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Director Resources

Choral Director Resources

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GIA Publications

Align music instruction with state and national standards and remain focused on active music making using this resource as your guide. This second edition includes new and updated chapters by a team with experience teaching music at all educational levels: Pre-K, K–12, higher education and beyond. Part I defines the field of curriculum and assessment in music. Part II connects various approaches to music teaching – Orff, Kodaly, Dalcroze, Suzuki, and Gordon's Music Learning Theory – in the areas of movement, rhythm, singing, creative music making, expression, literacy, and listening. Part III guides the reader through various approaches to designing curricula, including Understanding by Design, Universal Design for Learning, and the National Standards. Part IV addresses curriculum and assessment in early childhood, secondary students, popular music, adult music learning, English language learners, learners with disabilities, preparation for adjudicated events, preservice education, and in-service education. Finally, Part V looks to the future, addressing the role of technology and the challenges to musicianship-focused curriculum and assessment. Polish your curriculum and reach your assessment goals with this helpful guide.

Musicianship-Focused Curriculum and Assessment

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Hal Leonard Corporation

One of America's best-loved musical personalities shares his passion, humor, and insights, helping to revitalize and reenergize teachers! This includes 366 short essays - one for each day of the year, including leap day - to help educators rediscover the energy and creativity that brought them to teaching in the first place, and inspire the artist within! Through the readings in this beautifully designed daily companion, a teacher will reawaken to the connection between one's personal art and the art of teaching, tapping the restorative power of creativity in nourishing the soul.

The Artist Within Me

A comprehensive beginning conducting text - complete with pictures, online videos, and supplemental conducting etudes - to facilitate the development of a clear and expressive conducting technique. This volume addresses three major areas for beginning conductors: gestural technique, score study, and leadership. For gestural technique, the text details a number of technical skills, including the appropriate use of the body, the roles of the right and left hand, basic conducting patterns and their derivatives, an application of Laban movement analysis, the importance of the conducting planes, and conducting with varied articulations (staccato, legato, and marcato), among others. In addressing score study, rather than advocating for one particular approach, this volume presents a number of possible score study methods for the student to explore. Finally, the text addresses how to be an effective and ethical leader from the podium. It also presents the transformational leadership model as a positive pathway for improving the conductor's effectiveness on and off the podium. Also included are music etudes to help students develop the technical skills of the conductor. A major contribution to conducting pedagogy and an extraordinary resource that distills the essence of effective conducting gesture.

Foundations of Conducting Technique

Book

From rehearsal procedures to reading music, new singers have a lot to learn when they join a choir. This practical and compact guide written by experienced choral conductors covers all the basics. Topics include an overview of common rehearsal equipment; how to read pitches, rhythms, and expressive markings; how to mark the score; proper body alignment and breathing technique; good vowel production; what to expect in rehearsals and concerts; how to audition for choirs and solos and more. Written in an easy-to-read style with bite-sized chapters, this guide is perfect for novice singers in many settings from middle and high school choirs to community and church ensembles. Keep this resource in your singers' choral folders to jumpstart their understanding of key concepts and the choral process.

A Quick-Start Guide to Choral Singing

Inspired by the teachings of her mentor, the legendary Frauke Haasemann, Sabine Horstmann has written these creative exercises for choirs at any level of development.  Written in a straightforward, direct manner, this volume provides 94 sequential exercises that can serve as the central part of vocal training for your choir. Topics include: an overview of the "how" and "why" of vocal pedagogy; techniques for teaching posture, breathing, resonance, and relaxation; exercises for high range, low range, dynamics, and diction; suggestions for planning the choral warm-up; and canonic exercises for developing voice and ear.  The author is instructor of Group Vocal Technique and Voice at the Robert Schumann University in Dusseldorf.  She has extensive experience working with singers of all ages.

Evoking Sound: Choral Vocal Technique

Oxford University Press

Offering practical suggestions for helping both teachers and students think about the world around them, this book seeks to help implement social justice practices in music classes and ensembles at the elementary and middle school levels. Each chapter engages with important themes through music making and presents examples of dialogue with students, unit ideas, and lesson plans geared toward students between 6-14 years old. Tackling subjects often considered beyond the understanding of younger students, this book respects the voice and critical thinking of the student. Suggestions are given that help reflect and redirect dialogue, with questions that address bias, misinformation, and misunderstandings that too often stand in the way of coming to know and embracing diversity. The book also includes legally grounded arguments appropriate for school board presentations and ready-to-go classroom-tested lesson plans.

Music & Social Justice

Neil A. Kjos Music Company

Here is a unique, innovative, and comprehensive textbook devoted exclusively to the teaching of rhythm. This book presents traditional as well as nontraditional 21st century outside-the-box concepts and strategies relative to the teaching of rhythm. There are five main parts to the book, which focus on: introducing students to the performance of rhythms; a look at the The Whole Note System; other counting systems and their effective uses in the classroom; compound meter; and irregular and mixed meters. All music teachers, whether band, orchestra, or choir directors, classroom music teachers, or private studio teachers, must deal with the problems inherent in getting students to first perform and then to understand rhythms. Rhythmic independence is one of the most important skills for students to master; this book will be an invaluable resource for all music educators.

Teaching Rhythm

Applying the principles of Edwin E. Gordon's Music Learning Theory, this volume aligns choral pedagogy with the principles of voice science and works as a guide to transforming the sound, intonation, and musicianship of choral ensembles at all levels. Topics include:
 
  • Vocal science as it pertains to alignment, respiration, articulation, phonation, registration, and resonance   • Debunking myths about "fixing" choral ensemble sound   • Teaching via the architecture of the vowel   • The pedagogical "miracle" of the mixed vowel ü   • New warm-up and music-learning sequences   • Vocal registration and the choral warm-up   • Rethinking the warm-up to build healthy choral tone   • Determining acoustically correct standing positions for choral ensembles   • New essential 1-3-5 exercises for use in choral warm-ups   • Eliminating blend and intonation issues   • Guides to teaching phrasing   • Understanding the horizontal part of the conducting gesture and its role as the primary method of communication to singers This book continues the pedagogy contained in The Anatomy of Tone; The Choral Warm-Up and Intonational Solfege, and together with the companion 1-3-5 Essential Choral Exercises book it is a landmark work for choral conductors and choirs.

Essentials of the Choral Warm-Up: Science, Method, and Pedagogy

This selection emphasizes awareness and understanding of the essential role empathy plays in honest musicianship. Including a collection of suggestions for how musicians can harness their own empathy to refocus rehearsals and performances, the authors propose that a constant awareness of empathy should be at the forefront of all music making and must be the threshold to artistry and human connection. As an added bonus, the book contains QR codes for video presentations for both self-exploration and class use.

The Musician's Empathy

Series

This best-selling series of books and CDs has quickly become an indispensable resource for music educators searching for the best possible music at all levels. Each book includes analyses of select pieces and insights from national leaders in the field. Recordings by top ensembles make this series truly invaluable.
 
Now the complete set of books and CDs for Choir are available at a special price. This bundle includes Teaching Music through Performance in Choir, Volumes 1-5 and Teaching Music through Performance in Middle School Choir plus all corresponding CDs. Build your library today!  Please note: there are only 4 CDs in the bundle. Volume 5 does not contain a CD at this time.

Teaching Music Through Performance: Complete Choir Bundle

Boxed Set Volumes 1-5, Middle School - Books and CDs

Written by noted scholar and conductor Dennis Shrock, this is a presentation of composers throughout history who represent the broad and diverse canon of choral music. It includes twenty women composers and ten composers of color, many of whom have been previously underrepresented in studies and in performances. Each chapter presents overviews of the composer's life and choral output; information and analysis of selected compositions, including complete texts and literal translations not found elsewhere; and guidelines that address related and important aspects of performance. Rounding out his approach, Shrock also explores the lesser-known works of familiar composers such as Palestrina and Brahms. The repertoire also represents a diversity of musical periods, styles, and genres. With its broad scope and scholarly authority, this is the ideal resource for conductors at all levels looking to diversify their concert programming in a practical and historically informed way.

Choral Diversity

The iTheatrics Method is the first textbook specifically devoted to building high-quality and sustainable musical theatre programs in schools and community settings. This book is the culmination of more than 20 years of hands-on training conducted by master educators and vetted by the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Changing Education Through the Arts (CETA) initiative. Written in an entertaining, conversational style, this book also includes the advice of more than 100 instructors currently working in the field. It is the quintessential guide and resource for creating quality musical theatre programs for students of all ages.

The iTheatrics Method

Lisa Owens

As choir directors, we are constantly challenged to find ways to balance fun with music performance and theory. Assessment is an essential part of what we do. This program was created for students who used to get nervous when it was time to do testing, particularly sight-reading tests. Based on principles from learning karate, this program makes a game out of testing, utilizing short tests with immediate rewards that lead students to take ownership of their own progress toward becoming independent musicians. The concepts for middle school singers are divided into seven sections with progressively more challenging material at different "belt" levels. The program contains a study guide for each level as well as a student tracking form for each year in choir, written theory tests, and oral sight-reading and rhythm-reading tests. There are printable certificates and reward passes for completing the various levels. A great tool for district alignment and common assessments before students move on to their high school choral programs!

Choir Karate

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This book is the ideal way to teach music theory without spending valuable rehearsal time! There are 107 days' worth of lessons and quizzes designed specifically for the choral classroom. As your students learn, they will develop musical independence and rely less and less on rote learning. The student edition doubles as both a textbook and a workbook in which students are presented with information that is then reinforced through exercises on the same page. Quiz reviews are included for each unit, as well as a thorough review for the final exam. The teacher's Test Bank includes quiz and final exam reviews and answer keys, with copying permission to allow one Test Bank to fill the testing needs for your entire class.

One-Minute Theory #1

Editors Choice Year

The adolescent years can be a challenge for any choir director - to say the least! But now, Roger Emerson has written a book forged by years of teaching at this level and by years of successful composing, guest conducting and leading workshops throughout the world. With  topics ranging from recruiting to discipline and from the adolescent voice to administrators and budgets, this text is an absolute must for either the novice or the seasoned veteran who teaches and loves middle school singers.

Sing 6-7-8

Reproducible

Alfred Music Publishing

Even on non-rehearsal days, time is too precious not to fill these class periods with meaningful learning! Whether it's the day after a concert, the last week of the school year, a virtual day, or a day with many absences, this creative assortment of activities, projects, and games is designed to build student musicianship and social-emotional skills. Includes 25 activities as well as a downloadable PDF that makes the worksheets easy to reproduce and the directions easy to project. Craft a rich and resonant choral experience even when you can't rehearse!

Choir-tivities

Book & Online Media

Pavane Publishing

The third book on vocal training in the Cantabile series by Dr. Rundus, this one is tailored specifically for the choral director. The first book, Cantabile, is a graduate-level text that has become enormously popular throughout the U.S. and abroad for voice teachers, professors and choral directors. Her second book, Cantabile Voice Class, is aimed at the undergraduate student. This important third book provides a systematic approach to teach lyrical singing and tone broken down into 10-12 minute lessons intended to be incorporated into your choral rehearsal. An exceptional resource!

Choral Cantabile

This book is one of the most comprehensive resources ever published for middle school choir directors - written, researched, and compiled by conductors and educators with a wealth of teaching experience. It is ideal for anyone who seeks a deeper understanding of the best choral literature for middle school singers and who wishes to learn from some of the seminal voices in the profession. In Part I, Sherri Porterfield discusses the role of assessment in middle school artistry; Judy Bowers outlines a hierarchy for independent part singing; Patrick Liebergen and Paul D. Head discuss selecting and preparing quality repertoire; James Jordan encourages the inner journey of a young singer; and Frank Abrahams introduces comprehensive musicianship through the lens of critical pedagogy and reciprocal teaching. Part II includes teacher resource guides for 80 works considered by these experts to be the best available for middle school choirs of all ability levels. Each teacher resource guide includes information about the composer or arranger, the composition, historical perspectives, technical and stylistic considerations, musical elements, form and structure analysis, and text guidelines. Each guide also contains valuable suggestions for rehearsing the music with middle school students. Resource recordings of many of the works are available on the companion CD (Set 1). The long-awaited second set of middle school choir recordings feature unison and canons, SA, SSA, SAA, TB, TTB and TTBB repertoire from the series. Of special interest are seven tracks featuring middle school choirs. These are beautiful recordings of some of the great repertoire in print for the middle school level that serve as excellent models of what great singing can be at this level.

Teaching Music Through Performance in Middle School Choir

Habits of a Successful Choir Director presents effective teaching principles and provides a practical approach to everyday issues that choir directors face. Building on the successful Habits of series, Wilkinson and Rush have created a practical guide to all aspects of a successful choral program, including: program organization and management, teaching the components of singing, rehearsal strategies and ensemble fundamentals, music literacy and repertoire selection, strategies for assessment, and the significance of music making. Additional sections address musicianship, classroom management, working with parents and colleagues, the importance of warm-up time, building student leadership, professional development, field trips, fundraising, scheduling, developing a mission statement and quality-of-life issues. This is a comprehensive book that will exponentially inspire as teaching skills grow. It will serve as a constant and essential companion throughout the career of any choir director.

Habits of a Successful Choir Director

Thinking of building a show choir program at your school? Here is the essential how-to guide for building and sustaining a thriving show choir program, perfect for new and seasoned professionals alike. The first sections of book cover the "what" and "why" of show choirs, as well as addressing the nature of competition. The next sections give a how-to guide that outlines everything from auditioning, fundraising, and costuming your choir to programming and selecting music. A glossary of all related terminology, a typical yearly calendar, and a list of dozens of additional online resources is also included. With her hallmark wit and nearly two decades of experience, author Jen Randall offers a wealth of knowledge, wisdom, and tools that address every crucial aspect of the show choir world.

The Art of Competitive Show Choir

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