Category Archives: Students

Compliment Day

Posted by MaryO on

compliment

 

National Compliment Day.  Give an extra compliment on National Compliment Day which is observed annually on January 24.

A compliment has a powerful effect. It can instill confidence in a child, or validate someone’s hard work.

The OCMS has sticker pages you can put in your student’s music or notebooks to remind him or her how well you think they’re doing.

Always find something to praise in your student’s practice and playing.  You’ll see that it makes a world of difference.

 

 

Music lessons spur emotional and behavioral growth in children, new study says – The Washington Post

Posted by MaryO on

From the Washington Post, but we knew this already, right?

Music training not only helps children develop fine motor skills, but aids emotional and behavioral maturation as well, according to a new study, one of the largest to investigate the effects of playing an instrument on brain development.

Using a database produced by the National Institutes of Health Magnetic Resonance (MRI) Study of Normal Brain Development, researchers at the University of Vermont College of Medicine analyzed the brain scans of 232 healthy children ages six to 18 specifically looking at brain development in children who play a musical instrument. (The original study did not indicate specific instruments.)

“What we found was the more a child trained on an instrument,” said James Hudziak, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Vermont and director of the Vermont Center for Children, Youth and Families, “it accelerated cortical organization in attention skill, anxiety management and emotional control.”

Read the entire article at Music lessons spur emotional and behavioral growth in children, new study says – The Washington Post.

Put Mozart on the Map

Posted by MaryO on

mozart-happy-birthday

 

Show your support for revitalizing music education!
Join the 1st worldwide virtual recital celebrating Mozart’s birthday on January 27th.

“Putting Mozart on the Map” marks the 1st event in a new global campaign to inspire and engage music students by coupling classical music with today’s technology, and honoring Mozart in a way that’s never been done before.

Every musician – concert pianist or 2nd-grader – playing a score on the Wolfie app on January 27th will automatically appear on an interactive world map at, www.wolfiepiano.com. Invite your friends, teachers, and music students!

1. Click “Join” at the top of this page.
2. Download the Wolfie app for free (https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/wolfie-for-piano/id868060859?mt=8).
3. On January 27th play any score on the Wolfie app and automatically appear on the map atwww.wolfiepiano.com. See musicians worldwide playing with you!
5. Share your piece and invite friends and students to join the celebration!

What’s Wolfie?
Wolfie is the premier music education platform for teachers and students worldwide. The Wolfie for piano app is powered by a magic cursor that listens as you play, keeping track of your tempo, time, errors and more, and turns the pages at exactly the right moment. With its catalog of thousands of songs, Wolfie allows teachers and students to easily share annotations, record and review performances, and hear scores at different paces – with no need for carrying around sheet music.

Fun with Music for Young Children in Northern Virginia…

Posted by MaryO on


fun-music

The second semester of Fun With Music will meet every Monday from 10-11:30 am in the Gathering Place of Pender United Methodist Church at 12401 Alder Woods Drive Fairfax, VA 22033.

This program is for moms and dads with their children ages 0 to 5. A fee of $30 covers the cost of food and supplies for the semester.

Each week there is 30 minutes of singing, a snack and toys are brought out for the children to play. The parents are served a breakfast and have the opportunity to fellowship with each other.

Christmas Carols: “Intervals Roasting”

Posted by MaryO on

music-theory-song

Music theory has never sounded so catchy with this witty remake of the holiday classic The Christmas Song (with apologies to Mel Torme) Try not to laugh at the ending.

Though it is a bit humorous, this version titled ‘Intervals Roasting’, with lyrics by David Rakowski, attempts to encapsulate the fundamentals of music theory in just over two minutes.

It does a good job of explaining the intervals and harmonic structure of the song and also gives you an idea of how to use music theory to analyze or compose music.

The O’Connor Music Studio has a copy if anyone wants to learn this 🙂

Christmas Listening and Coloring Pages

Posted by MaryO on

I have purchased a set of Christmas Shades of Sound Listening & Coloring Book for the studio.

Please let me know if you do not want your student to participate in Christmas activities and I will assign alternate activities.

Each week, I will print out some of the pages for your student and put them in his/her notebook.  After listening to the music on YouTube, the student may color the pages.

After they are colored, please return them to the notebook so that there will be a complete book when finished.

If you are an adult and want to listen and color, too, just let me know and I’ll print you a set.

From the website:

Get your piano students listening to great classical music!

The Shades of Sound Listening and Coloring Books are a great way to encourage students to listen to great piano and orchestral repertoire. Students of all ages will love coloring the fun pictures while listening to and learning from the music of the great composers.

This Shades of Sound Christmas edition includes 20 pieces of piano and orchestral literature for the Christmas season, from the Baroque to the Modern period. Includes background and historical information on the pieces and the composers, and a beautiful coloring page for each piece.

The Christmas Shades of Sound book includes 20 different pieces, including:

  • In Dulci Jubilo from the Christmas Tree Suite by Liszt
  • Pastorale from the Christmas Oratorio by Bach
  • Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring by Bach/Hess
  • Farandole from L’arlesienne Suite #1 by Bizet
  • Christmas Sonatina by Reinecke
  • Elegy #4 by Busoni
  • The Adoration of the Magi by Respighi
  • Winter Sonatina by Rowley
  • Christmas Concerto by Corelli
  • Ave Maria by Schubert/Liszt
  • Sleigh Bells in the Snow by Gillock
  • Diversions by Dello Joio
  • Nuit de Noel by Busoni
  • Sheep May Safely Graze by Bach/Petri
  • Carol Symphony by Hely-Hutchinson
  • Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy by Tchaikovsky
  • Trepak by Tchaikovsky
  • Arabian Dance by Tchaikovsky
  • Waltz of the Flowers by Tchaikovsky
  • Hallelujah Chorus by Handel