Giveaway: 100.00 USD Google Adwords Gift Card

Using Google Adwords is a great - and not too expensive way - to advertise your music studio. I have 2 (two) Google Adwords coupons to give away.  Each coupon is worth 100 USD and can only be used by a new Google Adwords user.  Both coupons expire at the end of March. 

Official Rules
(Please leave a separate comment for each entry)

1. To enter simply leave a comment at the end of this post. 

2. For a second entry, share this giveaway on twitter by tweeting, "I just entered to win a Google Adwords coupon via @pianolessonsmn.  You can, too, at http://bit.ly/pianolessonsmn."

Good luck to everyone! A winner will be chosen on Monday, March 5!

Piano Teacher's Guide to Creative Composition - Part 5 (Reading Together)

This chapter focuses on how to refine a composition. Klose starts out with a list of some easy ways to create more variety.

Klose also includes more expanded examples and ideas to use to help your students refine their compositions:
- how to harmonize a melody
- how to develop interesting accompaniments (includes quite a few examples geared towards different levels of students)
- how to spice up chord progressions
- how to vary the bass line
- how to form transitions
- how to create endings
- how to use repetitions effectively
- how to write duets

This final chapter is followed by the appendix which includes some helpful resources:
- a list of all the music examples in chapters 1 to 5
- a list of resources including additional teaching material

I hope you've enjoyed reading along. I know I've really benefited from this book. I'll be announcing the next book in the next couple of weeks, so make sure to stop back to find out what we'll be reading next.

Piano Teacher's Guide to Creative Composition - Part 4 (Reading Together)

This week's section lays out lesson plans so that you can incorporate composition into your regular teaching sessions.

The lesson plans are designed to work as a series that last for 6 to 8 weeks. The goal is to help your students experience a steady progress on their composition from week to week.

Each lesson plan is designed to take 5-10 minutes of your teaching session. In addition, every lesson plan has three parts: the goals for the lesson, the process by which you teach the given aspect of the composition, and what you will assign to your students.

Here is a list of the lesson plans:
Lesson 1: initiating the compositional idea
Lesson 2: mapping the story and musical ideas
- The main goal here is establish the big picture.
Lesson 3: establishing the framework of formal structure (usually ABA)
Lesson 4: continuing the creative process
Lesson 5 and subsequent lessons: connecting the dots
- The main goal is to now refine the composition.

I hope you are enjoying the reading as much as I am. Have any observations? Please leave them in the comments below.

Apology

I want to apologize, but I won't be posting about the Piano Teacher's Guide to Creative Composition - Part 4 this week. I had some unexpected things come up, and I haven't been able to get the post put together. Sorry!

I will be posting about Part 4 next week, so please be sure to stop by then! Thanks for understanding.