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Looper's Delight
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>Mark writes: "Find out what turns on your student and teach based on >that." I do think this is the key. I've been teaching guitar for 10 years and have always used this method. It does just come down to fundamentals. Music vocabulary is fairly basic, and the guitar lends itself to pattern and memorization which can be applied to the simplest power chord or more "sophisticated" type of harmony. Let the student decide. >The challenge is that with 10 students, one teacher needs to think and >teach in 10 different ways. That's hard work. This I feel is true as well but the best part of teaching. There is so much music that I don't listen to that I don't mind hearing when a student brings it in, and that includes much of the radio hits. I wouldn't put it on myself but it is kinda fun transcribing Linkin Park or whatever, and then trying to convince the student that even within that stuff there is consistent music material that can be concentrated and absorbed into a broader vocabulary, or better stated a personal vernacular. Plus my real goal is to get students to transcribe. Then they can be "self-taught" ha ha. As for keeping up with technology, that comes down to what the teacher does. I routinely bring my looping rigs and pedal boards and powerbook, etc. to the studio to try and school these kids. 99% of the time the kids flip because they don't ever see that kind of stuff. For that matter they don't ever hear fingerpicking in the style of John Fahey! The scope of popular culture is so limited these days that almost anything you expose a young student to is new. Many of my early teen students have no idea who Jimi Hendrix is, let alone Gary Lucas or David Torn. That says a lot. My basic method is to work from some general music theory/technique and to encourage kids to bring in CDs to transcribe. I then transcribe something I want them to learn. I love blowing a kid's mind with Ennio Morricone. The major problem I see as a teacher that gives 50+ lessons a week is that most younger students have no real exposure to music and very few purchase CDs. For every 1 store bought disc I see, I get 20 burned copies, and the students often don't even know who the artist is. Sorry for the long post, but this is a big subject form me. _________________________________________________________________ STOP MORE SPAM with the new MSN 8 and get 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail