Resources for Teachers & Musicians:
Here you will find resources that new teachers, class musicians and those aspiring to improve their teaching and playing might find useful. Materials will be either PDFs giving explanation and ‘hints and tips’ or MP3 audio exemplars, complete sets and practice files. Files can be downloaded.
Working with a musician:
Bringing in the Music:
Use of ‘Ready and’ and 5,6,7,8 – Ian Muir (PDF) Download
Examples:
Teaching skip-change of step – Jig time (MP3)
Here are some resources for building skip-change of step with a musician. This example gives you a ‘mantra’ which builds up to the speed of the music starting. The wording of this ‘mantra’ is interchangeable with any wording you would wish to use and is presented here only as an example.
The example mantra is: “Ready and…….Hop, right, close, right, hop, left, close, left, hop, right, close, right and on your toes. Hop, step, close, step, hop, step, close, step with the music ready and”
Exemplar material for teaching strathspey setting step bringing in the music slowly. (MP3)
The example mantra is: “Ready and…….Right, close, right, behind, left, close, left, behind, right, close, right and on your toes and, reach, close, step, hop, reach, close, step.hop. With the music ready and”
Exemplar material for teaching strathspey travelling step bringing in the music slowly. (MP3)
The example mantra is: “Ready and…….Right, close, right, and, left, close, left, and, right, close, right and on your toes and, reach, close, reach, and, reach, close, reach. With the music ready and”
Exemplar material for teaching Pas de Basque bringing in the music slowly (MP3)
The example mantra is: “Ready and…….Step, beat, beat, and, step, beat, beat, and step, beat, and on your toes. Spring, beat, beat, spring, beat, beat. With the music ready and”
Practice MP3 for Pas de basque for musicians – mantra and click track (MP3)
Teaching Skip-Change of Step: Reel/jig example, Jig/Reel example
When teaching skip-change of step it is usual to use 6/8 rhythm for this purpose. However, this is not the only tempo in which dancers will come across this step and it is often helpful to make dancers aware of the differences between 6/8/and 2/4/ or 4/4 rhythm. Not everyone finds the differences between the two rhythms easy to spot and it is therefore useful to be able to demonstrate and ‘feel’ the difference by having a musical sequence that links the two. Hopefully the following resources will help fill this gap. Each example has a ‘Ready And’ in strict tempo to bring the dancers in.
Warm-ups/Cool-downs:
Here are some sequences of tunes that you may find useful for use as warm-ups/cool-downs. These might be useful in the fact they use unusual time signatures.
Class Dynamics:
- A musicians expectation of the Teacher (Judith Muir) (PDF) Download
Links to other Teaching Resources:
RSCDS Unit 2 Syllabus, Videos, and tracks (2×32)
RSCDS Unit 3 Teaching Resources . Suggested Tunes for Step practice etc. with reasons for the particular choice of tune.
Teaching Tracks for RSCDS Books 49, 50, 51 & 52. These are a set of prepared tracks with either an introduction or ‘Ready And’ which breaks down the dances into their probable teaching sequence together with a once through of the dance. Recorded by Ian & Judith Muir. These are free resources and downloadable
RSCDS Web Site Tune Types