Transcript Literacy Numeracy Games in instrumental lessons by Alan Coady Literacy Literacy (From - etymonline.com): literacy 1883, formed in English from literate + -cy; illiteracy dates back to 1650s. literate early.

Literacy
Numeracy
Games
in instrumental lessons
by Alan Coady
Literacy
Literacy
(From - etymonline.com):
literacy
1883, formed in English from literate + -cy; illiteracy
dates back to 1650s.
literate
early 15c., from L. lit(t)eratus "educated, learned," lit.
"one who knows the letters," formed in imitation of
Gk. grammatikos from L. lit(t)era "letter."
Notation
note (v.)
early 13c., "observe, mark carefully," from O.Fr.
noter, from L. notare, from nota "letter, note,"
originally "a mark, sign," possibly an alteration of
Old L. *gnata, infl. by gnoscere "to recognize."
Meaning "to set in writing" is from c.1400.
Related: Noted; noting. The noun is first attested
c.1300, in the musical sense; meaning "brief
writing" is from 1540s
Musical notation...
...is limited to:
ABCDEFG
And that's it!
The rest is done with smoke & mirrors
or repetition, grouping, recycling
or sharpening and flattening
Notes are grouped into...
Sentences – or phrases
which peak at the main word – we stress or accent
this note/word – this often occurs at Fibonacci
moment – of which more later...
there may be more than one clause
each with a key word, which will be stressed
Commas shouldn't sound like full-stops
This is known as...
Phrasing
And getting the stresses wrong is an error of prosody
mid-15c., from L. prosodia, from Gk. prosoidia "song
sung to music," also "accent, modulation," from
pros "to" + oide "song, poem" (see ode).
Similar to someone who speaks a second language
very well, but occasionally puts the stress in the
wrong place – or to early speech synthesis – a field
in which Edinburgh is a world leader!
How can you tell when you are at
the end of one phrase and,
therefore, the start of another?
There will usually be
inactivity of some sort A rest (silence) or a long note
– equivalent to breathing
in normal conversation
Languages
late 13c., "words, what is said, conversation,
talk,"
from O.Fr. langage (12c.)
from V.L. *linguaticum, from L. lingua
"tongue,"
also "speech, language" (see lingual).
Meaning "a language" is from c.1300
Italian
the international language
of written music
and musical terms
(vocabulary tends to be
in the language
of the country of origin of an activity)
e.g. Japanese for Karate, Judo
French for Ballet, Fencing, Cuisine
examples
Some of which have made their way
into everyday English usage...
accelerando; adagio; ad libitum; affrettando; allegro;
andante; andantino; appassionato; brio; cello; coda;
crescendo; cuartetto; da capo; dal segno;
diminuendo; duo; facile; forte; giocoso; largo;
leggero; maestoso; moderato; niente; ossia;
ostinato; piano; pesante; pizzicato; quintetto;
ritardadno; scherzo; tempo; trio; troppo; tutti;
vivace
Spanish
The language of the techniques of the guitar
e.g. fingers: indice; medio; anular; pulgar;
Right-hand techniques:
apoyando (rest stroke) tirando (free stroke)
rasgueado (Flamenco-style strumming)
golpe (striking body of guitar)
Left-hand techniques:
ligado – slur (a way of joining notes together)
ligar also means to get off with
Latin...
...through the text of the Mass
and other liturgical sources:
Kyrie; Gloria; Credo; Sanctus;
Benedictus; Agnus Dei
others
In titles of pieces (often involving names of people,
cities, countries), composers' names etc.
French; German; Russian; Portuguese; Polish; Czech;
Swedish; Finnish; Norwegian;
And through Spain's colonial history
titles/names/stories/legends from:
Argentina; Bolivia; Chile; Cuba; Colombia;
Mexico; Paraguay; Uruguay; Venezuela;
Etymology and guesswork will get
you a long way.
Langsam (German for slow/long)
Allargando (Italian - large/broadening
out)
Links are occasionally at some remove...
eg. Forte (fort = strong = loud)
If all else fails, try 'onomatopoeia'.
For this idea, I'm indebted to neuroscientist,
and 2003 Reith Lecturer, V. S. Ramachandran
- author of Phantoms in the Brain.
This idea has less to do with
a word imitating the sound it describes
than the vocal apparatus
mimicking the idea (or feeling) of a word...
...possibly the way in which language
evolved...perhaps we'll never know...
Examples in English..

Teeny-weeny - mouth tightens up

Large - mouth opens more widely

Huge – syllable often elongated

Compare, for example
 lament with jig
Examples in Italian musical
terminology
Largo – slow, wide spaces between notes
 Pizzicato – plucked e.g. violin – short notes hinted at
by short plosives (p zz c t)
 Arco – bowed – longer notes hinted at by longer vowel
 Stretto – narrowing (in fugue) – hinted at by restricted
vocal movements.
 Consider similar English words
 strict; strife; struggle; strain
All hinting at a voluntary, temporary and useful form of
synaesthesia

Degrees of the Scale
Degree:
early 13c., from O.Fr. degré (12c.) "a step (of a stair),
[…] gradus "step" (see grade).
Scale:
"to climb," late 14c., from L. scala,
from scandere "to climb"
There are choices here:

Fixed letter names A-B-C-D-E-F-G/A etc.
Moveable tonic sol-fa
 (1540s, from It., from M.L. sol + fa)
do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti/do etc. think Sound of Music



Moveable numbers 1-2-3-4-5-6-7/8 etc.

and.......
Functional names
• Tonic – the main note (tone) and centre of gravity
of the scale/key/tune
• Supertonic – super = above tonic
• Mediant – in the middle of 1 & 5 (tonic chord)
• Subdominant – below dominant
• Dominant – strongest note in scale (with obvious
exception of tonic)
• Submediant – in the middle of chord built on
subdominant
• Leading note – does what it says on the tin - leads
to tonic
Modality
"manner," late 14c., "kind of
musical scale," from L. modus
"measure, rhythm, song, manner"
(in L.L. also "mood" in grammar
and logic)
MAJOR / minor
Often thought of as happy/sad
 Actually describing distance between notes
(intervals - c.1300, from O.Fr. intervalle (14c.)

Parallel with MAJOR DISASTER/minor disaster
MAJOR in the army/minor (can't yet vote, marry or
watch scary films - yet, curiously can star in them



e.g. Taxi Driver - 1907, shortening of taximeter "one who drives" - c.1400
And now ...
Numeracy
Numeracy
from numerus “number”
(see number)
on model of literacy, etc.
Number - c.1300, "sum, aggregate of a
collection," from Anglo-Fr. noumbre, from
O.Fr. nombre, from L. numerus "a number,
quantity,"
The trouble with numbers in music
is...
...that the same few numbers are used for everything:

1234567
for scales (notes in chords)
 12345 for fingering
 (unless you go to Torness Primary)
 beats per bar
 bars per phrase
 phrases per section
 sections per movement...
 Section numbers (rehearsal marks!!!)

Why do I use rehearsal numbers
when letters are more common?
B, C, D, E, G, P, T, V - all rhyme
("agreement in terminal sounds," 1560s)
This can be a nightmare
in a reverberant rehearsal space
You have a 1:8 chance of everyone
starting in the right section
Time Signature
e.g. 4/4
Numerator – how many you get per bar
- in this case, 4
Denominator – name of what you get
- in this case ¼ notes (American terminology)
or – crotchets (European terminology)
Time signature and proportion
2/4, 4/8, 8/16
 3/4, 6,8. 12/16
 There are also indivisibles e.g. 9/8
 There are also irregular time signatures
 e.g. 7/8, 11/16
Most irregularities can be dealt with by subdividing



for 7/8 - count 12, 12, 123 or 12, 123, 12

for 11/16 – count 123,123,123,12
European vs. American names for
note durations and implications for
understanding time signatures
4 beats – Semibreve – Whole note
 2 beats – Minim – 1/2 note
 1 beat – crotchet – 1/4 note
 ½ beat – quaver - 1/8th note
 ¼ beat – semiquaver – 1/16th note
nd note
 1/8th beat – demisemiquaver - 1/32
1/16th beat – hemidemisemiquaver - 1/64th note –


and we're back to literacy
hemisphere; demigod; semicircle


Sequence
from O.Fr. sequence "answering verses"
(13c.),
from M.L. sequentia "a following, a
succession,"
from L. sequentem (nom. sequens),
prp. of sequi "to follow" (see sequel).
Complete the following...
2, 4, 6, 8, ?
 1, 3, 5, 7, ?
 1, 4, 7, 10, ?
 1, 5, 9, 13, ?
 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, ?
 abc, bcd, cde, ?
 ace, bdf, ?

My preferred definition of
sequence:
A sequence must have a pattern which you can
see/hear easily
You must be able to predict
what should be coming next
You should be able to see/hear whether what you
were expecting to come next actually did happen
When what we are expecting doesn't happen this is
called.....
A break
Why is it important to know where these are?
Expectation
is as much in the ear of the audience
as the player
If the expected doesn't happen
it can sound like an error has occurred...
Unless the moment is handled
with sufficient confidence!
We do this naturally in language
(prosody again)
For example:
“Now, Primary 5, when you've finished, put
your rulers in the green tray
and your protractors
in .… the yellow tray.”
The space makes people listen more.
Where else do we get sequences?
Maths
 Art – motifs, patterns
 Dance
 Science - DNA...
 History – sequence of events
 (prediction is less certain here
as the recent lack of Rapture confirms)
 Any other suggestions?


Fibonacci and growth
Finbonacci series again
0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21...
Each number..

is the sum of the
previous two
The series is found
in nature
e.g. fir cones

Dividing any number...

...into the following number

comes out at

approx 1.6
Dividing any number...

...into the preceding number
 comes out at
 approx 0.6
Resulting in either of the following
ratios* .....
1 : 1.6
or
1 : 0.6
*ratio
1636, "reason, rationale," from L. ratio "reckoning,
calculation, business affair, procedure," also "reason,"
from rat-, pp. stem of reri "to reckon, calculate," also
"think" (see reason).
Mathematical sense is attested from 1660.
This ratio...
...known as the golden
section,
 matches the proportions of
the rectangle
 thought to be most pleasing
 to the eye

Fibonacci point in a musical phrase
Imagine a phrase of music e.g.
 Twinkle, twinkle, little star  Including the rest, at the end, there are 8 beats
 (2 bars of 4 beats – time signature 4/4)
 0.6 of the way along this journey is 4.8
 In other words beat 5
 Where the natural peak occurs
st syllable of little
 At the 1
Ironically, the biggest point of the phrase is on the
word, “little”
 Don't blame me, I didnae write it


What's the point of the whole
Fibonacci thing?
To get a natural feel for
growth and decay in musical phrasing
which
like the length of lines of poetry
is based on breathing.
(Accidental alliteration – honest, guv
I don't even like alliteration
- a device for dullards)
Where does this come from?
Mary Oliver in A Poetry Handbook says the
iambic* pentameter **
represents the lung capacity
of the average human lung.
*(1570s, from L. iambicus, from Gk. iambikos, from
iambos "metrical foot of one unaccented followed
by one accented syllable,")
**1540s, from M.Fr. pentametre, from L. pentameter,
from Gk. pentametros (adj.) "having five
measures," from pente "five" + metron "meter"
Why is this not more obvious?
In riff*-based pop music
where vocal phrases are draped
over a pre-existing rhythmic framework
this is much less obvious
– and less still on X Factor.
*riff
"melodic phrase in jazz," 1935 (but said to have been
used by musicians since c.1917), of uncertain origin,
perhaps a shortened form of riffle, or altered from
refrain. The verb is attested from 1955. Related:
Riffed; riffing.
Axes
No, not things to
chop down trees...
but...
The plural of...
axis
1540s, "imaginary straight line around which a body
(such as the Earth) rotates," from L. axis "axle,
pivot, axis of the earth or sky," from PIE *aks"axis" (cf. O.E. eax, O.H.G. ahsa "axle;" Gk. axon
"axis, axle, wagon;" Skt. aksah "an axle, axis, beam
of a balance;" Lith. aszis "axle").
x, y and z
x = along the string
i.e. changing fret
y = along the fret
i.e. changing string
z = distance from the strings –
which should always be
as small as possible
Games
Always better in group lessons :-)
Spelling game
There are approx 70 words
which can be spelled out
using the musical letters
ABCDEFG
Version 1
Pupils are given a word
(either by me or one another)
to spell out in notes.
First to complete the word
is the winner
A variation on this...
is to relocate at least one of the notes
to another octave
or another string
Version 2
Pupils are told the starting note
and then have to identify a
word
(played by me or another pupil)
Surprising things which many
people don't notice...
Double letters e.g. EGG
Prefixes e.g. AGE followed by CAGE
Suffixes e.g. EDGE followed by EDGED
Insertions e.g. FED followed by FEED
End matching beginning e.g. DAD; FAFF;
That O, R, S, T, U etc. are not notes
When pupils improve at this
game...
You know that
their listening skills
have sharpened up
a great deal
Name that rhythm..
Where the rhythm* of
a well known tune
is played on one note
*rhythm - 1550s, from L. rhythmus "movement
in time,"
from Gk. rhythmos "measured flow or movement,
rhythm,"
related to rhein "to flow," from PIE base *sreu"to flow" (see rheum).
Supply the next note...
I play a phrase from a famous tune,
stopping on the penultimate note
The pupils endeavour to land
on the correct finishing note
A good game for beginners
with limited note range
Good fodder: nursery rhymes; Christmas carols;
TV/film theme tunes; national anthems
Reading Games
Play one bar each
The purpose of which
is to practise* the skill
of re-entering after
having lost the place
* s - because it's a verb :-)
When things are going well....
We change personnel..
Every half-bar
Every beat
Every note
The last one results in little more than hilarity
which is not a bad way to end a lesson
Name that tune...
Not very high-brow
but a good way to relax
Of all these games...
Which do you think
is the most popular?
The spelling game!
Funny old world.
Thank you!