I am currently setting up my School Year schedule.  If you have not gotten back to me as yet, please call to set your appointment.  Slots are filling up quickly and I would not want for anybody to be without a time slot for their lesson.

Teaching is my passion and I am feverishly working ahead to get all my lesson plans ready for my homeschool music students.  I am so very excited to start the year:)  I’ll see you guys in a few short weeks.

I myself as a student, had tapes on for the first few years and when I traded up to a larger instrument the tapes vanished.  However, I started the instrument at a young age.  I’ve come to develop my own way of doing things.  I generally put on tapes for the first three fingers.  I leave off the 4th finger as it is a reach.  Most students extending their pinky all the way will hit the mark for that finger no problem.

As a student progresses, I take off the second finger marker after the lowered second finger is introduced.   The student is now left with third and first markings.  The second finger will learn that it touches first in the lowered position and touches third in the higher position.  I leave things this way until the student is playing in tune for the most part with the second finger.  I then remove the first finger tape.    I then begin to teach the lowered first finger.  Teaching this many times pulls the hand back thus flattening the entire first position, but students adjust after a while.

All that is left is the third finger tape……….what a fantastic time to introduce third position!  To play in third position, go up to where your third finger was and put down your first finger.  Once we have been doing a few exercises in third position, I introduce the others and then add them all into the scale work.  So you could say that my students learn with the tapes but also by ear,  just a little more gradually.

I’ve recently seen these large fret stickers on some student instruments that make their violin resemble a guitar.  They are the most confusing things I’ve ever seen…………so many lines in such a small space.  I would not recommend using them.  They very much become a crutch in some students and I can’t see where these are at all helpful.

Just my thoughts for the day………….oops night!

The second is the Kennesaw State University Summer Clinic for Music and Dance.  It takes place from June 6-11, 2010 and the cost is $289.  For more information or to register, go to www.kennesaw.edu/music/music-clinic

If you are interested in a Day Camp option, Atlanta Violins is hosting one at Dickerson Middle School.  See http://www.atlantastreetviolins.com/images/UpbeatFlyer2010_Cobb_Web.pdf for more details.

How wonderful to have such great Arts Education programs so close by!

In my string studio, I have several Middle School students learning “Allegro” by composer Joseph Hector Fiocco.  It is a great piece (and fun) for students who have learned how to shift positions and are ready to incorporate their shifting into a real piece of music.  The piece is three pages long and has one or two sections per page where the student needs to be in second or third position.  They are having fun learning!

Interestingly, I also have a Middle School student who wishes to switch from the clarinet to the violin and from Band into the Orchestra at school.  He has very committed to the switch and we have been able to get through the G,D and A Major Scales, slurring 2, 3, 4 and yes…………attempting 8 notes in a bow as well as learning some beginning solo pieces.  He will attempt to try out for the School Orchestra in the next few weeks to see if he can keep up.  It is fun to have a student who already reads music so we can concentrate on the actual playing of the instrument!

Thats all for now!