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CAUTION TO THOSE WHO ARE TRIGGERED BY CLASSICAL MUSIC PEDAGOGY - Turn back while you still can!
Since spring 2019 I’ve been running a beginner guitar ensemble at our local community center under a ‘life long learning’ course they take during the summer. The students liked it so much they retained me to teach it year round. We took long breaks during the most intense parts of the covid pandemic, but continue to meet as my schedule allows.
Last Saturday we played in the town culture festival and I’m sharing a sample of the music we played. With the exception of one person all the students began guitar for the first time in 2019. Today they are beginning to have a cohesive group sound.
At this point the ensemble has 9 students and myself. Most are retired folks and a few soccer moms, and a guy who’s had stroke that struggles with arm mobility. The guy playing the lead part is not quite perfect, but I let them take the harder parts instead of being the feature player. Over all I’m pleased because they are determined and now thinking about how to get a better guitar sound. This was a good performance for us.
I’ll post some photos of the culture festival stage, but the video is too noisy to enjoy and I knew kids would be talking etc. so I threw my iPhone on the floor when we warmed up in a room backstage.
RE: Bach and forth *music pedagogy t... (in reply to estebanana)
I tried to get them to play it at 60 on the metronome, but they said it was too hard, so we practiced at 64 on the metronome for three weeks. Somehow the tempo crept up I felt, but I haven’t timed it yet. They started listening to Xue Fang and her solo version is a bit fast, so they took that as permission…. these students are crafty
I have to look on my computer, one choral I arranged last year and one I downloaded that was free from a guitar teachers website.
There are three players who don’t have good nails, small fingers and hooked soft nails. I’m trying to get an idea of how to teach them to achieve better tone with just flesh fingertips. I took lessons on lute many years ago and I cut my nails for it, but because lute is a double course instrument the way the finger tips need to slice and release is slightly different than how I think single course guitar string tone management should be. I don’t want to cut my nails and work on it though lol 😂
RE: Bach and forth *music pedagogy t... (in reply to estebanana)
Bach to the Future
Maybe not Ynweenie good, but ok
We recorded this on my iPhone three weeks ago The screen is set to wide mode so I look huge, but I’m 7” taller than anyone in the group
We have a Bach set, Bouree’ from the E mi lute suite, a Choral in C maj from the St. Matt passion and the Air on a Strippers Thong. I’m working up one more Bach thing to make it a four piece set. I’m thinking of the first fugue in Art of the Fugue, or I think #6
The arrangement we are playing is by Lou Warde I have another book with 12 chorales from BWV 244 I’m trying to get more of them in practice. We are finishing up learning a three part arrangement of Narváez’s version of Cancion del Emperador, it was trickier that it seemed because it has those back and forth melodic passages divided between guitar 2 and guitar 3, with guitar 1 playing lots of whole and half notes. The people with guitar 2&3 parts do the work and guitar 1 part is easy. I picked it because usually the less advanced players are relegated to thumping around like a tuba in a marching band, but this arrangement gives them the opportunity to play high on the treble E string with long held melody notes.
In December we practiced diligently and rented the local concert hall to make a recording of all of our Bach stuff. A friend of mine recorded us, we sounded clear, in tune, very tight, but one problem, the HVAC system kicked on during our recording and nobody noticed it until later that afternoon when the guy recording went over the session, our sound was smeared over by hissing air sounds.
The arrangement we are playing is by Lou Warde I have another book with 12 chorales from BWV 244 I’m trying to get more of them in practice. We are finishing up learning a three part arrangement of Narváez’s version of Cancion del Emperador, it was trickier that it seemed because it has those back and forth melodic passages divided between guitar 2 and guitar 3, with guitar 1 playing lots of whole and half notes. The people with guitar 2&3 parts do the work and guitar 1 part is easy. I picked it because usually the less advanced players are relegated to thumping around like a tuba in a marching band, but this arrangement gives them the opportunity to play high on the treble E string with long held melody notes.
In December we practiced diligently and rented the local concert hall to make a recording of all of our Bach stuff. A friend of mine recorded us, we sounded clear, in tune, very tight, but one problem, the HVAC system kicked on during our recording and nobody noticed it until later that afternoon when the guy recording went over the session, our sound was smeared over by hissing air sounds.
Cool, would like to hear all that stuff.
So this one you linked was in D major. However the tune melody (soprano) is the main church theme Bach did not write: http://bach-chorales.com/BWV0244_44.htm
So in the same Passion the last chorale version of the same tune might be closer to the traditional harmonization (in A minor but actually the melody is considered PHRYGIAN mode, ie., mode 4). You can see this version is more “flamenco”. So I am still curious if your last chord is Major version, or the Phrygian version?
Just another footnote…in school, and for me this goes back to high school music theory class, first year theory students learn harmony by harmonizing Bach chorale. But as per the circle of 5ths, they only choose the Major or minor key harmonizations from the repertoire, and therefore all students of theory lack the tools for dealing with the Phrygian cadential techniques. Worse, they force us to fill in voices bottom up, as in figured bass being the formal structural basis. The irony is Bach himself was thinking EXACTLY OPPOSITE to this…top DOWN. As in the MELODY is the formal structure (the cante) and you accompany it based on the tradition (his church). It boggles my mind as to how many chorales were ruined by “education”. . And now people are so confused about flamenco harmony as if it is some exotic high jazz Arabic thing, when it is simply old school cante melody harmonization, mode 3 or 4.
Thanks! Yes it is based on the two major key harmonizations (transposed from D major in BWV 244. 44…from F in BWV 244.54, so two chorale settings). There are two more, in E and Eb, plus the last one I explained earlier in Phrygian.
And now people are so confused about flamenco harmony as if it is some exotic high jazz Arabic thing, when it is simply old school cante melody harmonization, mode 3 or 4.
16th century Italian mode three or seventeenth century Spanish tono 3/4? Fuenllana tono 3/4 or Sanz tono 3/4? Didn't the Arabs borrow tons of Greek theory and Practice (or at least an interpretation of practice) which would have manifested in some ways in Spain? And do you mean "cante" or "canto?" Very different concepts. And who are these "people" that are so confused? Manolo Sanlucar, Lola Fernandez, Manuel Granados, Arjona, etc?
Thanks! Yes it is based on the two major key harmonizations (transposed from D major in BWV 244. 44…from F in BWV 244.54, so two chorale settings). There are two more, in E and Eb, plus the last one I explained earlier in Phrygian.
Lou Warde has a wealth of nice arrangements for beginner - intermediate level, it’s been a real time saver. He’s very generous to share these with everyone for free.
I also bought an edition with 12 chorales in the original keys arranged for guitar, but depending on key, some of the soprano voice parts are in the guitar stratosphere, so I think that’s why they arrange them in keys that can bring the voicings down into a comfortable range.
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Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
RE: Bach and forth *music pedagogy t... (in reply to estebanana)
quote:
I also bought an edition with 12 chorales in the original keys arranged for guitar, but depending on key, some of the soprano voice parts are in the guitar stratosphere, so I think that’s why they arrange them in keys that can bring the voicings down into a comfortable range.
The guitar is pretty much the ideal instrument because of the tessitura of the human voice. Above the 12th fret E, called E5 by singers, is extremely high. That is Helloween range. Whitney doesn’t even go up there, Mariah only on occasion. I am surprised if Bach goes to a ledger line above the staff (A5), because singing the main melody in a falsetto voice is pretty weak. (I can see he does indeed go that high on occasion). Maybe your first guitar should use a cutaway?
RE: Bach and forth *music pedagogy t... (in reply to Ricardo)
I think I loaned that chorale collection to one of the group members. Now I'm curious to compare it to the score of the SMP
I used to date a soprano who studied with an older singer who worked at La Scala in the late 1940’s to 1960’s, she, the teacher, had a high A. A few freaks have them.
Posts: 15316
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
RE: Bach and forth *music pedagogy t... (in reply to estebanana)
quote:
Now I'm curious to compare it to the score of the SMP
The tune is set, as I said 5 times in the Matthew Passion….the different keys are designed to express better what ever the chosen verses are, and the harmonies too. For example happy and triumphant vs sad and dark. He also sets several other church melodies he did not compose, in the same passion (yes, he hardly composed anything here LOL). The main melody is up in the high soprano range because the little kids in choir could sing that easier than the old school discant which was too difficult to navigate for children (swapped for tenor parts). Dropping some of the notes to a lower octave wouldn’t really harm the structure IMO. Plus, as a guitar instrumental, no lyrics means the pitch range is arbitrary. The site I linked has all the chorales in the original keys, just so you know,
BWV 244.10 is “por Minera”, main theme starts and ends on G#, BWV 244.17 is “por Cañizares”, or G sol Phrygian, BWV 244.44 is “Por Taranta”, F#, your first half guitar chorale based on this, BWV 244.54 is “por medio”, A, your second half guitar chorale based on this, BWV 244.62 is “por Arriba”, E. And Proper Phrygian harmony as the old hymn likely used. This would be the more “flamenco” sounding version for guitar ensemble IMO.