Music Syllabus:Piano Lessons as Life Lessons

Music Studio, Dili2014

StaffPiano Teacher: Joy Siapno-de AraujoMusic Studio, Dili, Timor Lestee-mail: pianocellolessons67@gmail.com and/or siapnoaraujo@gmail.com Lesson Times and Venues: Class times : Mondays-Fridays, 3-6pmClassroom : Music Studio, Dili, Timor Leste

Course DescriptionWelcome and thanks for choosing this Musical Path: stay positive, make beautiful music. This music program is based on the philosophy that play is the central basis for learning with young children and adults too. We will learn“technical skills” (50% of everyday practice must be on Technique and Method), but at the same time keeping in mind that music is not just about pyro-technical skills but also interpretation, story-telling, musicality, dynamics, nuance, and phrasing.

I hope that we can also learn to apply “piano lessons as life lessons” (e.g. how to apply musical terms such as “harmony”, “countrapuntal voices”, “polyvocality” and so on, in everyday life). We will explore music theory (e.g. Scales and Arpeggios, Key Signatures and the Circle of Fifths; Note Values and Rhythmic Precision), preparation for music performance (solo, duet, and ensemble), and learn about music history (from Bach, Beethoven and Brahms to Southeast Asian music/s).

Some of the thematic issues we will learn about and practice include: 1. Technique and Method: 50% of everyday practice.

For piano and cello: Scales and Key SignaturesBooks for piano: “A Dozen a Day”; Czerny; Isidor Phillip; Hanon (all available from the teacher or if not, from the website International Music Score Library Project or IMSLP).

Books for cello: Dotzauer; Rick Mooney’s Position Pieces.

2. Music TheoryStudents will be given hand-outs (by the teacher) every lesson or worksheets can be downloaded and printed from internet websites on: Note Values and Rhythmic Precision: if you don’t already have a METRONOME, please make sure to get one. Until you get one, you can ask the teacher to borrow hers. Key Signatures and Scales (with Arpeggios and Chords): very important not only for technique and ear training, but also for composing.Phrasing

Reading Notes (Sight-reading)Dynamics (the meaning of Italian and other musical terms): please try to get a comprehensive MUSIC DICTIONARY ( in order to understand the terms “legato”, “dolce”, “sforzando” and so on).Interpretation

3. Ear Training, Tonalization, and ListeningStudents are strongly encouraged to listen to their songs/pieces everyday (either from a music disc or in youtube). It is very important that you are not just sight-dependent, but can play and compose music too by “playing it by ear”. This is a very useful skill to have specially when playing music and with musicians who are not familiar with printed texts or cannot sight-read (e.g. Timorese music, some Philippine music, jazz, some hymns and spirituals, folk songs).

4. Learning how to cooperate with others by playing duets, ensemble work:This is a very important life lesson. You cannot just be a “soloist”. Our goal is to build a community of talented musicians in Timor Leste.

5. Music History (from different countries and cultures) and Reading the Biographies of Composers and Musicians

Students are strongly encouraged to read widely about music history and the lives of musicians. You can download composer’s biographies from Wikipedia or order books via amazon.com. I also have a “rotating library” of books I brought to Timor which I can lend to each of you and can rotate, please ask me:

Highly recommended (you can borrow from me):Eric Siblin’s “The Cello Suites: J.S. Bach, Pablo Casals, and the Search for a Baroque Masterpiece.”

Richard Powers, “The Time of our Singing.”

J. Siapno, “A Society with Music is a Society with Hope: Musicians as Survivor-Visionaries in Post-war Timor Leste,” in Southeast Asia Journal. London, 2013. See link:https://www.academia.edu/4513125/_A_society_with_music_is_a_societywith_hope_musicians_as_survivor-visionaries_in_post-war_Timor_Leste_

Films: Quartet, Copying Beethoven, Mozart’s Sister, The Pianist and many others.

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Important guidelines to students, parents/caregivers for studying Music on Appropriate Lesson Behavior and Assessment:

1. The Trio:Students and their parents/caregivers are expected to familiarize themselves through their own reading and independent research with the importance of Music Education for training on how to focus, pay attention to details, be disciplined and consistent with practice. I cannot emphasize enough the importance of the Trio: student-teacher-parent/caregiver in order for this program to work. The teacher only has the student for 30 minutes or 1 hour per week. It is up to the parents/mother/caregiver to create an environment at home where the student is exposed to different kinds of music/s and musicians (e.g. by going to live performances or listening to discs, or watching youtube.com) and toensure a pleasant and fun practice for the student, everyday, preferably at the same time to make sure there is a stable routine.

2. Please Do NOT use your valuable once a week Lesson Time (for only 30-60 minutes) as “practice time”. Please practice every day for 6 days (45-60 minutes each day, at the same time) before coming to your lesson.

3. Here are some Maths to remember:Becoming a brilliant musicians is 90% study/practice and only 10% talent.

50% of your everyday practice must be on Technique and Method.

When playing a duet or ensemble, listen to your partner 90% and to yourself 10% (this applies to other areas of life as well).

45 minutes of focused practice (i.e. “Is my mind focused?” is more effective than 3 hours of non-focused practice where student is going to bathroom breaks, taking snacks, chatting etc.

4. After each lesson, the teacher will send an e-mail to the parent/caregiver regarding the student’s progress and guidelines for practicing that week. The parent/caregiver is responsible for ensuring that the student practices every day, fill-out the “Piano happy training daily sheet”, and give stickers to the student after 45-60 minutes of practice. Strategies: if the student refuses to practice (as my son does sometimes), take away their privileges (i.e. favourite activities, ipad, tv-watching). There are 24 hours during the day and 45 minutes devoted to studying Music is not much.

Assessment/ Student Progress:1. Lesson once a week on the designated lesson time. Students who miss more than

3 lessons without telling the teacher 2 days in advance will be dropped. For those who are not clear about “appropriate lesson behavior” please read: “The Million Dollar Lesson”. Link: http://ottawasuzukistrings.ca/millliondollarlesson

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2. New Methods of Learning and Written Homework: Each week every student is responsible for completing their Music Theory and/or Music History written homework (i.e. learning “away from the instrument”). Music studies ought to be taken as seriously as “regular school”: e.g. you would never go to your Math or Science class saying: “Sorry, I forgot to do my homework.” Right?

Lessons conform to the conventions used for any other kind of formal Education or Studies. Sloppy practicing, mis-adventures in losing music sheets, coming to lessons with no music books…will result in poor Assessment.

Students will learn new methods of learningduring piano lessons: please make sure to apply them and practice them at home (e.g. focusing on problem areas in your pieces using colored pencils and zooming-in on that mistake by playing it 10 times a day until it is perfect.)

3. Listening and Ear Training: students must be listening to their discs and or youtube links assigned by the teacher, every day. Please kindly create an environment at home where they are exposed to different music/s: by listening to discs and watching in youtube, and better yet – attending live music performances and getting to know musicians. Learning about intervals, chords, harmony, and so on will be a lot easier in such a musical environment.

4. New methods of cooperation without domination (Duet or Ensemble Work) and Student music performance (solo, duet, or ensemble): every three or four months, depending on the student’s progress. The student (in consultation with the teacher) will choose music pieces that s/he wishes to perform. If it is a duet or ensemble (e.g. cello and piano; violin and cello), the student is responsible for arranging ensemble/chamber music practice times with the other musicians.The idea is to train students to discover and explore methods of cooperation without domination. Our possible recital dates this year are end of April 2014, August 2014, and December 2014.

Books and folders (please make sure to prepare your folders in a neat, organized manner):

For this year 2014 students are required to use the following 2 books:1. Technique and Method:

For Piano:“A Dozen a Day” by E.M. Burman (Vols. 1-4, depending on your level).Czerny: Practical Method for BeginnersCzerny: The Art of Finger DexterityIsidor Philipp: Exercises de Tenues (download from IMSLP).

2. Scales, Arpeggios and Key Signatures:You can use different books, but the one I’m using is Alfred’s Basic Piano Library, The Complete Book of Scales, Chords, Arpeggios, and Cadences

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3. Songs: depending on what you are working on and learning. But here are some examples:

a. Suzuki Piano Volumes 1-6 (depending on your level).b. If Cello: Suzuki Volumes 1-6 (depending on your level).c. J.S. Bach, Two-Part Inventions (can be downloaded and printed from the

website: IMSLP).Besides the pieces in the Suzuki Volumes and J.S. Bach, I also strongly recommend playing Mozart. This will be excellent for your Technique. Play slowly, with no pedal, until you are up to tempo. I also recommend playing:Beethoven Sonatas; Mozart Sonatas; Chopin; Brahms; Schubert; ScriabinTimorese Music; Philippine Music (please ask the teacher)Hymns and Spirituals; Pop Music; JazzPiano Duets; Cello and Piano; and other Ensemble Music, Duets, Russian Composers (including Prokofiev, Rachmaninoff, Tchaikovsky and others)and many others (depending on your level and interest).

About the Music Teacher:Jacqueline Aquino Siapno (Joy) received her early training in piano in Bonuan Gueset, Dagupan City, Philippines, but it wasn’t until she was 14 when she started studying with Helen Vourax-Birch in the Sherman Clay School of Music in Oakland, California that she truly enjoyed and became very committed to music. From the age of 14-18 she studied music intensively with Ms. Helen Vourax-Birch, a Steinway artist and renowned concert pianist and teacher who lives in California. She spent her first year of university in a School of Music (Conservatory) in the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, the same year that the “Edsa Revolution” was unfolding in the Philippines, where she began to feel that spending 8 hours every day practicing piano surrounded by very a-political musicians may not be the most enriching life-path. So she switched to Political Science and transferred to Wellesley College in Massachussetts, but continued to study Piano and Music History as a minor, with Professor Jean Alderman. She moved to London, England to study for an M.A. at the University of London, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), where she Majored in Area Studies (Southeast Asia), writing her Thesis on Politics, while at the same time taking courses in Southeast Asian Music (focusing on Thai Music Performance, with the Thai composer and musician, Anant Narkong). In 1992, she moved back to California after receiving a scholarship from University of California Berkeley where she went on to do her Ph.D. in South and Southeast Asian Studies, where besides taking courses in Malay, Arabic, Dutch, Portuguese language classes, Political Theory, Anthropology, Rhetoric, and Malay-Indonesian Literature, she also continued to take classes in Ethnomusicology and Composition and worked closely with scholars studying Southeast Asian Texts, Rituals, and Performances, including Sally Ann Ness, Rene Lysloff, Deborah Wong, and Ben Brinner. She currently also studies cello and tutors her son in Music Theory and Music History. Joy and her son Hadomi (10 years old) started studying cello in October 2011 with the concert cellist and teacher Ms. Adrianne Mascho, in Seoul, Korea. They continue to study cello with Ms. Mascho via Skype. They both practice every day and have cello lessons once a week. She also continues to study with her piano teacher, Helen

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Vourax-Winocur in California, via e-mail and exchanging recordings (for feedback). For some of their performances, see for example: Two Cellos (duet), J.S. Bach, Minuet No. 3, Joy and Hadomi.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPTsDyliOGY

Recommended Links: MUSIC STUDY LINKS: You can download one Music Theory sheet per day and ask the student to do 10-20 minutes of written homework. If you are travelling, sick or cannot practice on the instrument, this is also a good way to continue learning:

GREAT music / games and music education site :)  It's all done on the computer.http://www.musictechteacher.com/music_quizzes/music_quizzes.htm

Interactive music ear training / rhythm training:  Print out the blank quiz, and download the listening file.Pretty easy and kid-friendly (scroll down towards the middle of the page, you will see thumbnails)http://www.musicbumblebees.com.au/free_downloads/

Note flashcards (PDF download, print and cut) http://chentheresa.squarespace.com/storage/music-flashcards/Music-Note-Name-Flashcards.pdf

Music worksheets from the same site as above (PDF):http://chentheresa.squarespace.com/free-music-theory-worksheets/

Other Recommended links:Will send to student and parents every week, depending on pieces we are working on.

On “appropriate lesson behavior” please read: “The Million Dollar Lesson”. Link: http://ottawasuzukistrings.ca/millliondollarlesson

On “El Sistema”, the cutting-edge music program in Venezuela:http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/16/arts/music/el-sistema-venezuelas-plan-to-help-children-through-music.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&

“Is Music the Key to Success?” in the New York Times:http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/13/opinion/sunday/is-music-the-key-to-success.html

Music Performance links:Piano duet by Joy Siapno and Jon Siapno: Overture from Carmen by George Bizet:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEbSgSo_MyEPiano Solo, Joy Siapno: Rachmaninov Sonata, Op. 19, 3rd Movement:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vujWUQFgb8oSee other videos posted in youtube.com under Joy Siapno “Making Music in Timor Leste”.

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