The Piano School Masterclass

The Piano School will host its sixth annual masterclass for middle and high school students on Saturday, May 24, 2014, at 10:00 a.m., in Mrs. O'Brien's studio.

Students voted on the theme which will be Music from Movies, and Dr. Tracy Cowden from Virginia Tech will be our guest instructor.

Past themes and teachers were:
2009 - No theme (Dr. Tracy Cowden, Virginia Tech)
2010 - Amy Beach, American Composer (Dr. Lisa Withers, Emory and Henry)
2011 - Andrew Lloyd Webber (Dr. Lise Keiter, Mary Baldwin)
2012 - The Beatles (Kerry Morgievicz, Hollins University)
2013 - Disney Music (Dr. Brooke Dezio, Charlottesville)

This year's music selections are:
"Waltz for Peppy" from The Artist performed by Tess Drzymala
"Through the Eyes of Love" from Ice Castles performed by Urmila Bharathan
"Where Do I Begin?" from Love Story performed by Alisha Freitas
"Castle on a Cloud" from Les Miserables performed by Paris Eve Reinhard

Students may dress casually and should arrive by 9:55 a.m. The class will be over by 11:30 a.m.

Scenes from the 2013 Disney Masterclass

MTNA Studio Festival

The Piano School is hosting an MTNA Studio Festival on Saturday, May 3, 2014, with student appointment times between 9:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. The adjudicator for this year's festival is Mrs. Ashley W. Cundiff, a piano instructor at Ferrum College.

This festival provides an opportunity for students to play two prepared pieces for an adjudicator who will provide written feedback consisting of encouragement and suggestions.

Each appointment will last between 5 and 10 minutes, and students should check-in at the back door of Mrs. O'Brien's home 5 minutes prior to their appointment.

What to bring:
Music that the student will be playing. (Original, not photocopies) Although most students will be playing from memory, the judge must have music to view during the performance. The measures in the music should be numbered, and pages should be marked with a tab, paper clip, or post-it note.

What to wear:
Comfortable, neat clothing. There is no need to dress up for this festival; however, students should be tidy and clean.

What should parents do?
Parents are asked to remain in their cars while their children participate in the festival. This is so that the festival environment can be as quiet as possible for the benefit of student and judge.

How long will the festival take?
Each student will be at Mrs. O'Brien's home studio for as long as it takes to perform his/her two pieces plus the time of checking in and waiting to have music books returned. The total time is approximately 10-15 minutes.

Does the festival cost anything?
Each student's festival fee was paid with registration at the beginning of the school year. The festival fee covers the cost of hiring a qualified adjudicator as well as offsetting the expense of tuning the piano and purchasing medals to be presented to students at the Spring Recital.

Is the festival required?
Participation in one festival per year is required by Mrs. O'Brien. Students must either play in the VMTA Fall Festival in November or the MTNA Studio Festival in the Spring.

For more information about the MTNA Studio Festival program, please click here: http://www.mtna.org/programs/music-for-everyone/studio-festival-program/

Teacher Tutorial: Using MTH to allow students to schedule their own lessons

The following question was recently asked in a piano teachers' group page on facebook:

I volunteered to do a tutorial on how to set a scenario like this up on Music Teachers Helper. First, you would need to have an MTH account. If you have one, you'll be able to give this a try.

Let's suppose that during the month of June, we want to allow students to register for specific time slots that we wish to offer, but we want to let them handle this without us. The first thing we need to do is block out the dates on which we do not wish to teach.

1. Block dates when lessons not offered.

 

Your blocked out dates will appear shaded in pink.

2. Add your available lesson slots.

 In the "Add New Event" window, be sure to select options shown below.

 

Your event title and description could be anything you want them to be, but this is how I do it.

 

If you want to offer the same time slot on different days, you can save time by using the "repeat" function. Since I do not teach on Sunday, I selected the "weekly" repeat type and checked only the days on which I wanted this time slot to repeat. 

 

As you can see, the 12:30 time slot I added now appears on all of my non-blocked dates except Sundays. You would need to repeat step 2 for each different time of day you wish to offer. Personally, I think that's a drag, but MTH has notified me that they are working on offering more repeat options, such as "repeat every 30 minutes."

Step 3. Let your students know that you have posted available lesson times for June and they can be reserved on a first come first served basis.

From the student's account view, clicking on an available time will make this pop-up window appear.

When the student selects "Register" the following pop-up will appear.

 

Once they click "Submit Request" the lesson slot will be shown as "book closed" or not available. Other students will not be able to request that time slot.

You, the teacher, will then receive an email notification that a student has registered for one of your available time slots.

COMMENTS:
I have found this scheduling function to be very useful, particularly during the summer months. The only complaint I have is that if a student cancels a lesson online, it shows as canceled on the calendar until you manually go in and make it available again. I will probably send a suggestion to MTH now about that. They are generally very quick to solve problems and offer new options when suggested.

Please let me know if you have any questions that I haven't answered here. Hope this helps!

Save Those Recital Programs!

So, teachers, what do you do with the stacks or drawers full of recital programs that accumulate over the years? I came up with a way-cool idea. I'm about to show you step-by-step how to do turn THIS:

...into THIS:

READY?

STEP 1: Collect all of your programs, and put them in chronological order. I had a stack of 29 programs, so I decided to divide them into two volumes. Take your programs to a full-service copy place like Kinko's or the UPS Store. I went to the UPS Store. For less than $5 each, I was able to have each of my two volumes bound with comb binding and covered with a clear plastic front and black plastic back. It took about 30 minutes for the shop to get it done.

STEP 2: Make tabs for each program so that you can find the one you're looking for quickly. This step is entirely optional, but it took my cool book of programs and turned it into an amazing volume of awesomeness, so I highly recommend it. You can make your tabs using cardstock or maybe buy some pre-made tabs somewhere. I made mine from scratch. Note: I have a Cricut cutting machine, so I didn't have to cut the tabs out by hand. They are a REALLY SIMPLE design, though, so you could sketch out your own tabs and cut them with scissors instead. If you do happen to have a Cricut, you will want to know what cartridge and size I used. The "From My Kitchen" cartridge has loads of different tabs. The one I used was on the "cow" button. :) Really, there's a cow button. You select the tab function and then select the cow. Set your size to 1 3/4 inches. Since I had 29 programs, I cut out 29 tabs using different patterns of scrap cardstock I had on hand. Here's what the tabs looked like before they were folded:

STEP 3: Print a list of dates or other type of label for your tabs. I printed two of each date in order to have labels for both sides of the tabs. I wanted to print my labels on patterned cardstock, but before I ran the good paper through the printer, I printed a sample page on multipurpose paper to make sure the font size was going to fit the tabs. I ended up using a font called "The Last Something That Meant Anything" and font size 14. After you print the date labels, you have to cut them out.

STEP 4: Attach your printed labels to your tabs. I used a strong craft glue because some of the tabs were cut out of glitter cardstock which can be difficult to attach things to. Also, you will notice in the next picture that I ended up cutting the tabs in half. That was just my preference, because the folded tabs had sort of a bumpy edge that I didn't like. 

STEP 5: Attach your tabs to each program cover. You could do this any way you like but I staggered mine so that there would be four tabs visible at a time.

This is the reverse side of the same tab shown in the previous picture.

Continue adding tabs until each program is labeled.

STEP 6: Make a title for the spine of your program book(s). I used the same polka dot cardstock, font, and font size I used for the labels and included my studio logo as well. To adhere your spine label, you could use any type of strong adhesive you have on hand. I tried two different methods for my two volumes. For one, I used the craft glue shown above. I think it's made by Making Memories. For the second, I ran the title through my Xyron sticker maker. Both worked, but I think the glue was a little more effective with the plastic comb binding.

Before removing the title "sticker" I wrapped it around
a pen to help shape it for the comb binding

I really like how these turned out! It took two to three hours to make the tabs for one volume, but it probably would have gone quicker if I had not used glitter cardstock (which made craft glue necessary) and had printed my labels on sticker paper or tiny Avery labels. But it was a fun project, and what are summers for anyway?!

Recital Programs Through the Years