Creative music for children, a plan of training based on the natural evolution of music, including the making and playing of instruments, dancing--singing--poetry

Front matter

CREATIVE MUSIC

FOR

CHILDREN

Preface

This book has been prepared especially for those mothers and teachers who have written to me for help in their work with young children. It is not for those who have geniuses to train — for genius makes demands and finds ways peculiarly its own — but for those who wish to give all children more vital, more fundamental, and more joyous experiences in their early musical training; for any who may be interested in the musical training of children, and for all those who wish to see music make a more effectual contribution to character building, home life, and society.

My first appeal to teachers in behalf of the child appeared in the Musical Observer for September, 1917. Two years later a monograph on "Primitive Music for Primitive People — a new view of music for children," gave a general statement of the principles underlying the work which forms the subject matter of this book. In June, 1920, two articles, one in Musical America, and one in

vii viii

Preface

Good Housekeeping, were written by visitors to my studio, and these articles resulted in so many letters from mothers and teachers in all parts of the United States who were perplexed by problems similar to mine, that a book seemed the inevitable answer to them.

After my studio experiments had proved to me and to others that musical training in its broad sense, including the making and playing of instruments, was practicable, educative, and joy-giving in small groups of children, my next wish was to try out the plan with large classes to ascertain the practicability of bringing these stimulating activities into the lives of public school children. So in the autumn of 1919 I began an experiment in the Lincoln School of Teachers College, applying my studio experiment to large classes, and the results, so far, have been gratifying. A full report of this newer experiment will be given later for the benefit of those teachers who may be interested in the idea as applied to school conditions. The scope of this book, however, is confined to its application in the studio and in the home.

To Miss Emily Barnes I am indebted for the specific name of my work. After observing the

Preface ix experiment in my studio and in the school, she thought the name "Creative Music" an appropriate one to cover all phases of the work in construction of Musical Instruments, Creation of Music and Poetry, Playing, Singing, and Dancing, and it is in this sense that I have used the term throughout the book. I am also indebted to Miss Lida Lee Tall and to Miss Helen Norfleet for suggestions in the revision of the manuscript.

I would add a word in appreciation of Mr. R. E. O'Neill's interpretation of the spirit of my work in the charming picture he has drawn for the lining of the book.

S. N. C.

New York,

September, 1921.

Part I The Background Chapteb Page

I. — Music Lessons or Musical Training? . 3 II. — Early Heresies of the Writer . . 13

III. — The Story of an Idea ... .23

Part II

THE CREATIVE MUSIC EXPERIMENT Introduction . . . . . , . 37

IV. — How THE Children Made their Instru-

V. — The Development of the Rhythmic

VI. — Singing and Voice Control for Children 99

VII. — Correlation of Singing and Playing 108

VIII. — Original Compositions .... 122

IX. — A Word about Recitals .... 134

xi xii Contents

Part III The Outcome Chapter Pack

X. — The Place of Creative Music in Education ....... 141

XI. — The Beginnings of Creative Music in the

Home 185

XII. — Suggestions to Teachers . . . 207

List of Instruments Used in this Work 215

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

FACING PAGE

Frontispiece

1 . The Last Touches of the Tom-Tom's Decora-

tion (after the Maker's Original Design) 8

2. A Glass Player of 33^ Years (Birch-Bark

Drum in Corner) ..... 16

3. A Three-Note Marimba Played by its

Maker 24

4. Ready for the March (Tom-Tom and Tabor) 32

5. A Sleigh-bell Melody (Hollow Stump Drum

6. Chinese Gongs ...... 48

7. Swiss Bells ...... 56

8. A Twelve-Note Marimba Played by its

Maker 64

9. Pipes of Pan ...... 72

10. Reed Trumpet ...... 80

11. A Birch-Bark Trumpet .... 80

12. Some Music Lessons are Best Out of Doors 86

xiii xiv Illustrations

FACING PACE

13. The SuEPHERn's Pipe . . . . • . 86

14. A Noon IIouu at Home. A Flageolet Duet 94

15. A Revival of Merrie England's Pipe and

16. Triton-Shell Trumpeters .... 106

17. A Lazy Oboe Player 106

18. Chinese Tche 112

19. Transverse Reed Flute . . . .112

20. Wheat-Straw Clarinet . . . .112

21. Summer Music in the Garden (Squash-Leaf

Oboe) 116

22. A Young Apollo Plays the First Stringed

Instrument . . . . . .116

23. Experiments with the Tension Bow 120

24. The Ancient Egyptian Shoulder Harp is

Revived by the Help of a Cart Wheel . 128

25. Listening to the Soft Tones of the Theban

Harp 132

26. A Young Orpheus ..... 136

27. A Psaltery Duet . . . . . 142

28. Four Stages in Our Development of the

29. A Modern Kin of the Old Chinese Type . 148

Illustrations

XV

FACING PAGE

30. Barney Tries his New Cocoanut Banjo . 148

31. The Use of the Movable Bridge is Discovered ....... 148

32. A High Bridge is Added and the Banjo

Becomes a Fiddle .... 154

33. The Bird's-Nest Lute . . . .160

34. There is a Time and a Place Even for the

Cornstalk Fiddle ..... 166

35. Alva's Cello Gradually Takes Form . 170

36. The Beginnings of Chamber Music in the

37. A Cello and Two Monochords Serve this Trio in their Chamber Music Combinations ....... 178

38, "Just to See How it Sounds under my Chin."

(Elizabeth's Cigar-Box Violin) . ' . 184

39. "The Soundpost Makes it Sing Like a Real

40. Another Ancestor of the Piano — the

41. The Irish Harp, too, Belongs in our

42. After all, the Modern Cello is Not so Far Removed from its Ancestor the Monochord ....... 196 xvi

Illustrations

FACING PAGi;

43. Bobby and Jane Build "Pio-pens" to Music 200

44. Simple Instruments that Ciiildken can

Make at Home ..... 206

45. Suggestions fok Home-Made Drums . . 206

Music Plates (Original Compositions) . 214

CREATIVE MUSIC FOR CHILDREN

Chapter I Music Lessons Or Musical Training ?

The human interest in music is as old as the race, and the use of it as a recreative and stimulative, as well as a soothing agent, antedates history. The Chinese, Hindus, and other oriental peoples long ago recognized its influence on the mind and on human conduct, and Confucius went so far as to claim that he could tell whether or not a nation was well governed merely by hearing its music. The ancient Greeks defined the different effects of different kinds of music, and recognizing it» value in the education of their youth, gave it an important place in the school curriculum. But in the various upheavals through which our civilization has passed since then, music has been allowed to fall from its earlier high estate. Although the church has preserved its religious aspect and our own instincts have preserved its recreational meaning, we have, until recently, overlooked its educational value.

Just now we are groping our way to a better understanding of the significance of music in the training of the young, but we are still without conviction. We cannot ignore the fact that music is growing to be one of the strongest forces of our society, and as a people, we enjoy and encourage it. The shelves of our libraries are heavy with books about music and musical training, pleas for the propagation of good music, learned discussions of masterpieces and theories, popular treatises on music-appreciation, expositions of methods, and analyses of music, — scientific, spiritual and artistic. During the past decade the floodgates seem to have been opened and music of varying degrees of worth has deluged the public. Some of us have absorbed the good and the beautiful; some the unbeautiful; and many of us are wondering how this great force is to be controlled and its beneficent power conserved. We do know that it is toward the children that our efforts must be directed, but the minds of most of us are not quite clear as to how music may best contribute to the development of our children.

In these days nearly everyone believes in some kind of musical training, though occasionally one 4oes find a parent who thinks it a useless waste of time. However, when such an attitude is met, it is usually due to lack of information on matters of education, or it is the result of former unsatisfactory experiences. A mother once said, "I studied music for several years, but I have nothing to show for it and I cannot play a tune to-day. Why should my children repeat that waste of time and nervous energy? Life is too short"; and her inference was right. A disappointed father once said, "Yes, I am going to sell the piano. I spent thousands of dollars in order that my daughter should learn to play, and I had visions of sitting by the fire in the evenings while she played to me all those old things I love so well. But my money was wasted and my effort availed nothing. She never opens the piano, and when I ask her to play for me she says, *I can't play a thing.' No more music lessons in my family." A nervous woman once said, "I cannot bear to hear the children practice. It makes me positively ill. Perhaps it is because I live over experiences in my own childhood. When I was a child I had lessons on the violin. It was very difficult for me, and my teacher used to get very cross and often gave me a sharp pencil-whack across my fingers when I didn't hold them properly or played the wrong note. My!

how it hurt! I can feel it yet! And somehow, since then, I have always hated violin music."

In spite of the discouraging effect of many experiences similar to these, there are few enlightened parents who do not try to give their children some form of musical training, and many think it important enough to make great sacrifices to that end. On the other hand, there are still those who look upon musical ability as a special gift, and think that none but the talented need pursue the study. I have been interested to note how widely parents' ideas differ as to the special gains to be derived from the study of music. Some parents, without any definite object in view, or without knowing why they wish it, just want their children to be able "to play." Some want to give them all the advantages the age provides, saying, perhaps, *'I never had the chance when I was young; I want to give my children all those advantages that I missed." Some parents see in the study of music a mental stimulant; others a vocation and means of livelihood. In some cases the main thought is to keep the children busy after school hours, or to provide them with a pleasurable and harmless pastime and larger resources for self entertainment. To many, the final goal is "music appreciation"

and the ability to enjoy good music; and there are those who study music merely to broaden their appreciation of art in general. Some wish most for music in the home, for the enjoyment of family and friends, and some parents arrange for lessons merely to gratify the wish of the child. There are others who consider the greatest value of musical training to be its refining power in the cultivation of the emotions and tastes, while still others look to it mainly for help in muscular coordination and physical poise.

More of us than have realized it, perhaps, have been interested in music as an accomplishment — an ornament — something to make our children more attractive socially. It may have been the wish to make her daughters welcome in larger social circles and to give them a wider field for selection in the choice of husbands that led the mother of a few generations ago to urge musical training upon her daughters, rather than upon her sons, for the sons had more direct ways of attaining to marriage. Fifty years ago few American parents considered music lessons for the boy unless he showed unusual talent; but often great sacrifices were made that the daughter should be able to play a few "company pieces" at the piano. Unfortunate results have come about from this general attitude towards musical training as an accomplishment — something to affect one's social life. But it is easy to see how this attitude has been encouraged, for on the face of it the ability to make music is an accomplishment that has, from earliest times, made one more welcome among his fellows; and it is right, of course, to encourage it from the pleasure-giving side.

The child very easily catches the spirit that moves his parents to give him lessons. His attitude towards music is established in the beginning of his musical education and it is very hard to change it. If he feels that his social popularity depends in any measure upon his musical ability, it is inevitable that jealousies shall arise; for it is only natural that he should wish to feel power over others, and therefore he resents whatever weakens that power, especially if it is a rival personality. The jealousies among singers and players in the social and professional world are well known and seem to me an inevitable result of the attitude we have held toward musical training. It has been so easy to use music as a means to gain the attention and applause of others; its very nature lends itself to the "showing off" propensity in children,

1. Tlie Last Touches of the Tom-Tom's Decoration (after tlie Maker's Original

Design)

and many adults, too, have no stronger motive behind their daily practice than the wish for public applause. The adulation of the individual artist in a public performance, rather than the pure enjoyment of the music itself, is an exaggerated result of this attitude, and the view of the audience, in its turn, feeds anew the perverted motive. It is much easier to let this tendency of music run along the open road of ego-gratification in our training than to guide it through paths of more wholesome development. But we must find those paths. For the desire to produce effects on other people is strong enough in us all to need no extra stimulation, and when the subtle power of music is thrown in that direction, the result is a disastrous overbalancing.

Musical training has extraordinary educational value, but so long as we are interested in music as an accomplishment only, and so long as the motivating power behind musical study is the wish to impress others, we shall never realize its greatest value.

But what about the outcome for that vast number of people whose purpose is not superficial ornamentation, but who wish their children to be musical, with all the wholesome results that come from being so? Have we realizea our hopes? Have we and our children had "music lessons" or musical training? And are we, as a people, musical?

To be musical is to feel and enjoy music — to have the impulse that results in habits of playing and improvisation — and to enjoy one's own music and that of others for the sake of the music itself. The Australian Bushman is musical. Travelers say that the Bushman sits alone for hours at a time listening to the sound of his gora, without being concerned about anything but the succession of tones which he brings out of it for his own pleasure. Most primitive peoples are musical, and the music employed by them is a necessity of life. The primitive people in our midst, the children, are musical in the beginning (more so than some of us think) but this tendency does not always survive their training, and perhaps no one will claim that "grown up" America is truly musical. The negroes in the South are (or were) musical. They came from Africa with rich, musical voices, a natural capacity for melody and harmony and a tendency to musical production. Out of their natural gifts has come the most beautiful folk-song literature America has. The sorrows that civili-

Music Lessons or Musical Training? n zation has forced upon the negro in removing him from his African home have doubtless had a part in the development of his music, but it is certainly not the result of any training that our civilization has given him.

We believe that we love music, but as a rule we do not love it enough to take the trouble to make it, and most of our home music at present is "reproduced " and not "home-made." Do we, as families, love to gather together in the evenings and sing and play, as really musical peoples do.^* (I wonder if many of us realize just how far that custom goes toward making children musical?) Compare our habits with those of musical European countries. Do our young people show enthusiasm over singing clubs and musical gatherings .-^ Do we, after all our training, appreciate and encourage the best music .^^ Has our training given us all a taste for truly beautiful music? Does it "harmonize the souls" of those who pursue it, as the Greeks found it did, and does it make us kinder and more just in our relations to others? And does it, as the ancient Chinese believed, bring us poise and self control? Has the study of music proved a good investment of time and money? Does it really bring us happiness and content? We have reason to expect all these things in some measure, and if we have been disappointed, if we are not musical, never "know anything to play," if "bought" music is the only kind that thrives, if we grow nervous and irritable in the study of it, and envy someone who plays or sings better; if it has not helped us to recognize and enjoy beauty or to express some form of beauty that is within us, if it has not helped to make our lives move in better adjustment to the "rhythmic beat of Nature," — the fault lies not in the art, but in the use that we and those before us have made of it.

CHAPTER II Former Innovations Concerning Notation, Singing, and Dancing

If we feel a lack in what music has done for us, there are probably two main causes for that lack. Our musical training in the past and present is, of the two, the more responsible, and may even lie at the root of that other contributing cause, — our customs and attitude, as a people, toward music. My feeling that something was wrong in the way music was taught — to me, at least — really began at the age of eight. I vividly remember the day I was to have my first music lesson, my eager anticipation and thrills of joy to think I was going to learn to play the piano ! Soon I would understand that mysterious array of black and white keys, and be able to manipulate them in a "really truly" tune ! At last the hour came and I sat on the piano stool and the teacher sat beside me. Then she opened a book and put it in front of me. The page did not read: "Put your finger on this key and play Yankee Doodle,'' as I half expected, but instead, there was a picture like a fence, with many black spots on it. She said it was a staff, and began telling me various things about it. My interest in this staff was only momentary, and then I went back to the thing I had come for. "I want to learn to play," I ventured. "All right, my dear; this is the way to learn to play. You must first learn to read these notes, and then you can play them on the piano." Then followed explanations and drill on the letter names. "When the note is in this place, you must strike this key," and by going through a most intricate mental process, the teacher allowed me to strike an occasional key.

But where was the tune? And what did the lines and spots in the book have to do with music, anyway? I wanted to play the piano, not study queer marks in a book. My fingers ached to make a tune that sounded "pretty," or to play some of the little songs I already knew how to sing; but she would neither show me how nor let me try. The disappointment was bitter. But my longing to play was so great that I was willing to pay any price, so I accepted the terms — hard though they were — and finally learned the notes. I remember being greatly discouraged and nervous over the complicated feat of trying to hold my hands in the right position, decipher the note's place on the staff, figure out its time value and strike the right key, all at the same time; and when it came to managing two hands and puzzling over two staffs at the same time, it was indeed a trial! My only incentive and comfort lay in the hope that, finally, music would come out of all this mental strain and nervous tension.

After a time I found great pleasure in picking out tunes by ear and harmonizing them to suit my own fancy, but that was soon prohibited. My teacher gave directions that I was not to be allowed to "play by ear" at all, as it would ruin my note playing, and her instructions were carried out. I felt the deprivation very keenly, but it chanced that after the first year, my lessons were discontinued for a few years, and I was free to do as I liked at the piano. So I played by ear and improvised to my heart's content; read notes, too, and grew, all unaided, in musical feeling and understanding.

In after years it was the memory of my childish disappointment and instinctive feeling that led me to try the plan of teaching children to play the i6 Early Heresies of the Writer piano by ear — entirely without notation. The memory of how I had naturally improvised, and an analysis of my childish mental operations in harmonizing melodies, were my guides in teaching improvisation at the piano.

Ten years ago my experiments with children had already proved that they could be taught to play the piano without the help of printed notes, and that they loved to do it. It all seemed so natural and reasonable. Does not a child learn to speak his language before he learns to read it, and shall he not say musical things, with his fingers as well as with his voice, before he reads them? Herbert Spencer reminded us years ago that the thing should be taught before the symbol of it — that experience should come before knowledge — but we have been slow to realize how ruthlessly we have broken that educational principle in our music teaching. We have overlooked the original and true purpose of notation, and have confused the symbol with the thing symbolized. It was a true instinct that made me, as a child, feel disappointment in my teacher, perhaps as much as if she had told me a picture of my mother was the real mother.

It is not surprising that so many children hate

2. A Glass Player of Years (Hircli-I?ark Drum in Corner)

their music lessons. The thing that interests them is the playing — the sounds they make. If that activity is blocked by something of no interest in itself they quite naturally become bored; if coercion is used in note reading routine, they usually come to hate it; and since this mountain of difficulty lies between them and the thing they want, they give it up as being undesirable at that price. I believe it is a great mistake to deal with music in a disciplinary manner, forcing children to practice. Music is going to affect us emotionally. The delicately organized child will not be indifferent to it — he will either love it or hate it — and forcing him into it without his wish will either make him hate it, or make him irritable towards those who urge it.

Many children, enthusiastic at first, lose their ardor in the dreary process of learning to read notes, and give it up before they ever taste the joys of real musical expression. Many others, more persevering, settle down to cold mechanical playing because the natural feeling cannot break through the wall of conscious technicalities which their training involves. The opportunity for free expression must be given, and the habit cultivated from the very first, unfettered by new or complicated i8 Early Heresies of the Writer processes, mental or physical, if one is ever to realize the meaning of free musical expression. Few habits are harder to break than that of constraint.

"One mental process at a time," says the modern educator. When we think of the mental processes and simultaneous muscular feats required in teaching the use of an unfamiliar keyboard or group of strings by means of an unfamiliar system of signs, manipulated by unpracticed and uncoordinated muscles, we are appalled ! (Let a " grown-up " who knows neither notation nor the use of an instrument, try it with either violin or piano.) The wonder is that any children survive with a love for music. And perhaps none would, were it not for the great inborn desire to make music. This is merely a proof of the power of music over us, and the greatness of the human need and longing for musical expression.

One modern educator (M. E. Boole in Pre'paration of the Child for Science) says: "I believe that hardly any mistake in education is more disturbing to normal brain action, more likely to induce nerve-storms in delicate children, or more dangerous to future brain power in all children, than the attempt to convey a new idea by means of a process still artificial {i. e., inadequately coordinated) or to teach a new process by means of an idea still unfamiliar." The observation of children becoming nervous and irritable at the piano or violin probably lies within the experience of most of us. "When the process of learning by the more direct means has become so familiar as to be performed sub-consciously," then and only then should the more complicated processes begin.

Another educator (H. S. Jennings, in his Biology of Children in Relation to Education) states that, "Training is even harmful when it comes earlier than the development of the power which it tries to train; it must then be classed with the blights which cut off the development of the powers. . . . This driving of the powers too far le?ids to most serious difficulties — nervousness, twitching of the face, etc. Strain makes men hate their work."

How, then, are we to eliminate this strain in the child's playing? How can we teach him to play without note reading?

He learns to speak his mother tongue by rote, or imitation; he learns to sing by rote; birds teach their little ones to sing by rote; all young animals learn by imitation; why shouldn't the child's first playing be by rote? Why not deliberately employ the child's natural way of learning until the physical process becomes easy? Very soon, as his ear and his mentality develop, he can follow a more intellectual process and play by ear.

But playing a melody by ear presupposes that the child knows the melody. Therefore before a child can play by ear, he must first sing. The only way he can really possess a melody is by singing it, and his singing may begin as soon as he begins to talk, or even before. There is no strain in a child's learning to sing songs that are suited to his age.

From the beginning, he must sing and play rhythmically. But to do so, he must fed the rhythm of what he is playing, and the feeling for rhythm must come through the body. Reasoning thus, I saw the necessity of adopting dancing also as a part of the child's musical training, for rhythmical playing depends upon bodily response to rhythm. Some form of dancing it must be, not aesthetic or social dancing, but something suited to his age and development; something that will cultivate his rhythmic sense at his own level, and make him free to express it. Most folk dances are too difficult for very small children, but some of the simple dances of primitive peoples give excellent material for these little folks.

Some singing, some dancing, and some playing, seemed to me to be the proper formula for a child's music lesson; but for very young children (I had some pupils of three and four years of age) it was singing and dancing only, for my cue in the instrumental phase of the work was to wait until the child wanted to play, and voluntarily sought that means of expression.

The results were very gratifying. Children who had been baffled by the printed page found it easy and delightful to play the piano by rote and by ear, and to improvise, with nothing but the keyboard to think of. Children who had never sung in their lives, delighted in singing folk songs and improvising little songs of their own, and they all reveled in the rollicking dances of childish primitive peoples.