Playing and composing techniques (plus some theory tips, and information on Anglican chant)

On this page I'm putting up exercises to develop sight-reading, transposition, and improvisation skills. I've worked my way through the Colleague, Choir Master, Associate, and Fellow of the American Guild of Organists exams using things like these. There are also some tips on music theory and composing for church ensembles.

Improvisation

Parallel tenths and sixths

Automatic 2:1 counterpoint and a simple bicinium formula

Automatic figuration patterns in eighths, triplets, and sixteenths

A Pachelbel organ prelude, with missing notes to be filled in with figuration patterns

Three little tricks for turning any line into a series of running quarters, suitable for a cantus firmus

All possible combinations of two-part rhythms in beats of 2, 3, or 4 parts. To be played with the four paradiddle patterns given in the file. Hours of fun!

A 12-page handout for a talk on improvising in the French style. Many people seem to have found this useful.

An 8-measure melody covering all possible stepwise motions twice, with standard diatonic harmonizations in three parts (to prepare for trio playing); the tune is presented in the top, middle, and bottom voices

A little 8-page workbook taking examples from Charles Tournemire's Five Improvisations, and making exercises out of them, in order to learn his style. This originated as the handout for a talk I gave at Duquesne University. 

A page on what I call the "Melodic mode," which I discovered while fooling around with the melodic minor. As well as scale degrees 6 and 7 being movable, scale degrees 2, 3, and 4 also have higher or lower versions, depending on the next note they're going to. It's good for sight-reading practice, too. 

A page with two 48-chord patterns to thoroughly learn dominant sevenths in all keys and inversions.

Composition

Some tips on composing for handbells

Some tips on composing for organ

Theory

Identifying intervals

Some ways of thinking about key signatures

The church modes

Sight-Reading

General sight-reading tips (a page with some new ways of using printed music to improve sight-reading skills)

Transposition

I've found practicing transposition helps with both sight-reading and improvisation.

Organ Playing

Organists have to learn music quickly. There are lots of practice techniques everyone knows (such as gradually increasing metronome speed, or altering the rhythm of each beat in some consistent way), but here is a list of some of the things I haven't seen elsewhere that I find make learning a piece easier:

• try to have each finger/foot in the very middle of the key it's playing
• try to have each finger/foot resting on the key before it plays
• see how many notes you are playing in each hand position (by holding them down) before being forced to a new position (you could even think of a score as being a series of hand positions, with just finger numbers within each section)
• for hymns, alternating every note which hand plays the Alto (then go back and start with the other hand)
• try playing the piece backwards (by either the notes' attacks or durations), to really get used to reading the music, and not just let your fingers do the walking; or maybe have pedals one beat ahead of manuals, etc. This sounds horrible, but is a good brain-stretcher.
• try to lift all fingers/feet which are not playing, holding them up high (this needs a slow tempo) - the release muscles can get sore very quickly this way
• try playing just the notes sounding on each beat (good for hearing the piece at a fast tempo early on), then maybe each half-beat
• try playing just the implied harmonies in tempo
• try playing with hands crossed, so the LH plays the RH's music and vice versa (this is especially good for contrapuntal music; I found it much easier if I thought in lines rather than chord-shapes)
• try playing with the backs of the fingers (so, palms up); this helps strengthen those release muscles, and general control of the fingers
• improvise on just the rhythms of the piece, even if it's just with scales or pairs of notes

Anglican Chant

This is a page with some discussion of how I've done Anglican chant an the past, and an example of what I hand out to the choir each week. This might be helpful if you've been thinking of adopting the practice, but have been scared away by the notation. I've also got quite a few TIFF files of Anglican chants (both single and double), mostly based on hymn tunes here. They've been pretty popular, and are free to use.

Miscellaneous

Here is a little paper I wrote listing the teachers of the organ class at the Paris Conservatory, along with whatever information on their teaching methods I could find.