Thibeault, M. D. (2012). The power of limits and the pleasure of games: An easy and fun piano duo improvisation. General Music Today, 1048371311435523.
I really enjoyed this article for its overarching theme: that music is fun. What I’ve learned most this year is that especially as music students who interact with music daily, are constantly studying it, and spend our entire student careers focused on music, we forget that the reason we started studying music is because it is fun. I think that through the year we’ve gotten so caught up in our stress surrounding our music education, we’ve forgotten how much joy music has brought into our lives. The reason why I really like this article is because Thibeault clearly explains the difference between this piano improvisation as a game and as a drill: “A game is something we do for pleasure, for our own enjoyment…A drill is something we do for some other time and place or even a goal we may never achieve.” I think that sometimes we take music much too seriously, and we need to remember that sometimes we can do things just for fun. But not only that, but even when we’re having fun, we’re still learning; we’ve just found a better way to engage with what we’re learning. The article discusses a game in which two people play piano. One will play a scale while the other improvises on top. I remember from playing piano as a child that scales are probably the most boring part about playing piano. It’s very technical and boring sounding, but as the article mentions, it’s only because we perceive it that way. Beethoven used scales all the time, but everyone loves Beethoven and thinks his music is rather exciting and evokes a certain amount of emotion. I think that by changing our perspective (in the case of the article, treating scales and improvisation like a game) can really change the outcome. Similarly, I was very intrigued by how the article gave suggestions as to what the teacher should do when conducting this game with their students. I think it really emphasized on listening rather than teaching, which is a very interesting phenomenon. As we’ve spoken about in class, as human beings we tend to think about what we’re going to say in response rather than listening to what the other person is saying. I think the same thing applies here. Instead of trying to think about what we want to teach a student during an improvisation game, it would be much more beneficial to the student if we listen to what they’re playing and see how we can speak to what they’ve brought to the table instead of just talking a mouthful into their ear. Finally, the article ended with some very interesting variations of the game which I think were helpful. If I were to ever use this in my music classroom, I know for sure the exercise could be overdone and become boring for students. However, if there are always new things to add to a game we’ve already played, it can continue to be exciting. Not only that, but such a simple game opens so many avenues of music to explore, and that’s very exciting.
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Carole PalattaoI'm an 18 year old studying classical voice at Western University. I'm also a hardcore mental health advocate, and I do creative writing on the side for fun!
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