Recorder Improvisation and Technique, Book 1

Recorder Improvisation and Technique Book 1

Beginning with the Soprano Recorder

The Isabel McNeill Carley Orff Essentials Collection

By Isabel Carley

Book

63 pages

A beginner's primer and foundational guide to playing the soprano recorder. Eleven tightly integrated lessons introduce the student to the recorder repertoire and technique in short exercises that partner the teacher with the student. The emphasis is on a collaborative process that develops musical and technical skills by actually making music. From the beginning, there are songs for the student to play, improvisations to nurture the musical imagination, and ensemble materials to deliver the excitement of rhythmic layering and patterning.

This fourth edition teacher and student book retains the contents of the third edition with the addition of expanded reference and resource materials.

Contents:

• Care of Your Recorder
• Three Gapped Pentatonic Scales with Hand Signs
• Reading, Writing and Saying Rests and Time Names - Tags - Guidelines

Part I: C PENTATONIC

• Lesson 1: 
• New notes High C' and A  
• Introduced: Holding the SR, Echoing, Improvising, Rhythm patterns, Sight-reading 
• Titles: Goin' down to Cairo, March, Hew down the Tree
• Lesson 2: 
• New note G
• Introduced: Tonguing, Notation, Articulation, Q+A, Ostinati 
• Titles: Cross-legged Woman
• Lesson 3: 
• Notes C, A, and G 
• Introduced: Improvising over an ostinato, Meters, Rests, tonal centers, Phrase length 
• Titles: Parade
• Lesson 4: 
• New note Low E 
• Introduced: E tonal center, Transposition, Song structure, Composition 
• Titles: Lanterns Light, Scherzo
• Lesson 5: 
• New notes: High D' and low D 
• Introduced: D tonal center, Memorization, Arrangements, Syncopation, Dance form 
• Titles: Rondo, A Riddle, Come up Horsey, Three Cats 
• Lesson 6: 
• New note: Low C 
• Introduced: Finality 
• Titles: Fais Dodo, The Fisherman's Song, Rowing to Grandmother's House, Shady Grove, Fanfare for Recorder and Drum, The Bamboo Flute
• Lesson 7: 
• New note: High E' 
• Introduced: Longer forms, Improvised dance, Ambiguous tonal centers
• Titles: Lullaby, Shoes of Deerskin, The Train, Flowers in June

Part II: G PENTATONIC

• Lesson 8:
• New notes: B 
• Introduced: G scale, Rondo, irregular meter, triplets
• Titles: My Dancing Top, Frogs Jumping, Hard Work for a Grain of Rice, Daily Growing, Nottomun Town, The Riddle Song
• Lesson 9:
• New note: High G' 
• Introduced: Composing through improvisation  
• Titles: Longing for the Spring Breeze, Fanfare, The High Mountain

Part III: F PENTATONIC

• Lesson 10:
• New note: low F
• Introduced: F scale, minor mode, Drone 
• Titles: The Big Drum and the Little Drum, Scottish Croon, Pretty Saro, A la Claire Fontaine, Cock Robin, Heavy Rain, Canoe Song
• Lesson 11: 
• New note: High F' 
• Introduced: Group improvisation 
• Titles: Harvest Festival, Gaelic Tune, Come O'er the Stream Charlie, The Farm Village, Hare Hunting, The Red-Cheeked Maiden, Dance

Resources:

• Isabel McNeill Carley, Teacher
• An Appreciation Body Percussion Patterns, Combinations, Ostinato Patterns
• About Pentatonic Scales and Modes: C Pentatonic, G Pentatonic, F Pentatonic