Teaching Uneven Meters – Guest Post by Dan Chandler
It is a great pleasure to feature a guest post by Dan Chandler, a research sociologist who also teaches Suzuki violin at the Humboldt Music Academy in Arcata, CA. Dan plays violin and bagpipe with the Balkan band Musaic. He is host of a radio program of ethnic music called In the Tradition, which can be streamed live from KHSU.org at 9pm Pacific Time or heard on the KHSU.org archive.
Musaic on the Steps (Dan Chandler is at the top)
There are now many resources that allow Suzuki teachers to incorporate fiddle tunes into their Suzuki curriculum. A good example is Lisa Deakins’ Fiddlin’ Favorites graded tunes with technical skills keyed to specific pieces in Suzuki Book I and Book II.
Less common is the introduction of music from other traditions, but my experience is that these tunes also are of great interest to students. I have used Violin Globetrotters by Ros Stephen, which has pieces based on folk music from Greece, Ireland, Argentina, Egypt, Bulgaria and other cultures written with a violin lead and a second violin part and piano part. Since I am in a band that primarily plays Balkan music, I also sometimes introduce students to supplementary pieces from the Balkans which feature uneven meters.
It is the uneven meters which I want to discuss in this post. I hope to show you why learning them early will be of benefit to Suzuki students, and remind you why Suzuki students have an advantage in learning them. I also will share some resources that I hope you—whether teacher, student, or parent—will find useful.
Why Study Uneven Meters?
First, why should students studying classical music and in particular those using the Suzuki approach be interested in uneven meters? One answer is that if our students go on to play classical music professionally, they will encounter uneven rhythms in much music of the 20th and 21st centuries. Composers like Bartok, Messien, Philip Glass, Steve Reich, and Stravinsky are among those who use uneven meters.
But there is also a great synthesis happening among contemporary musicians. In the US, most younger fiddle champions have been Suzuki students, and many of these have gone on to play jazz, bluegrass or other “alternative” musics professionally—with or without parallel classical careers. Yo Yo Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble and the Brooklyn Rider string quartet embody this synthesis as it reaches out to incorporate music from other cultures. The focus in school music programs on alternative styles is part of this overall movement that is making music more interesting for many students and challenging teachers to learn about improvisation and other skills—like playing uneven meters—that will allow our students access to this new world.
