Discusses how teachers can incorporate musical composition into their classrooms by teaching students about aleatory, or chance, music. Provides a definition of aleatory music and provides various composing techniques, focusing on aleatory music. Includes lesson plans using aleatory music, such as the "Mozart Model" for grades 4-12. (CMK)

Focuses on ways to develop student creative thinking, improvisation, and composition skills in instrumental classes. Provides suggestions, such as the importance of offering students creative opportunities, supplying examples, giving control to students, and encouraging expressive integrity. Includes a bibliography of resources for developing…

States that choral directors should put more time into planning music rehearsals. Discusses activities that can be included in a rehearsal practice and describes extension activities that could be used. Includes a lesson plan that can be used with a concert choir. (CMK)

Presents results from a study that examined student assessments of their own musical abilities as related to compositional creativity. Focuses on nonmusic majors in a music fundamentals course for elementary education majors. Explains that the students were placed into high-,middle-, and low-creativity groups. (CMK)

Focuses on teaching students how to compose music. Addresses issues, such as how to get the students started and types of questions to ask students about their compositions. Discusses the musical elements involved in composition, such as melody, harmony, rhythm and meter, timbre, texture, and formal design. (CMK)

Discusses how to encourage creativity in the music classroom for upper-elementary students by focusing on musical composition. Includes a description of a nine lesson unit that focuses on creativity in musical composition. States that students can continue working on compositions at home. (CMK)

Discusses the life and career of William Schuman, addressing his career in music with a focus on his work as a composer. Explores his work as the president of the Juilliard School of Music and of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts (New York City, New York). Focuses on his philosophy of music education. (CMK)

Describes musical instrument digital interface (MIDI), a communication system that uses digital data to enable MIDI-equipped instruments to communicate with each other. Includes discussion of music editors, sequencers, compositional software, and commonly used computers. Suggests uses for the technology for students and teachers. Urges further…

Discusses the selection of material for vocal performances by high school students. Describes adolescent voices as young with little vocal technique and only partially developed or unused register. Includes considerations of breath management, tessitura, energy, subject matter, and language. Provides a list of songs meeting appropriate…

Describes how a 16-year-old African-American male, Tyrone, excelled in a mental-health day-treatment facility in which he was enrolled. Tyrone used the skills taught within the replacement-skills curriculum at the facility to compose a rap song that reminded him and his classmates how to react when faced with a difficult situation. (MKA)

Describes the use of "Recorder Teacher," a computer software program that teaches elementary students to play the soprano recorder and compose their own music. Highlights include reinforcing music concepts; using written and auditory examples in the software; and testing on fingering and reading. Sample screens are included. (LRW)

Describes the technique of scordatura, and the different unusual notional principles, as a means to exploring the Baroque repertoire. Explains that scordatura pieces indicate, using either the term discordable or discordatura, that the established tuning must be altered by mistuning the instrument. Concentrates on Domenico Gabrielli's "Seven…

Proposes that high school choir teachers utilize multimedia technology in order to provide students with simultaneous aural and visual examples of various musical concepts. Offers examples using a multimedia approach to teach John Bennet's "Weep, O Mine Eyes" and Randall Thompson's "The Road Not Taken." Includes a list for selected software. (CMK)

Provides three strategies to help chorus teachers assist boys to develop their singing abilities by: (1) choosing the appropriate repertoire for the boys' abilities; (2) routinely separating the boys and girls during rehearsals; and (3) having boys do exercises that expand the upper parts of their singing ranges. (CMK)

Contends that speech ensembles can be useful in the music classroom, particularly at the middle school level, to help develop students' creative thinking, powers of expression, and skills in notation and counting. Offers five steps to guide students in creating speech ensembles that address the National Standards for Music Education. (CMK)