Singing is for everyone, even the instrumentalist. Basically this means that anyone who really wants to learn to sight sing and has a good teacher can learn to read or sing music. Although we are not here to discuss the pros and cons of music education it is interesting to note that Zoltan Kodaly (16 December 1882 - 6 March 1967) was convinced that early music education was a key component of bringing his nation of Hungry to a heightened awareness of music and culture.
So our first two tips are to find a good teacher and start early.
A man without a musical education in Hungary is considered illiterate. Almost all play instruments, almost all sing, and the concert halls are full. How can it be that a nation the size of Indiana with a population of ten million people has eight hundred adult concert choirs, fifty of the first rank and another one hundred of radio or public performance quality? There are four professional symphony orchestras in Budapest alone.
Tips number three and four are to attend concerts and join a good choir.
What would it take to change the musical abilities and tastes of an entire nation? In Hungary, it was a matter of raising the standard for those who taught music plus involving the education of young children and getting many interested in making music belong to everyone, not just the upper classes. Making the people aware of their musical heritage was a large part of helping the people to connect with music and with each other.
Tip number five is to be aware of our musical heritage.
Tip number six is to do what we can to raise the standard by improving our own singing.
Self improvement could be as simple as visiting a choir class at school or church. Some Suzuki and Kodaly teachers would welcome a parent or visitor in the lesson.
So this brings up some serious questions. Do those teaching our children even know how to read and write music? Would our musical heritage be worth knowing? Would a nation like America which is made up of so many diverse people groups even have a musical heritage? In Hungry one of the problems was that they had been under the authority of other nations and influenced by them so much so that they almost lost their musical cultural heritage. Even today some will make the mistake of saying that certain music is Hungarian yet it only has a Hungarian theme but the rest of the piece is very romantic.
Tips number seven, eight and nine are as follows.
We need to know and understand that sight singing is actually the ability to hear what you see and see what you hear. It is the ability to sit down quietly with a piece of music and actually hear it like we would the words of any other book that we read quietly to ourselves.
We need to realize that there are varying degrees of skill with regards to this music reading. Some may be able to hear a single line of music while others may be able to hear four parts of a hymn or others may be able to hear all the parts of a symphony orchestra!
Be aware of your skill level and then make the effort to improve it. Once you know where you are then you know where you need to go.
For instance, there was a young lady who as a child took piano lessons and was in a choir where she learned to sight sing. When she realized what she had in her hands, she continued studies at the Kodaly Musical Training Institute. Soon she was auditioning for a city wide choral group. She had received a summer certificate from the Kodaly Musical Training Institute but had no college degree. When she went for the audition she was able to do well. One reason she excelled is because she understands what a tritone is and was able to sing it in the works she had been given to prepare in advance and in the sight reading she had to do on the spot. After spending a season with this group she went on to teaching free lance and now makes an exceptional living teaching.
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