Category Archives: Studio News

Studio Incentives: Bravo Badges

Posted by MaryO on

 

A new reward system for fall.

These collectible cards will excite and motivate your beginning students. Your student will get one when they complete a task or accomplish a goal in their musical journey! Each level has fifty-four achievement cards. There are enough for the whole year.

Bravo Badges are designed to be eye-catching. Your students will love showing off their collection.

When the next levels become available, intermediate students will be able to collect these, as well.

Piano Maestro: A Parent’s Guide

Posted by MaryO on

Piano Mania

 

It will be fun watching your child improve their piano skills all while having fun using Piano Maestro in lessons each week!

As your child’s teacher (or YOUR teacher!), I’m looking forward to seeing the progress they will make when they start using it at home each day. This guide will help you understand how this app will benefit your child and how to get it set up on your own iPad.

Overview
What is Piano Maestro?

Piano Maestro is the ultimate piano practice tool that will have students quickly playing their favorite classical, pop, rock, TV and video game songs and themes. It is available in the App Store and works on the iPad.

What skills does it improve?
• Note reading
• Sight reading
• Rhythm
• Inner pulse
• Confidence

What makes it so fun?
• Upbeat background tracks
• Stunning graphics
• Instant rewards and feedback
• Satisfaction of playing REAL music

It works with an acoustic piano?

Yes! Your child practices on your real acoustic or digital piano. Piano Maestro listens from the iPad’s built-in microphone. No wires needed.

I’m already paying for lessons. What value does this add?

Sometimes I wish I could be there with your child to encourage them to keep practicing daily. I’m sure it’s not always easy, as unforeseen challenges will arise.

Since our time each week is just too short, this app will give me eyes on the ground and it will keep them practicing longer and improving more quickly.

How will it be used in lessons?

I will spend a few minutes of each lesson helping your child master a couple of new songs all while having fun! I will also teach them how to use the practice options at home.

At the end of the lesson, we will choose Home Challenge assignments within the app that will show up in your account at home. I’ll get updates when progress is made.

 

 

Getting Started
Wow, this sounds awesome. Now, how do I get started?

1) Download Piano Maestro on your iPad from the AppStore
2) Create a JoyTunes account with a parent’s email, under which, you can have multiple profiles for each member of the family.
3) Create a profile for each family member (that means you too Mom and Dad!) inside the Parent/Teacher zone (top right-hand corner of the main screen)
4) Connect to your teacher, me! After creating a profile in the “profiles” tab of the parent/teacher zone, select the student’s profile and click “connect to teacher.” Once I approve the connection to your child, they will receive full access to all content for FREE! I will then also begin receiving weekly progress reports.
5) Start Playing – I will now start assigning you homework, meanwhile, get started on Journey Mode.

When you connect to the O’Connor Music Studio, Piano Maestro is free for as long as you study here.

Piano Lessons For Very Young Children

Posted by MaryO on

RT_Front-cover

Student books in 5 different categories are available now in both digital and hardcopy.  There is now “To the Lake”, “Outdoor Adventure”, “To the Farm”, “Country Carnival” and two levels of “Rockstar Rally”.

  • Ideal for students ages 4 and up.
  • On the staff from the start
  • Music is a mix of familiar tunes and original pieces
  • Multi-key approach
  • 18 songs that can be learned by note or rote
  • Clean easy-to-follow pages (great for special needs students!)

 

 

Two levels of Roadtrip! are currently available in Piano Maestro.

Register for Roadtrip!  Students (ages 4-5) are scheduled for half-hour lessons with their parents present.

2019 Fall Piano Lesson Registration

Posted by MaryO on

 

Thank you for your interest in the O’Connor Music Studio!

Available times are on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays during the day and after school for all ages and levels.  There may be other times available if requested.

After you register, you will get a confirmation email with the information you need to access the Student Portal. After logging in you may choose from the available lesson times or request something different.

If you are a transfer student, please bring your most recent method book(s) and notebook to the interview.

Prospective students must have a piano, organ or electric keyboard to use for daily practice. 

Roadtrip! students (ages 4-5) are scheduled for half-hour lessons with their parents present.

Beginning children (ages 6 to 9) are scheduled for half-hour lessons.

Youth (ages 10 and up) may be scheduled for half-hour lessons or forty-five minute lessons.

Adults are highly encouraged to take hour-long lessons but are always welcome to schedule half-hour lessons at first.

I look forward to meeting you!

 

 

Daily Listening Assignments 2019

Posted by MaryO on

 

This summer, I’ve decided to add a new feature to piano lessons.  I know that many families travel during the summer months and it’s sometimes difficult to practice.

These daily assignments, June through August will help you and your students learn a bit more about the pieces they’re learning during the year – or maybe give ideas for something that they’d like to learn.

Each piece has a bit of composer info and several different interpretations, some of which are very humorous.  Some of the assignments appear in Piano Maestro so be sure to have that handy, if your student uses that.

Some days give hints that the assignment of the day may be played (or reviewed) at the next lesson so please be sure that your student takes note of that (no pun intended!)

Find them here, under Daily Listening Assignment starting June 1 at 9:00 am.

Have a safe and musical summer!

Unfortunately, Bi-weekly Lessons Don’t Work

Posted by MaryO on

 

7 reasons why bi-weekly lessons do not work…

 

Now and then, our studio gets asked if we offer bi-weekly lessons. I mean, doesn’t it make sense that if you take lessons every other week, you have half the number of trips into the studio, you have double the amount of time to practice, and you can save some money, right?

WRONG.

Aside from the fact that it is a scheduling nightmare for the teacher and studio, I want to outline a few reasons why (in most cases) bi-weekly lessons do not work.

Source: Bi-weekly Lessons – Why they won’t work – The Piano Studio

From Remind, Our Messaging Service

Posted by MaryO on

As you may know, we use Remind for various communications and music game challenges.  Here’s info from them about an upcoming change:

 

We’re sorry to write with disappointing news. Recently, we learned that Verizon will be charging Remind a new fee that makes it impossible for us to continue supporting free text messaging for anyone who has Verizon Wireless as their phone carrier. Please read on for all the important details—we promise to keep this as short as we can.

What’s happening?
To offer our text messaging service free of charge, Remind has always paid for each text that our users receive or send. Now, Verizon is charging Remind an additional fee intended for companies that send spam over its network. Your Remind messages aren’t spam, but our efforts to resolve the issue with Verizon haven’t been successful.

As a result, the Verizon fee will increase our costs of providing text messaging by 11X—pushing our annual costs into the millions of dollars. This isn’t financially feasible for us to support, and it’s forcing us to end Remind text messaging for everyone who has a wireless plan with Verizon.

How will this affect you?
Beginning January 28, 2019, the people in your classes who normally get your Remind messages as texts will no longer receive these messages if they have Verizon Wireless as their phone carrier.

What can you do?
To make sure people in your classes continue receiving your messages, ask them to download the mobile app or enable email notifications—both of which are free of charge. Our team’s also working hard on a solution that allows your classes to continue to use Remind by text, and we’ll share more details with you before January 28.

In the meantime, we’ll keep fighting to make sure educators, students, and parents have access to effective communication. To do this, we need your help: If using Remind has made a positive impact in your classroom, at your school, or anywhere in between, please ask Verizon to reverse the fee here: www.remind.com/verizon-fee

We’re very grateful for your support, and we’ll be in touch soon with an update.

Sincerely,
The Remind team

 

December Listening and Coloring Pages

Posted by MaryO on

I have just 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