We're Getting Ready!

Our upcoming Christmas recital is just around the corner, so we've been working hard on lots of music!  Each student participating will play one seasonal piece and one non-seasonal.  I try to incorporate collaborative playing in each of my recitals so several of my students will be playing duets together.  I also arranged a couple of group events so here's a quick look at what we're doing...

Four girls in my studio will be playing the bells! This is easy enough to do by simply picking a piano duet.  In this case, it was a student primo with a teacher secondo which means the primo is much simpler.  I grabbed my handbells and made a few adjustments in the music and it sounds BEAUTIFUL!  The girls are so excited to play together.  I made this work by choosing 2 girls who have lessons back-to-back and are on the same level.  They practice together each week, carefully counting when they do not have notes in a given measure.  Of course it helps that I sing along as well!  The other 2 girls are homeschoolers so I will be getting every one together right after the week of Thanksgiving.

Four boys in the studio will be playing the cups! Thanks to Wendy Stevens, we have a fun version of "We Three Kings"!  One of them will be playing the piano part while the other 3 will be using cups.  To practice it, I either play the piano part or a cup to work with each student during their lessons until we can get together.

The boys are having a BLAST with this one so it should bring loads of smiles to the recital!



Are you doing something unique?  I would love to hear some of the creative ideas you are using this Christmas!