Developing Audiation

Audiation or “inner hearing” is critical to the development of total musicianship.  Audiation occurs when children are exposed to musical patterns, rhythms, and harmonies that they can store in their musical mind.  Because children are so conscious of sounds in early childhood – a wide range of key centers, meters, and harmonic content should be provided for them to experience through movement, singing, chanting, and the use of manipulatives.  Remember – the voice is the most natural musical instrument and processing patterns through the voice helps the child store the patterning in the ear.

How old should a child be to begin music lessons?
The peak age for the development of the brain is around three years. Our Kindermusik program is for infants as young as four-weeks. Our Harmony Road piano-based programs begin at 18-months -- but students can begin at any age. Our graduated, age-specific programs allow each child to move at his or her own pace while being supported by parents and the group itself.

Aren't private lessons better than group lessons?
We have found through our years of experience in teaching piano, that private lessons are not necessarily appropriate for young children at an elementary level of piano playing. Typically, private lessons for beginners concentrate on working through the primers and learning to read notation. Technique and repertoire are the main ingredients. (Gibb, 1993)

Although the emphasis on technical work and notation during instrumental lessons is necessary for intermediate to advanced piano students, if too much of it is introduced to a beginning, young piano student, it can stifle his/her creativity and musicianship. In terms of brain usage, technical skills and note reading are based largely in the left hemisphere. Students who are taught this way from an early age never learn to listen properly to themselves and are unable to play with feeling. Once these students learn to rely on notation for their music, it becomes increasingly difficult to explore musical avenues that do not have a notational basis. (Evans, 1985, Priest, 1989.) Most teachers surveyed rated the following components as low priority: only 63% covered playing-by-ear; only 54% included improvisation; only 49% taught composition. (Odam, 1195, Gibbs, 1993, Thompson, 1984 and Jorgenson, 1986)

Before 1850 pianists routinely learned not only to interpret but also to improvise and compose on the piano. After this date, piano performance was gradually transformed into a reproductive art. The accomplishments of all-round musicians were lost as interpretation and technical prowess took priority. (Gellrich and Parncutt,1998)

The dominance of notation in verbally-oriented and teacher-led lessons leads to hours of practicing where the body is fully occupied but the brain is not engaged at all. Traditional method books encourage students to listen "a note at a time"; their physical movements and coordination are shaped for life by that kind of listening. Most traditional instrument lessons are teacher-centered rather than student-centered. Telling children to do their best to please their teacher causes nervousness and anxiety which leads to muscular and emotional tension. The focus on technique has also been shown to be responsible for unnecessary physical tension leading to injuries. Tension also results when children have no clear mental perception of the music in and of itself. (Chappell, 2001)

What is the Harmony Road Music Course?
Harmony Road founder and composer Jan Keyser developed the first course in 1981. Over the last twenty five plus years, the curriculum has grown and been continually refined to ensure student success. With entry points for beginners ages 18 months to adult, Harmony Road classes provide ideal groundwork for more advanced musical training as well as a lifetime of music enjoyment.

• Pre-school music play programs do not teach your child to play a musical instrument.
• They do not include parents as key teaching resources after the age of three or four.
• They do not continue beyond the ages of six or seven.
• They do not focus on teaching solfege singing (naming notes using do-re-mi) as the musical foundation for developing inner hearing, listening, feeling and music reading.
• Some of them are activities to pass time, and not investments in the child's academic or musical future.

Harmony Road students learn to play piano, compose and improvise. They have their own books and CD's to reinforce their studies at home each week. In Harmony Road classes, parents participate fully in each lesson and coach their children at home throughout the week. Harmony Road incorporates the rhythm and movement of Orff and Dalcroze, the solfege singing of Kodaly and the child centered learning approach of Montessori. Its founder, Jan Keyser, has taken a layered, age-specific approach to programming developed over many years with Yamaha as a teaching specialist. In 1981 she created and began teaching the Harmony Road program in Portland, Oregon, where 600 students enjoy her musical guidance today. Lessons are based on the time tested Harmony Road triangle—parent/caregiver, child and trained Harmony Road teacher.

The incredible musicianship and technical skill that results from this combination results in young musicians who are truly gifted repertory performers and creative composers. Harmony Road is rooted in the old European teaching model of comprehensive musicianship, which produced Mozart, Beethoven and Bach. Remember the great composers did not only play the classics, they wrote them!

Do I need to buy a piano to start Harmony Road Music Program?
Although digital or acoustic piano with weighted keys is our first choice, an electronic keyboard can be purchased for teaching the very young and fortunately can be purchased quite affordably ($100-$200). As the child learns to understand the geography of the keyboard and develops a sense of musicianship and timing (in the second year normally), we recommend that you purchase a digital piano with hammer action or an acoustic piano.

When are tuition and materials fees due?
Tuition is paid by the semester which is generally 16 to 18 weeks long. An installment payment plan is available. See the enrollment form for complete details.

Who teaches the classes?

Teacher Kitty Rea graduated magna cum laude from San Francisco State with a BA in Music and a minor in Broadcasting. The day of her last college final she was cast in the original San Francisco company of "Godspell." As an actor/singer/dancer she traveled the U.S. landing in New York City where she performed Off, Off-Off, and On Broadway as well as in caberets and national commercials. Kitty also shared the San Francisco stage with the late John Raitt, Bonnie's dad.

Back in the Bay Area Kitty became one of the first women engineers at KCBS radio and worked on the technical side of TV for KGO, KCSM and KDTV and as a news editor at KPIX-TV. After many years freelance editing award-winning videos and and writing scripts, Kitty moved into the corporate world where she worked in employee communications as a senior manager, writer, and executive producer for videos and one of the first corporate intranets.

The start-up world called and she had a fabulous time there in customer communications, public relations, marketing, content creation and web production. In between working in the "real world" Kitty found time to perform in San Francisco in a critically acclaimed Irving Berlin revue and with Broadway by the Bay as Maria in "Sound of Music," Diana in "A Chorus Line" and Peter in "Peter Pan." Ultimately, the wonderful world of music and working with children brought her to her senses and Kitty found her true calling: teaching.

Harmony Road creator and founder Jan Keyser trained and certified Kitty as a Harmony Road instructor. She's also a Certified Kindermusik Instructor and recently began Orff training. Kitty has studied with well-known Orff educator Doug Goodkin and is incorporating his methods of teaching jazz to all ages at Harmony Road. Her teaching credits include kindergarten through 3rd grade music at Alvin S. Hatch Elementary School in Half Moon Bay, piano at Lisa Specter's Music School, Kindermusik at the Half Moon Bay Parks and Rec Department, private piano at her home studio, and Young Performer's International rock, world music and jazz camps in San Francisco and Marin.

A longtime Coastside resident, Kitty sings with a mostly a cappella jazz quintet called the San Andreas Singers, developed the popular Creative Connections Summer Camps which combine music, math and science, and lives with her daughter and lots of dogs, cats and birds.