Word of the day: https://wordpress.com/read/feeds/27030/posts/1762943855
In the early days of a new students’ piano lessons, I share with them several mnemonics to help them learn their notes. Musical notes appear on music staffs as dots or O’s, placed appropriately on either lines or spaces for either the Treble or Bass Clef. Their location in the staff determines the note, and corresponding key on the keyboard.
Learning to read the notes is very much like learning to recognize the letters of the alphabet. Before one can spell words, they must know their letters. Before they can make sentences, they must know how to spell words, which requires them to know their letters. Mnemonics can be helpful in learning the notes
There are four different groups of mnemonics – two for the treble clef and two for the bass cleff. For the treble clef, there is one for the “line” notes (those whose center is on the line) and one for the “space” notes (one whose center is on the space) between the 5 lines making up the staff. There are many different mnemonics that teachers have used over the years, however, it seems that one “standard” seems to be that the Treble Clef Spaces mnemonic is “F-A-C-E”.
Bass clef line mnemonics have ranged from: “Go Bring Down Fanny’s Apron” to “Good Boys Deserve Fudge Always” to “Grizzly Bears Don’t Fly Airplanes”
For some student, learning the mnemonics seems as challenging as simply learning the notes themselves. Perhaps for those students, mnemonics may not work the best. Th successful teacher will experiment with different teaching techniques to find that which suits the student best to help them fourish in their new endeavors and find satisfaction with their challenges.
Journey-For-Life 