Improvisation and Composition

 This week in Technology Assisted Music Learning the class focused on creating music. The two main topics of the class included improvisation and music writing software. This weeks reading started with the story of the Katie a student who was interested in music but did not want to be involved in band, orchestra or choir. She was able to use the technology available to her and make her own music. Through taking a music class on music technology, she was able further to enhance her knowledge of music. She was able to share her music with other students and receive feedback from the other students in her class. With the use of technology, she found a way to make music that other could relate with and critic each other.. With the use of technology, she gained confidence in her ability and increased her knowledge as a musician.

Teaching with technology can seem like a major task that takes that seem to take more time than we have.  As teacher looks to plan and included technology into their lesson this can help the student understand what their resources are in the musical world around them. The Internet can be much more than a research tool for the students. Compositions can help the students to understand the musical structure, but it can also provide creativity for the students. Noteflight.com is a great tool for the student to compose or arrange for any musical group. The site allows the student to create an account and start creating their own music after they have reviewed the instructional videos. Noteflight is a good tool for students using tablets or other devices that use the only Internet.  This allows the student also to save their progress easily.

If the student has a laptop or desktop computer MuseScore is a great alternative when looking at costly music software programs.  The program is shareware, which makes it free for the students and it also update frequently. The program also has many instructional videos that help the user create music with ease. This allows the student get started in their personal journeys into the world of arranging and composition. The use of MuseScore or Noteflight gives the students more options to help the teacher when planning their lessons.

Technology also has made improvisations easier to teach and to understand for the students. This week we were introduced to the seven-level model of development of improvisational abilities. Level one the students get to explore by listening to different styles of the music they would like perform as an improviser. They can use other technology to understand music theory to enable their essential skills of improvisation. In level two the students go through process-oriented improvisation. The can create sounds and their own melodies with the help of music software. Band-in-a-box allows the students to create their own melody or add the chords from an existing melody. With level three there is a deeper understanding of improvisational skill. In Product-oriented improvisation helps the students to understand the musical structure and how this applies to the improvisations they would like to make. When the students have a more technical aspect of their performance they are at level four. Fluid improvisation occurs when the musicians are comfortable with their own performances. Play-a-long books provide chorded backgrounds help the student to develop their own style and fluid improvisation.

Level five allows the performer to understand structural improvisation. They can develop ideas on the melodic ideas, tension and release. These also allow the performer to create a beginning, middle and end to the piece. Level six is where the performer develops their stylistic improvisation. They can achieve this through using the skills that are learned in the previous levels.  They learn through studying standards and listening to the artist. This helps them to perform personal improvisations. Creating an improvisation that is personal is a combination of all the levels. Level seven: personal improvisations show the confidence gained through learning and experience. Improvisation has benefited greatly from the technology that is available. It can create a stable environment for the student to experiment and that creates benefits the student and the teacher.

Bauer, W. (2014). Music learning today: Digital pedagogy for creating, performing, and responding to music. New York, New York: Oxford University Press.