I found myself very impressed with many of the ideals that were mentioned in this chapter. I have been thinking a lot about what I would want out of a classroom of musicians. What keys can I give to my students that will help them as adults? I found a lot of help in this chapter with a lot of my thoughts.
The first key point I wanted to share about this chapter is a realization that Emile Dalcroze came to; children (as well as adults) fall into a trap of having tremendous understanding of mechanics, but no understanding of music. This means that people may be technical virtuosi on their instruments, but have no way of making their technique musical. As I have been performing much more regularly, I have seen how a technically player can bring down an ensemble.
I think it is very smart of Dalcroze to address this in his style of teaching. Children especially need to know key musical processes such as counting in 4/4 against 2/2 or how to correctly place a triplet. The fact that Dalcroze puts emphasis on this key point of 'breeding' musicians instead of mechanics is brilliant to me.
The second point I found key was also from the Dalcroze section. I actually touched on this point in my last paragraph. Dalcroze attempted, in his teachings, to create a foundation through musicianship. Again, I love this approach to teaching. The way that I took this approach was to take care of the "problems" that occur in later music and learning as the students are still children. I am not sure quite how to do this at the moment, but a good example is to teach what a triplet is.
Playing Paul Ferguson's jazz numbers have required me to be so 'tight' on my Dalcroze eurythmics that I have found them invaluable. Knowing how to correctly place a triplet has been imperative in many jazz arrangements that I have played. I wish that I could teach every student of mine how to do this (it took a good two semesters to accomplish my learning). Just having the tools to figure out rhythms, notes, and time signatures as a child would greatly help out any musician in the future.
The last point I found interesting in this chapter was Kodaly's idea to incorporate the pentatonic scale in his teachings. I do not want to talk too much on this topic, but I will say that the pentatonic scale may be the key for getting the world to appreciate music and keep it in the schools. This video shows why.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ne6tB2KiZuk
I love the pentatonic scale and its powers.
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