Counterclassical Treatise for Youth Ensembles

‍Perusal for the Youth Orchestra Performance module 

About the Education Module: This module provides an introduction and invites student musicians to explore the art of improvisation through Kebra-Seyoun Charles’ Counterclassical Treatise.Using familiar traditional forms of embellishment as an introduction, such as trills and mordants, students are guided from adding simple ornamentation to an existing melody, to expanding those ornaments into short original phrases, to improvising freely within the context of the piece. Students will explore how their individual sense of ornamentation (or “style”) is connected to their personal history and identity and they will explore how artists from a variety of genres express their history and identity in the ways that they add ornamentation to their own music. This module encourages students to go beyond technical execution, fostering a deeper connection to the music by allowing their creativity to shape the piece in real-time while bringing their own personal styles and ideas into the room.

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Conductor’s Performance Modules are designed to provide conductors and teachers with all of the essential entry points for engaging with the composers and their works. These guides provide a deep reimagining of the ways that we approach learning a new piece of music, placing the composer and their ideas at the center of the process, and helping students connect to the work through identity-based inquiry.