elissahalliday

After I had successfully learnt Mary had a little lamb and felt confident in my breath control, I moved on to learn “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”. This song was by far the most challenging for me. It was significantly longer than the other 3 songs I had learned prior and consisted of a wider range of notes. Since I felt confident in my ability to play each note separately, I went straight to the measures. I started by playing the first measure over and over until I could play through it smoothly. The biggest challenge for me was moving from the C to the G as it was a big jump. Since I struggled with this, I practiced just transitioning between these two notes. This helped me to smooth out that transition. I then moved on to the next measure, which had the F note in it. I find that the F note is tricky to move into as the fingering for that note is more complex. I had to slow down this part to be able to play this note correctly. After a lot of practice, I could play each measure successfully. I then attempted to put all of the measures together. I started by playing at a slower pace. I found this is where I struggled the most with my breath control. I could get through the first 3 lines, but by the 4th I felt out of breath. I practiced focusing on my breath and taking those breaths when I could so that I was able to get to the last line without feeling lightheaded and out of breath. After quite a bit of practice, I successfully got to the last measure without feeling out of breath. Once I got through the whole song and could control my breath well, I moved onto playing the song at the normal pace. This was a challenge, but after lots of practice, I was able to play the whole song at the correct pace. Once I had the pace down, I began practicing without the notes. By the end of my practicing schedule, I was able to successfully play “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”. This was a big accomplishment for me as I found it was a difficult song to play. Overall, I now feel more confident in my ability to play the recorder, which will be beneficial for me as I move into the classroom. If I have to teach a music lesson at least now I have more background knowledge, then I previously did.

The next step I took was to learn “Mary had a little lamb”. For this song, I put a large focus on my breath control, because this was still something that I had trouble with. This song was more advanced than the first two, but it was a good progression. I found this song challenging because it had many lower notes in it. I find the lower notes much harder to get the right sound out of. I practiced each note separately to make sure I felt confident in each one before putting it all together. I found making that “tuh” sound into the recorder was very helpful, and it allowed me to get the correct sound out of the note. This was when I had to put an even larger focus on my breath control as I found that as soon as I began to feel out of breath, the “tuh” sound was much more difficult to make, affecting the sound of the note. Once I could confidently play every note in the song, I started to learn each measure. I started on the first one, which was EDCD. Since I had spent a lot of time practicing each of these notes, it was easy to play the measure. Even though it felt easy to play the measures separately, I still practiced each one so that I felt confident in my abilities before putting it all together. I then put all of the measures together. To start, I went at a slower pace so that I would successfully learn each measure. My first try went well, but I made a few mistakes when transitioning between notes. So, I went through the song multiple more times at that slower pace until I was error-free. After accomplishing that, I played the whole piece at the actual pace of the song. I had to practice this multiple times as I struggled with transitioning from note to note at a faster pace. I especially found it challenging going from the lower notes (E, D, C) to the G note. After practicing the song at this pace, I was able to go through the whole song smoothly. I continued to practice even when I got it so that I could make it sound as good as possible. By the end, I was happy with my progress, and I felt confident in my ability to play “Mary had a little lamb” without looking at the notes.

After I had mastered “Hot Cross Buns” and was feeling even better about the notes I learned, I began to try learning a more complex song. I chose “Happy Birthday”, which included the notes D, E, G, F, A, B, and C. This song had a significantly larger variety of notes, which made it much more challenging. I started slowly and worked measure by measure to allow me to practice switching between notes. Since this song had a larger variety of notes, I found it difficult to switch between them, especially ones that were not right beside each other (like they were in hot cross buns). It was also more challenging than “Hot Cross Buns” because it had both low and high notes. I was still working on mastering those lower notes, so it took me even longer to work on switching from lower ones to higher ones. After quite a bit of practice, I felt confident in my ability to play each measure and switch between notes smoothly. The next step I took was to put the four measures altogether. This took me quite a bit of time to be able to do smoothly. I found it challenging to put all of the measures together while making the transitions flow between the notes. I made sure to start doing this slowly to give myself more time to switch. Once I felt more comfortable, I sped up the pace to the normal tempo of the song. I had to practice it many times at the normal pace to be able to feel confident in my ability to play the song. After I felt comfortable playing it, I practiced “Happy Birthday” without looking at the sheet. This did not take me too long to learn as I already had a lot of practice with the song and the notes within it. I now feel as though I can confidently play “Happy Birthday” and I am excited to play this for my students when there is a birthday in the classroom. Overall learning this song was a challenge for me, but after lots of practice, I was able to play it well. I am excited to challenge myself even further and learn harder and longer songs.

I chose to play the recorder for my musical growth project. The last time I played recorder was when I was in grade 3, so safe to say I was very rusty at the beginning. I started with the wrong hand positioning, which made learning some of the notes quite difficult. I felt that I could not reach my pinky down to the bottom hole and as a result, the notes were sounding off. I shortly realized that my left-hand goes on the top and that allowed me to reach those low notes. I then started my journey by learning the basic notes on the recorder. I was able to get a hang of the first few notes right away (B, A, and G), but I found the lower notes much more challenging. I found it difficult to keep the note consistent. It was very dependent on my breath and I had not figured out that technique yet. I struggled with playing the note softly enough but not too soft that you couldn’t hear it. After Anita taught me the breathing technique of making a “tu” sound as you breathe out, all of the notes were sounding much better and I found it easier to control the softness of my breath. This tip allowed me to play each of those notes correctly. I now feel confident in my ability to play C, D, E, F, F#, G, A, B, C, D. Once I felt as though I had mastered that, I began to learn my first song, which was “Hot Cross Buns”. This song was a good place for me to start especially because it consisted of the three notes I was feeling most confident about (B, A, G). I started off slow and had difficulty controlling my breath. I was finding that I would get halfway through the song and would feel like I needed to stop to take a breath. After a few days of practicing, I figured out my breath control and was able to play the song much better. I now feel that I can play this piece well and I do not need to look at the notes to guide me. It has been a fun journey so far and I am excited to continue to learn and develop my skills.