backed up from his quote:
"the fate of a child is in the hands of his parents" (Suzuki, 1981)
...
P argued, this aspect of the
Suzuki method puts too much stress on the parents
...
Suzuki quotes "An enriched,
stimulating environment is a necessary tool in assisting the gifted child's development" (Harris, 2009
in Nurtured by Love, 1969)
...
Graetz as he states that “the physical characteristics of learning environments can affect
learners emotionally, with important cognitive and behavioral consequences” (Oblinger, 2006)
...
Other aspects of learning classical guitar through the Suzuki
method include strong aural and reading skills
...
To quote classically trained tenor and guitar educator Brendan
McCarthy, “Musical notation is obviously very important too and reading music is a very real goal of
the Suzuki Method
...
This
statement provides real evidence towards the importance of reading music above all else, which
isn't agreed by everyone in the field of education
...
He is outlining here that reading
isn't exactly a necessity for guitar players, which is ambiguous and relative to a players ambitions
and learning style
...


Edwin Gordon has an opposing theory to Suzuki, as he believes that music reading is less important
than other factors within learning
...
As he
so often does, Gordon is referring to music as a language, and here he is placing musical reading as
an inferiority to the other vocabularies - listening, speaking (playing) and thinking
...
d
...
As previously mentioned, Gordon compares learning music to learning a language, a
comparison which is culturally diverse and agreed upon by other professionals in the field, however
not everyone
...
This statement is quickly

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concluded in disagreement by author Aniruddh D
...
From his publication 'music, language, and
the brain', he quotes; "This book promotes the alternative perspective, which emphasizes
commonalities over differences
...
Firstly, Patel is saying here that
similarities between music and language are the 'alternative perspective', the implication being that
they are usually segregated from one another
...
He is quick to agree with Gordon's theory however by saying that they share a
number of basic processing mechanisms
...
Guitarist
and author Robert Johnson quotes a resonating statement from his guitar instructional book, saying
that “you really want easy to learn guitar tunes to start with
...
This is a very
relevant point made by Johnson that is useful for any musician starting out, and I may add that
learning enjoyable tunes will further develop the learning process too
...
I will best formulate a result by posing a series of questions in the form of a
survey to classical guitarists of different backgrounds and abilities (see appendix material 1 for
questions)
...
This quantitative research method will be sent to the public through blogs, forums,
or as a personal message through SoundCloud and other such websites
...
I expect
the majority of the public to have started playing from an early age with some form of tuition, with a
lot of the focus put on reading
...
The majority of the responses will be
influenced more towards Suzuki's and Gordon's method's, not so much Dalcroze
...
Unfortunately, primary sources will be very limited for my question, as
the educators whose methods I am researching are no longer around
...
Members of these societies will be great interviewees, and I expect them to give biased
answers in favour of their practitioner
...
The majority of these
educators will be PhD holders which is a great source, and they can best be interviewed through
email or through a live video stream
...
I received mixed responses from the classical
guitar playing public, while several answers had some form of correlation
...
For
instance, I found that most players started learning guitar from an earlier age, took a break from
playing then picked it up again as they got older
...

Fig
...

The 5 people that didn't learn how to read straight away all said that they learnt by ear primarily
...


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Fig
...
3

Mode = 10-19

Average age = 22
...
Figure 3 represents the most common age bracket (ages 10-19) and the average
age (22)
...
4

Embellishing a piece
18
16
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
People who embelish

People who don't embelish

No response

Figure 4 shows the responses from people who were asked the question 'Do you often embellish on
a piece once you've learnt it? Improvise over it, alter rhythms, pitches etc
...


Fig
...
As you can see,
the majority (23) had received tuition from their years of playing
...
6

Listening to a Piece Before Learning

21%

Never (7)
Rarely (4)

40%
12%

15%

12%

Often (4)
Mostly (5)
Always (13)

Figure 6 shows how many people listen to a piece before attempting to play it
...

When asking the public what grade they were at guitar, I got a different response to what I was
expecting
...


I also found a useful secondary source which focuses on listening
...
One group got a chance to
listen to the melody beforehand, while the other didn't
...
8 compared to the group that didn't get to listen
...


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Chapter 5 – Discussion
The age in which students should learn guitar is down to the discretion of both the students and the
parents of the students
...
This is where the learning method
will have to be altered to match the circumstances
...
The parents' involvement has a huge influence on a
child's desire to learn the guitar and the success that they aim for on the instrument
...
After the interview with Suzuki teacher
and established classical guitarist Ignacio Barcia, he highlighted the importance of positive
reinforcement with the following statement:
"The use of negative words is mostly eradicated
...
If anything there is
another way worth trying
...
Hyper achiever parents, or parents who feel the constant need to acknowledge out loud that
their kid is making a mistake, often need to be coached and reminded that this is not acceptable
during the lesson
...
No loving parent
will feel the need to correct their one year old son or daughter who is trying and mispronouncing
Mommy or Daddy for the first time
...
With music is the same thing and if done right it works magically" (Barcia,
2016)
...

From my results, I found that most people learn classical guitar during the adolescent stages in life
...
Previous reading experiences on different instruments and
getting the foundations of music theory down before taking up the guitar is highly beneficial for
anyone starting to learn
...
Having that
knowledge makes beginning on the guitar much easier" (John
...
This also makes learning the
guitar easier as an ageing adult, as 61 year old guitar beginner Isaac said; “It was relatively easy to
tackle the reading when I started classical guitar
...
There is nothing like starting any activity at an early age” (Isaacfe, 2016)
...
I struggled with the 5th and
6th string notes because of the number of ledger lines but once I got my head round that it became
easy" (Green, 2016)
...
This was concluded by all of the professionals of my chosen research
methods
...
Gordon's learning theory and PhD holder Jennifer McDonel went on to
say:
“I would definitely advocate learning by ear first before reading, because again, that follows the
sequence for how we learn language, so we get a chance to acclimate yourself to the instrument
itself, the technicalities of the instrument, and from brain research it's best to introduce one new
thing at a time rather than overwhelm with many things
...
But if you get a sense of the instrument, you can play by ear and start

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interweaving those tonal patterns and rhythm patterns by ear and then you can start doing those
same tonal patterns and rhythm patterns by notation, which eventually become the full tunes that
you're reading, melodically and harmonically” (McDonel, 2016)
...

A large number of the respondents to my survey claimed that they learned to read music at the
same time they learnt how to play guitar
...
As
mentioned before though, previous reading experience on different instruments, such as the piano,
will prove to be useful
...
Suzuki's and Gordon's method advocates this a whole lot more than
Dalcroze Eurhythmics because the process revolves around learning and understanding tunes by ear
...

Embellishing on pieces and improvising over changes shows a strong connection between what we
hear and how we understand music, something that gives Gordon's way of learning an edge over the
Suzuki method in particular
...
This is a bold statement because of the importance that the other two methods place on
improvisation
...
(see appendix material 5 for
full interview)
...
The
correlation that I found in my results was that most people who do embellish were from a jazz or

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blues playing background, and the habits they picked up from that were incorporated into their
classical playing
...
Embellishing on pieces or improvising over changes is a vital skill
for a guitarist to have, so having that blues or jazz background will improve these skills, as well as
one's general musicianship
...
Regardless of the learning method
though, improvisation provides the staple for strong musicianship and should be highly regarded by
all classical guitarists, which is leading me to think that the Suzuki method is particularly ineffective
for guitarists
...
Self-teaching is inevitable, but learning with the right teacher to start off
with is imperative as they can cater their teaching to fit around your goals as a musician
...
One member of the classical guitar forum shared his personal
experience by going on to say; “I believe I would be a much better player if I'd had instruction
...
You "discover" things after trial and error that
could have been taught in a lesson” (Bear, 2016)
...
Teachers learn and are expected to perform the
Suzuki repertoire as well as a number of other pieces
...
org
...

A big part of classical guitar playing is learning pieces of music by notational direction
...
The majority of the public responded by saying
that they always listen to a recording first, however a large number also claimed that they just play

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what is on the page with no aural guidance
...
This is entirely dependent on the difficulty of the piece and
the ability of the person, however, through extended research I found a very informative case study
on this
...
All
students were allowed one 12-minute training session sometime between 8-10pm, in which they
practiced a 13-note melody with their left hand (all participants were right-handed)
...
Both groups showed improvement the morning after, though they did not improve at
the same rate
...
18 and over the course of the practice session improved to an average score of 99
...
The group
which was not given a recording to listen to started out at about the same level of accuracy – 48
...
16 (Kageyama, 2016)
...
80, but this was only for a 13 note exercise
...
Ultimately, this proves that listening to a piece beforehand improves how
accurately you will be able to play it, an effective learning method used by both Suzuki and Gordon
...

When conducting the survey for the public, I was hoping to find out what grade they were at guitar
...
Of the people who had taken exams, they spent more hours
learning a piece and had a stricter practice regime
...


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Chapter 6 - Conclusion
The interviews that I held with the professionals and the survey responses formed the definitive
conclusion for this paper
...
His approach along with the Suzuki method both have the most
valuable applications for learning guitar, however the stress that Gordon's theory puts on
improvisation was the ultimate decider
...
From drafting my results, the
Dalcroze approach was somewhat ignored in this paper, but its function should not be undermined
...
This is the triggering point for them to potentially take up classical guitar
...

The most useful point that I took from the Suzuki method is creating a positive and nurturing
learning environment
...
The idea that we learn language the same way we learn language is
the most beneficial though
...
Learning tunes by ear before starting to read is highly effective for
learning guitar, so other genres such as blues and jazz would benefit any classical guitar player
...
Gordon's theory of audiation
teaches musicianship and musical understanding, which is what every classical guitar player should
strive for
...


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This research is beneficial to the field of education because anyone who is looking to learn classical
guitar, or any instrument for that matter, will now know the most effective ways to go about it
...
It will encourage more people to take up classical guitar too
because they will no longer procrastinate about finding the right learning sources
...

We have found out that Gordon's theory of audiation is the most effective for learning classical
guitar
...
It
teaches music through five vocabularies in order of importance; listening, thinking, speaking, reading
and writing
...
This learning method caters t all ages, unlike the Dalcroze
approach which is only effective for young children
...

I found that most people learn in different ways and have different goals they want to achieve, but
starting off by learning through Gordon's method is the perfect starting point
...


9) How often would you practice a piece before learning another? Days, weeks ect
...

How would you approach this task? Would you just dive right in and spend all 4 hours reading
through the parts and working out the details? Or would you hop on YouTube and spend 30-60
minutes listening to some recordings first before doing any work on your instrument?
As a young Suzuki kid, it was always the latter
...
I remember well the little Sony stereo
set on my dresser that my mom would turn on and leave running as she left the room after tucking
me in
...

Even into my grad school days, listening to recordings was always a key part of my learning process
when beginning work on a new piece
...

My wife on the other hand (a pianist), was always a look-at-the-score-first kind of person, and didn’t
like listening to recordings until after she had already gotten the piece into her fingers
...

She’s a quick learner, and probably would have been just fine even without humouring my
suggestion, but the marathon listening session certainly didn’t hurt, and I like to think that it helped
her get everything into her fingers more quickly upon arrival
...


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So this leads to an interesting question about the impact of listening on our learning
...
13 notes
...

All students were allowed one 12-minute training session sometime between 8-10pm, in which they
practiced the following 13-note melody with their left hand (all participants were righties)
...
D
...
E
...
L
...
A
...
Effects Of Model

Performances On Music Skill Acquisition And Overnight Memory Consolidation
...

Everyone was instructed to “play the melody as quickly, accurately, and evenly as possible,” but
those in the listening group were also presented with a recording of the passage, which they heard
10 times before doing any practicing
...

So how did the groups do?
Well, both groups improved with practice, in that everyone performed the passage more accurately
after 12 minutes of practice than they did on their first try (no surprise there)
...

Yes, you read that correctly – they continued to improve overnight despite no further practice
...

Different rates of learning
Though both groups improved during the practice session, they did not improve at the same rate
...
18 and over
the course of the practice session improved to an average score of 99
...
The
group which was not given a recording to listen to started out at about the same level of accuracy –
48
...
16 (a gain of only 73%)
...
The group which heard the recording continued to improve
overnight (again, despite not practicing any further), and ended with an average final accuracy score
of 108
...
The no-listening group improved a wee bit too, but only by 4%, finishing with a final
accuracy score of 87
...

What do you think?
At first glance, the results of the study seem pretty clear, but it’s hard to say from the results what’s
best in the long term
...
But does
this lock us into a particular way of playing a piece too soon? And make it more difficult to develop
our own interpretation of a piece? Or is this more of a concern for advanced players than it is for
beginners?
What have you found in your own learning or teaching? Do you find it useful to listen to recordings
before looking at the score? Or find it more valuable in the long run to start from the score with no
auditory model?

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Appendix Material 3

1)

Could you tell me a little bit about the Suzuki method and its applications?

The Suzuki method is a method of learning guitar that is modelled after the way we learn
how to speak
...
Book 1 is exclusively taught orally and
introduces basic rhythms and instrumental techniques that alternate between difficult and
easier in a hard-word/reward fashion
...
It is
during book 1 that we establish good posture, good habits, attention to detail and aural
awareness
...
Music literacy is not introduced until book 2 and the method or
better say, Suzuki students have sometimes a bad reputation for being bad readers
...
At the core of the method is the participation
of the parents who need to be present in body and soul and following every lesson
...
The stronger the triangle
the more successful the lessons will be
...
Older children will probably find
book 1 to be boring, particularly nowadays with their never ending shrinkage of their
attention span
...

3) Other teaching methods such as Dalcroze eurhythmics, the Orf approach and
Gordon's theory of audiation all encourage improvisation as a primary learning tool
...


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4)

Do you recommend guitar students learn how to read straight away?

As a general rule I do not but it also depends on their age and how developed they are
intellectually
...

5) Can anyone past the early stages of childhood learn through the Suzuki method, or is
it strictly for children?
It can be done but it will require a mature attitude and patience
...
How can this be done?
This is done in many ways and is not that different than in other settings
...
Things are never “wrong”
...
Many times, the parents are the ones who need the most work in this
regards
...
That goes back to the parallelism of how we learn how to
speak
...
Quite the opposite! They
will celebrate, they will show support and display happiness, and the toddler will feel
encouraged to keep trying and making it better and learning new words
...


7) What would be a typical practice routine for a student learning classical guitar for the
first time?
Learning how to hold the guitar in a logical sequence
...
Practicing plucking repeated
notes on the bottom open strings with alternating fingers (index and middle)
...


29

Appendix Material 4

Interview with Jennifer Mcdonel

Joel: Could you tell me a little bit about GIML and Gordon's music learning theory?

Jennifer: Sure I could talk to you for hours and hours about that but it don't think we have
that much time (laughs)
...
It started in 1987, for
teachers in the United States who use Dr
...
I
feel like we’re at a really strong point and we’re about to explode music learning theory all
over the place (laughs)
...


Jennifer: Right yeah, I actually almost had a gig in Wales this June because, my family and I
are actually coming to England for holiday in a couple of weeks
...
But
yeah, I think people in England are interested in it, they just haven't had a formalized
representation there for GIML or music learning theory yet, but I think it will happen pretty
soon
...
So how is Gordon's theory beneficial for classical guitar learning, or
any classical instrument in that sense?

Jennifer: In terms of any instrument I think that learning through audiation is beneficial
because the premise of music learning theory is that we learn music the same way that we
learn language, and that is we listen to and absorb the music of our culture just as we
would listen to and absorb the language of our culture
...


30

Jennifer: Right, so you would hear people around you speaking, eventually you would start
to make sense of those things, start babbling
...
So, it's the same thing in music
...
Even from
a young age, and those sort of babbling sounds that they make with their voice, can also
be interpreted musically, and we can play with them musically
...

Like a baby might say “ahhhhhh” (with no musical expression) and we would go “ahhhhhh”
(with musical expression) and just kinda play with those sounds so the baby goes “huh?”
(Laughs)
...


Joel: So they'd start from learning the words they'd been brought up with, to replicating
the musical sounds their parents make back to them?

Jennifer: Exactly
...
So, once you get a good vocabulary of tonal and rhythm, things into your musical
mind, you start to play with that and when you start having your own thoughts, then
you're starting to improvise, and express yourself musically
...
I have vocabulary, I have things that I
want to share with you, so I form the sentences and I can do that in random ways you
know
...


Joel: Not like I do (laughs)
...
So, what would you say is the most important vocabulary for classical guitar
...


Jennifer: Right and I that pauses
...


Joel: That's good cause you answered about three of my questions in that previous one
(laughs)

Jennifer: That's good so I didn't get too far off (laughs)
...
So especially in
terms of pauses, well maybe in terms of classical guitar too, but like I'm a clarinetist, so in
terms of clarinet I always say at the beginning, okay this is an E, you push these fingers
down and you blow
...
You don't really have to think about it, but if you
develop students’ audiation through the listening vocabulary, and the speaking and
performing vocabularies, then they'll actually be able to think musically for themselves,
which is audiation
...
Basically, he says, give
meaning to the music notation, through audiation, rather than take meaning away from it
through the notes and the dots on the paper
...
So he would, like
us to be musically literate in the sense that we see music notation, we hear it in our heads
without ever having to play a note
...
You see the notation and it actually sings to you in your head
(laughs)
...
Does that make sense?

Joel: Yeah totally, so maybe one note or 1 bar on a page, using imagination through
audiation could expand into a completely different repertoire of what the piece may be
intending in the first place
...


Jennifer: Right, it could be
...
That's true understanding
...
That's the whole point of
what it's getting us to do, it's to get us to understand music through musical thinking
...
You can be taught by rote and then shown by note what it is but you're not
necessarily connecting those things
...
The real musicianship comes when you
understand what you're doing and you can also appreciate music more when you
understand its elements like melody, and harmony, and metre, and tempo, form
...


32

Joel: Anyone starting out learning a new instrument has a different goal that they set
themselves beforehand, but I feel that improvisation, learning how to improvise on an
instrument is the most important factor
...
If you have the command of that
vocabulary and in this case in music we have two vocabularies, tonal vocabulary and
rhythm vocabulary
...
All those things together make the
music that we’re playing
...
If you've ever taking psychology or educational psychology there's this
theory of, approximations of behavior (laughs) think it might be Skinner, but, when people
praise a child for an approximation of a right word like say ‘mummmumumu’ and you say
‘oh mumma’
...


Joel: So that could be very similar to learning a scale on guitar, if someone plays it and it's
one or two notes off then you would encourage the final push to get it correct
...


Jennifer: Yeah I guess with, well guitar a little bit but more so with a stringed instrument
like violin where you don't have frets, and you might play a scale but one of your fingers
might be a little bit out of tune and the person might say ‘oh, that was good but just move
your finger back a little bit’
...
So they have to be able to, that was kinda where I was going with it like,
at first when they're really young they can't understand so they're just babbling
...
So then you can teach them a little bit to listen
more finely
...
Yeah that was a really open question and we don't have
hours and hours to talk about it unfortunately
...
If a student plays something and it's one note off, always positively
reinforcing it, so what other methods of Gordon's theory can be used in private tuition? As
opposed to teaching a whole class and more theoretical elements
...
The tunes give us first, the melody, but his can be broken down further so
then you can do that, the tune is the whole but then Gordon talks about the parts
...
Which are the tonal patterns
in the songs and how they have tonal functions, like I try to teach them about tonic and
dominant functions aurally, it's not so much music theory and that it's an application of the
theory which is musical
...
Just like how
when I see a cat, I wouldn’t talk for hours and hours about it, I say that's a cat, and that's a
cat, that's not a cat (laughs)
...
So you can start having them do patterns, sing
patterns, playing patterns on their instruments, and eventually you can put that back into
the bigger whole, and when you play the songs again you can think about where a
dominant is, where a tonic is
...
Then you can teach them
about different types of chords, you know so tonally that's one thing, tonally and
harmonically
...
So you can take that same tune that you
taught them, and break down what are the big beats, which he calls macro beats, what are
the little beats, which he call micro beats
...
Those are very important things
because if you can't feel the metre then you're not going to play with good rhythm or good
tempo
...


Joel: So more the Dalcroze approach to learning?

34

Jennifer: Right, so Gordon took a lot of great things from different people
...
So the combination and interplay of flow,
weight, space and time give us all the rhythmic styles we play
...
It's continually
moving but there is a feeling of heaviness and tension in that
...
You can't really
separate all these four elements they're always interconnected but you can talk about
them in terms of each other
...
Space would be a feeling of direct space, direct
motion foreword or indirect space like not really going straight toward a goal, but kind of
meandering
...
Then time being not necessarily speed but time being, I can't
think of the word pauses sustained
...
So those sorts of things are sustained, like I
think of the barber adagio which is very sustained time and out of time, versus like pointed
very metronomic time where the beats are very clear
...
Maybe there are lots of rhythmic styles going on at the same time
...


Joel: I'm going to think of that next time I hear it (laughs)
...
Would you recommend
they start learning to read straight away or wait maybe a year or a couple of years until
they have a grasp of the instrument, and then go into reading?

Jennifer: Yeah I would definitely advocate learning by ear first before reading, because
again, that follows the sequence for how we learn language, so we get a change to
acclimate yourself to the instrument itself, the technicalities of the instrument, and from
brain research it's best to introduce one new thing at a time rather than overwhelm with
many things
...
But if you get a sense of the instrument, you can play by ear and start
interweaving those tonal patterns and rhythm patterns by ear and then you can start
doing those same tonal patterns and rhythm patterns by notation, which eventually
become the full tunes that you're reading, melodically and harmonically
...
It's like reading comes part
to whole, you learn the little parts which are the words of music, like the tonal patterns
and the rhythm patterns, and then you start to put those together in small ways, like
phrases or 8 measure tunes and then longer tunes and things like that
...
What would we read first, familiar words that we

35

know how to speak right? And then what do we do, we put them together into short
phrases that we read
...
Jane ran fast (laughs) you know things like that
...
It's really interesting, because I
learnt to read about 7 years after I started playing guitar, so it just made me think if I learnt
to read straight away, would my reading skills be a lot better? But then if I did that I would
have the aural skills that I do now, if I started to read straight from day 1
...
The danger is, if we start teaching reading straight away, we may not
get the connection between the reading and the musical mind, and the fingers that go
down
...
That doesn't mean I'm
connecting with the tonality, or the rhythm or the metre, you know
...
Like “do me do” with musical expression has
meaning in a tonality
...
The letter ‘B’ doesn't have much meaning unless you put it into a word like boy
...


Jennifer: Sure, and you have to start simply, I mean they do have to start simple things and
write simple things
...
Same goes with music
...


Joel: From my own experience that makes total sense
...
When my
papers all written I'll send it across to you to read and let me know what you think
...


36

Appendix Material 5

Interview with Frances Turnbull

1
...
It involves 3 integrated strands: movement training
(rhythmics), ear training (solfege) and improvisation
...
As the piano was Dalcroze's instrument of choice, there is a greater emphasis on the
ability to improvise using it, but I have known improvisers on guitar, flute, cello, violin, vocal
and piano accordion teaching
...
While the Dalcroze method is great for getting children actively involved with music,
how can it benefit instrument learning, especially with an instrument as kinaesthetically
restricting as the guitar?
The emphasis on relating a physical imitation of written scores or aural performances gives
a musician a deeper experience of the notation, dynamics and timing needed to play a piece
clearly, accurately, and above all, expressively
...
For advanced musicians trained
in Dalcroze, pieces become easier to perform because they are associated with natural
movement and understanding of intervals (follows Kolb's theory of experiential learning)
...
(Children who have had the opportunity to experience a year or two of
rhythmic training adjust easily to more advanced rhythms
...
Improv training usually involves
writing for particular movements, which develops the expressiveness of the musician
...
Do you think that the Dalcroze method could be used effectively past the early stages of
education? One of the most captivating and informative lectures I've had involved our
tutor using eurythmics to teach time signatures and rhythmic subdivisions
...

I think Dalcroze is actually used most effectively, and most impressively, in more advanced
musical concepts
...
g
...

4
...
Can any
aspects of the Dalcroze method help improve this skill? If so, how?
Rhythmics training improves the ability to read rhythms and dynamics almost instantly,
while solfege improves the ability to not only read the melody/key/pitch, but recognise the
relationship between the different notes, and an expectation of how it may sound through
ear training
...

5
...

6
...
As a Dalcroze subject,
it could be described as an introduction to different types of scales and styles, providing an
opportunity to deliberately compose with specific goals in mind, for rhythmics movements,
for example
...

Finally, I personally feel there is a lot of scope for the guitar to be used, both in
teaching Dalcroze as well as through learning, but this has not been explored because of the
focus on the versatility on the piano
...
org, (2016)
...

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...


Studio, W
...
CMU Home Page
...
Available at:
http://music
...
edu/pages/dalcroze-eurhythmics [Accessed 27 Feb
...


Boyarsky, T
...
Dalcroze Eurhythmics and the Quick Reaction Exercises
...
15
...
files
...
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Audiation
...
org/mlt/audiation/ [Accessed 27 Feb
...


Edin E
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(2011)
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RGT - Registry of Guitar Tutors | Electric Guitar Exams | Acoustic Guitar
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Jazz Guitar Lessons
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rgt
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[online] Classical Guitar
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...
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...
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...
Gordon Analysis | Online
Homework Help | SchoolWorkHelper
...
net/music-learning-theory-edwin-e-gordon-analysis/ [Accessed 1
Mar
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...
What is the Dalcroze Teaching Method? | SFCV
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org
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sfcv
...
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...
and Kemp, A
...
Kinaesthesia and Instrumental Music Instruction: Some
Implications
...
129-137
...
(2007)
...
American Dalcroze Journal 34(1), 1215
...
(1969)
...
New York: Exposition Press
...
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...
The Pros and Cons of the Suzuki Violin Method
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Available at: http://takelessons
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...
(1981)
...
Athens, Ohio: Ability Development
Associates, p
...


Sandercoe, J
...
BC-101 • Common Questions About Learning The Guitar | free guitar
lesson from justinguitar
...
[online] Justinguitar
...
Available at:
http://www
...
com/en/BC-101-CommonQuestions
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(2009)
...
Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Education,
p
...


Oblinger, D
...
Learning spaces
...
Chapter 6
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(2011)
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[online] Brendanmccarthy
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Available at: http://www
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ie/suzukimethod/suzuki-method-principles
...
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New York, N
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Scripp, L
...
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Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp
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How to Play Guitar: What Everyone Ought to Know About the Guitar
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Chapter 7
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(2016)
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http://www
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John
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(2016)
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Message posted to

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Isaacfe
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(2016)
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Message
posted to http://www
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...


41

Barcia, I
...
The Suzuki Method
...
Interviewed by: Senior, J
...
(11th May 2016)

Turnbull, F
...
Movement as an effective tool in early years music provision
...
edu
...
academia
...
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...
org
...
(2016)
...
[online] Available at:
http://www
...
org
...

asp?intSiteID=15&intPageID=3 [Accessed 19 Jul
...


Kageyama, N
...
To Listen or Not to Listen: Does Listening to a Recording Help Us Learn
Faster and Play More Accurately? - The Bulletproof Musician
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Available at: http://www
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com/to-listen-or-not-to-listen-doeslistening-to-a-recording-help-us-learn-faster-and-play-more-accurately/ [Accessed 19 Jul
...


42



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