Download Strings Lesson Plan

Brad Scherden
Music 345
Lesson Plan Assignment – Orchestra
In my rehearsal of Richard Meyer’s “Professor Wigstein’s Amazing Melody Machine”, I plan on
addressing an even blend of musical and technical concerns for the piece.
I will begin the lesson (after proper warmups) by reviewing fluency in switching between duple
and triple divisions of the quarter note, as is found in the opening fanfare of the piece. Practicing
streams of eighth notes and eighth-note triplets on a single pitch will isolate the rhythmic requirements.
Then playing the written rhythm on a single pitch will solidify the exact rhythm indicated. Finally, adding
in fingers will make sure that the students can play that whole passage properly.
The next activity I will lead is teaching cellos the proper technique (in both hands) for the trills
they have toward the end of the passages in the piece that are supposed to represent the machine
itself. For this sequence, I will first have the cellos play their written notes (As) in time without trilling so
they feel the motion of the music. Next, I will have them just practice the trilling motion with their lefthand fingers so they have the feeling of trilling properly in their hands. Finally, I will have them put it all
together so that they play the passage as written.
A piece of extended technique is offered to the upper strings toward the end of the piece,
starting in measure 91. Both violin parts and violas have a written multi-measure glissando up to the
top of the fingerboard. For this, I will emphasize the importance of keeping the pace of the glissando
consistent so not too much or too little motion happens at any one time. After just getting students
used to moving their finger all the way up the board at their own pace, I will then tell them to do it for
the proper amount of time as prescribed by the piece. I anticipate that some students will get to the
end of the fingerboard before I get to the end of the passage, and also that some will not have made it
far enough. I will encourage my students to visually divide the fingerboards of their instruments, and
mentally mark checkpoints. This is so they can think of how far up they should be after one measure,
after two measures, etc. until the end of that passage. After running this a couple times, conducted in
time, I will move on to have the students actually bow the glissando as written.
As important as the technique in this piece is the musicality. It includes melodies from
Beethoven, Mozart, Offenbach, and Chopin. If students play all of these melodies, and also the
machine-like passages, in the same style, it will not be effective. To that end, I will spend some time
covering proper style for the “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik” portion of the piece. I have chosen this one
specifically because this and the Chopin funeral march sections are most unlike the rest of the piece. I
chose this one over the funeral march because I feel more of the style of the march is directly obvious in
the music itself (slower tempo, very low dynamics), whereas Mozart’s style must be heard and taught
instead of read. To teach the style for the Mozart section, I will stress lightness in pizzicato and in
dynamics. I think the best way to rehearse this is to simply run through the Mozart section a few times,
giving recommendations for improvement to the students every time we stop.
The largest single portion of the lesson will be to cover the double-stop section that first violins
have, like in mm. 82-86. These are double-stop eighth notes in thirds, and I feel like this will be the most
challenging part of the whole piece. Because of that, I plan to approach this section very systematically.
(Because so much time will be dedicated to one part, I will have the other members of the orchestra
silently practice the parts they have the most trouble with while I work with the first violins). I will have
firsts start by practicing placing their fingers in the proper spots for these double stops, very slowly in
tempo without playing, then gradually speeding up through more repetitions. Once this is looking
better, I will have them bow, in time, the open strings that are used to play the written pitches, again
slowly, then faster. Once this is up to a reasonable speed, I will have them combine their left-hand
fingers and their right-hand double bowing. After a couple repetitions of this, I will bring in the rest of
the orchestra so that the firsts can practice this more in context.
Finally, after working through the whole piece, I will preview a future lesson in which we will talk
about the melodies and the composers featured in this piece. First, I will ask the students if they
recognize any of the melodies, and if they can name any. If they cannot, I will offer the names of the
melodies. Next, I will ask the students if they know who composed any of the melodies, and again will
tell them the composers’ names if the students do not already know. I will give the students hand-outs
that have these composers and melodies listed, and include a few basic questions. I will have the
students fill out these sheets and bring them back to a future rehearsal in which we can have further
discussion about these composers, their melodies, their styles, and their historical significance.