Since 1997, I’ve made nearly 60 trips to Ukraine and have traveled to 23 of Ukraine’s 24 oblasts (like a state or province) and the Crimea (illegally annexed by Russia in 2014). I’ve spent time in the industrial Donbass, filled with hardworking, blue-collar people, the remote Carpathian mountains (spending more than one Christmas in snow-covered villages where people sang until midnight in homes lit only by candles), the great city of Kyiv (yes, the great gate of Kiev was a historical place, though Mussorgsky had no idea what it looked like when he wrote the piece), and plains of Central Ukraine. My musical experiences range from concerts in the largest opera and philharmonic halls in the country to folk music celebrations in village huts. In 2015 we started our first children’s music camp in Ukraine; last year, there were six camps spread across the country. We’re having to relocate everything this year because of the war, but we are hoping to hold at least one music camp for refugee children. To say I’ve been blessed by my experiences with Ukrainians is an understatement.

1. Russia and Ukraine are not the same. They have separate histories, cultures, and languages. A bit more about that later…
2. Ukraine is one of three major countries in Eastern Europe, together with Russia and Belarus. Ukraine’s history is at least 1,000 years old. The country is older than Russia or Belarus. Kyiv, the capital city of Ukraine, was once the capital of all of the lands of Eastern Europe. Moscow became the capital of Russia much, much later.
3. The Ukrainian language is distinct from Russian or Belarusian. All three use the Cyrillic alphabet, but they are not the same language.
4. Ukraine has amazing natural resources, including access to major rivers and the Black Sea. There are huge reserves of coal, natural gas, minerals, and a lot of amazing farmland. Around 40% of the farmable land in Europe is found in Ukraine! It’s at a strategic crossroads, so you can see why so many people wanted to rule the land. 
5. Unfortunately, this means that for the majority of its history, Ukraine has been occupied by other rulers. Ukraine is also a combination of the lands of many earlier tribes, whose music influenced the development of Ukrainian folk music. Just in the last 500 years, various parts of modern Ukraine have been ruled by the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (1569–mid-1600s), the Austro-Hungarian Empire (1804–1867), Russian Empire (1721–1917), and the Soviet Union (1922–1991). The Cossack Hetmanate was an independent part of Central Ukraine from 1648–1764. But some parts of Ukraine have had fewer than 50 years of independence and the right to self-determination over the past 500 years. In other words, modern Ukraine is complex and diverse—much like the U.S.
6. Religion has been a large part of Ukraine’s history. Unlike many of its neighbors, Ukraine does not have an official state religion. Instead, all religions are given equal legal status in the country. Ukraine has substantial populations of people who practice Christianity (divided among Roman Catholics, Orthodox, Protestants, and other groups), Islam, Judaism, and other religions.
7. Ukrainians have suffered many great tragedies in their history. Important events include the Holodomor (1932–1933), when 7–10 million people died as a result of starvation, when the Soviet government attempted to subdue Ukrainians by robbing them of their crops and seed. Nearly 9 million Ukrainians died in World War II. Countless others were killed under Stalin’s rule. 
8. Ukrainian culture is very diverse and interesting! Ukrainian folk music is influenced by the music and dances of ethnic groups like the Hutsuls, Jewish Communities, and nearby countries including Romania, Bulgaria, and Hungary. Because people were nomadic, they traveled throughout Central and Eastern Europe and brought their musical traditions with them. There is also a very strong choral tradition in Ukraine. Classical music has been a part of Ukrainian culture and developed in parallel with the classical music of Russia. There are many famous modern Ukrainian pop and rock music stars. Ruslana won the Eurovision Contest in 2004 with her song Wild Dances, which combined traditional ethnic Ukrainian rhythms, dances, and instruments with modern rock styles. Another famous Ukrainian rock band is Okean Elzy (Elza’s Ocean).
9. People in Ukraine speak multiple languages—there are more than twenty languages found in the country. Ukrainian is the predominant language but most Ukrainians speak both Ukrainian and Russian. People in Ukraine are not looking to erase the Russian language or exterminate Russian people or Russian culture. In the same way that people in Switzerland speak German, French, Italian, and Romansh, many Ukrainians are multilingual.
10. Some of the great choral music of Ukraine was written by composers such as Maksym Berezovsky, Dmytro Bortnyansky, Mykhaylo Verbytsky, Mykola Lysenko, Reinhold Glière, Kyrylo Stetsenko, Myroslav Skoryk, and Mykola Leontovych.
11. Speaking of Leontovych, his song Shchedryk, which is traditionally called “Carol of the Bells” in English, is one of the most well-known pieces in the world. It’s often thought of as a Christmas Carol in the West, but it’s most definitely not! It’s actually a New Year’s song. The song is older than Christianity in Ukraine and comes from pagan traditions. When Christianity came to Ukraine, pagan traditions were eliminated or changed to align with Christianity. The song is now traditionally sung on New Year’s Eve (in the Julian calendar, so January 13). The words in Ukrainian are a song about a swallow singing to the master of the house and telling him he would have a bountiful new year. It was only in 1936 that Peter Wilhousky—an American with Ukrainian heritage—wrote the lyrics to the song we now know as Carol of the Bells. Those lyrics have nothing to do with the original Ukrainian lyrics, but are still recognized worldwide.
12. Things not to say about Ukraine: 
    1. Again, it’s not Russia. It never has been, although leaders of the current Russian government want to take it over.
    2. It’s not Kiev, it’s Kyiv. Kiev is how the city is pronounced and spelled in Russian. Kyiv is the correct transliteration of the city’s name in Ukrainian. It was called Kyiv before it was renamed Kiev by the Russians.
    3. Don’t call it “Little Russia.” Unfortunately, malorossiya (literally, Little Russia) was a pejorative term used by people in Russia to denigrate people who lived in Ukraine. Rather than respecting their unique culture and language, many began to refer to the country as Little Russia. This contributed to the idea that Ukraine is part of Russia and not separate. Orchestra directors may be thinking…wait, what about Tschaikovsky’s Symphony Number 2 (“Little Russian”). Yep, those are Ukrainian folk tunes, not Russian folk tunes. When I play that piece, I always call it the Ukrainian symphony.
    4. Honor that the Ukrainian language is beautiful and different than Russian. Consider singing more pieces in Ukrainian with your students.
13. Check out recordings of Ukrainian folk instruments like the bandura. Other folk instruments include the violin, the sopilka (like a recorder), the kobza, and trembita.
14. Music resources: 
    1. General Music teachers, go to nataliamay.com. The page is in Ukrainian, but filled with wonderful children’s songs! With easy access to translation software, it’s pretty easy to navigate the site. Songs in English and Ukrainian may also be found at Ukraine – Mama Lisa’s World: Children’s Songs, Nursery Rhymes and Traditional Music from Around the World, and Ukrainianmusic.net.
    2. You can find all sorts of diverse Ukrainian music (folk, choral, instrumental) here: Music – Yevshan. And, of course, online streaming sites have many resources.
    3. Alfred Music has multiple arrangements of the Ukrainian Bell Carol for everything from piano solo to orchestras and ukulele!
    4. For instrumental teachers, visit Duma Music, Inc., where you will find a wide range of Ukrainian music for solo instruments, ensembles. There’s even a selection of Ukrainian pop music on the site.
    5. Three great pieces to check out: The Ukrainian National Anthem, Prayer for Ukraine, and Melodia (for orchestra or various instrumental ensembles, by Myroslav Skoryk).

If you’d like to donate to Ukraine, here are some sites. Some are associated with religious organizations, some with humanitarian organizations. I can vouch for all of these. 

1. Donate Eastern Europe | MIWC: Money goes to Ukrainian humanitarian support and children’s relief.
2. Meest humanitarian aid packages for Ukraine: They list several good organizations and opportunities. I’ve worked with Meest for years to ship instruments to Ukraine. They are reputable and very affordable.

Ukrainian National Anthem for Flex Ensembles

Use the power of music to honor Ukraine alongside your students by learning the Ukrainian national anthem, “Shche Ne Vmerla Ukrania.” The 4-part FLEX arrangement for winds, strings, and percussion is available to download HERE for free, along with an MP3 reference track. Students who wish to play the melody, in unison or as a solo, can play Part 1. String instruments have specific parts labeled as the melody throughout.

The post How to Talk and Teach About Ukraine appeared first on SmartMusic.

I’m fortunate to have benefited from excellent instruction in my collegiate studies, which included extensive training on secondary instruments. I felt confident in my knowledge of fingering charts, basic instrument position, tone production, and embouchure issues. Where I lacked confidence was in my ability to demonstrate effectively the level of nuance that I wanted to hear from my students, and also detect those small (but crucial) problems that interfered with my student’s ability to play well – things that only experienced players and teachers would know about.

Perhaps you’ve encountered the same thing when faced with the prospect of teaching strings. That overpowering sense of inadequacy and lack of direct experience that may have sent you back scrambling for your string tech class notebooks or searching the web for any video that could be helpful.

Today we are fortunate that information about string pedagogy – including conferences, workshops, and publications – has become readily accessible. Resources about technique, skills, and performance issues are available from expert authors. In addition, there is an increasing emphasis on providing materials that can easily be used in ensemble settings to help develop and refine fundamental skill and performance issues on string instruments.

First, Some Words of Encouragement

As a music educator, you already know how to appropriately sequence and teach music in an ensemble setting. The ability to analyze a musical score – from the point of view of what a particular work teaches – can easily be transferred from a choral or band setting to a string setting. Certain issues and ideas are universal to all areas, such as rhythmic problems, playing correct notes with good intonation, articulation issues, balance, blend, dynamics, stylistic elements, and musical interpretation. The underlying cause of problems in each of these areas is often centered around aural skills and listening issues.

Further, the characteristics of outstanding instructional delivery are universal to all musical areas. This includes elements such as control of pacing, effective time management, engineering the flow of the rehearsal to limit student downtime and increase student engagement, providing appropriate and timely feedback and remediation, and helping students to develop critical listening and problem-solving skills.

String-Specific Help

So, if you’re a band or choral director facing your first orchestra class what’s left?

Essentially, it’s an understanding of the right- and left-hand technical skills needed to perform well on a string instrument that are different. However, even with those issues, there are topics that relate universally across all areas. The following information provides a short overview of those issues, which I also address extensively in Yes, You Can! Survival Guide for Teaching Strings (Carl Fischer).

Posture and Position

First, emphasis should be placed on students playing with correct posture and instrument position. In strings, this means providing good chairs (or bass stools), ensuring that students have the appropriate size of instrument for their body size and shape, and that the appropriate chinrest and shoulder rest have been fitted to the instrument for each student. 

Tone

Problems in posture and position will dramatically affect the student’s ability to produce a characteristic tone, which is the next priority. For wind players and singers, this means appropriate breath support and control of air speed, volume, and focus. For string players, the breath correlates directly with the right hand, the bow.

In the same way, string players need to control the weight of the bow (how much pressure is applied from the bow to the string while playing), the speed of the bow (how fast the bow hair is pulled across the string), the placement of the bow (which includes which part of the bow to use and where on the string the bow is placed), and finally the angle of the bow (i.e., the bow should be perpendicular to the strings and also the bow stick should be slightly tilted towards the fingerboard). 

Rhythm and Articulation

For wind players, articulation includes tonguing and fingering issues. For string players, rhythm and articulation occur in both the right and left hands. The bow is used to control volume, tone color, length of note (e.g., staccato vs. legato), and slurring/rhythmic issues. 

For the wind player, there are times when fingers may move while notes are not specifically tongued. For the string player, there are likewise times when the notes change (by the left hand), but the bow continues moving in the same direction. These elements are part of a concept called “bowing choreography,” which is a primary focus of Sound Innovations: Creative Warm-ups, Exercises for Intonation, Rhythm, Bowing, and Creativity.

Technical Development

Like their colleagues in the wind and choral areas, successful string teachers include technical development as part of their regular rehearsal routines, whether as part of the warm-up sequence or as a specific focus for a given piece within a rehearsal. In addition to the book mentioned above, there are two more volumes for intermediate and advanced orchestras that focus even more specifically on developing tone production. These include Sound Innovations: Sound Development, Warm-up Exercises for Tone and Technique (Intermediate String Orchestra) and Sound Innovations: Sound Development, Warm-up Exercises for Tone and Technique (Advanced String Orchestra). 

These three volumes are also linked directly to SmartMusic and have additional online video demonstrations, which solves the issue for the non-string playing teacher about how to demonstrate tone production and technical elements.

Try the new SmartMusic for free!

Director Musicianship

In addition to the ability to deliver instruction effectively, a successful music educator needs to be an outstanding musician, with excellent personal musicianship skills. The best educators I know continue to work on those skills on a regular basis, and it is evident in their teaching, especially by the high standards that they set for their students and by the high levels of musicianship that they are able to elicit from their ensembles.

In my travels across the US and in several other countries, I can safely say that some of the best string ensembles that I’ve observed have been taught by wind and choral conductors who are themselves superb musicians. For these individuals, acquiring the ability to work with strings complemented what they already know about wind and choral conducting.

What about the curriculum?

For an overall look at a comprehensive string curriculum, I strongly recommend the ASTA String Curriculum: Standards, Goals, and Learning Sequences for Essential Skills and Knowledge in K–12 String Programs (published by the American String Teachers Association). This resource includes more than 200 specific lesson plans and teaching techniques for addressing fundamental playing issues at all levels. The ideas in this text are easily incorporated into an overall rehearsal plan, or can be used to develop a specific skill in conjunction with the warm-up materials listed above.

So, if you are one of those faced with teaching strings for the first time this fall, rest confident in the skills you already have as a music educator. Then use the resources above to help you as you develop the knowledge you need in the area of string teaching. These tools can be a great assist for you and your students, especially when it comes to guiding at-home practice using SmartMusic and providing sequential warm-ups and technical development during your rehearsal time.

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