More Recital Talk

Author: admin

1 Dec

Sometimes I feel so mean assigning the order of recital pieces by ability. It’s always the most beginning student to the most advanced and I know the kids catch on. I know a lot of teachers do that, and I think it’s probably the best way to do it. But I want to explore other options.

For our Christmas recital, each student is performing two pieces. I wrote a number for how many pieces there are in the recital and threw them all in a hat. Each student is picking two numbers and that will be the order in which they play their pieces. So they will each play twice at different times in the recital. I don’t know how it will go, but hopefully it will make it fun! And hopefully it will split up the many different renditions of Jingle Bells and Oh Christmas Tree!

Have you ever tried something like this? How do you order the students in your recitals?

Filed under: Fun Things, Thoughts, Trial and Error Tips

4 Responses for "More Recital Talk"

Derek Polischuk December 3rd, 2008 at 12:50 am 1
I wrote a brief entry recently about how I order recitals by mixing ability levels throughout the course of a program (http://tinyurl.com/62mc5o). I guess what I try to do is think in terms of the flow of the music in the program rather than just ability. Most importantly, I feel that the audience enjoys this diversity in programming the most!
sfrack December 3rd, 2008 at 4:53 pm 2
I always mix up the order. Sometimes I ask for a volunteer to go first and then that child chooses the next performer and so on down the line. Sometimes I go alphabetical by first name, last name, draw numbers, month of their birthday, order they walk into the room, etc. I was a victim of the “ability” list and hated it, especially as I got older. There were 3 of us who always wanted the last prestigious spot.
Lauren December 8th, 2008 at 11:56 am 3
My default order is by age rather than ability, but it is fun to mix it up randomly. For this Christmas it will be mid, easy, mid, adv, easy, mid, adv.
Christmas » Piano Teacher’s Retreat December 15th, 2008 at 12:58 pm 4
[...] I’m emerging for a moment from my stuffy, congested daze to report that our Christmas recital was a success! Everyone did wonderfully, and nobody got confused with our unique order. [...]