What is the Kodály Method?
Who was
Kodály?
Zoltán Kodály (1882-1967) was a Hungarian composer who was looking
to improve musical education in Hungary and travelled extensively looking at best
practise to take home with him. At the centre of his teaching is the premise
that musicians require four things: “A well-trained ear, a
well-trained mind, a well-trained heart and well-trained fingers”. However,
most teaching concentrates on the mind and fingers i.e. the technique. This is
even more true with piano as if you play a note, that is what comes out,
compared to a violin, say, where you have to be able to hear the note correctly
to play it in tune. As a result, the ‘well-trained ear’ often only happens by
accident, if at all!
What is the Kodály
approach?
Kodály methodology puts the well-trained ear at its centre. Our
voices are the first instrument we learn to use & by having a focus on
singing, any technical difficulties associated with playing an instrument are
removed. As a result, singing and active participation is the fastest way to learn
and internalise music (hear it in your head) and to develop musicianship
skills. Singing is also the proof of accurate internalisation of the rhythm and
melody. The notes we start on are So & Mi (the 5th
and 3rd notes of the scale) as these are the first we naturally
start singing (think about children saying ‘Mummy’ in a singsong voice &
this will be So, Mi!). If these are taught first and solidly, they can be used
as building blocks – hence the tutor books I use start with D & B (which
are So & Mi in the key of G). Another important concept is that Solfa (the
So, Mi and other notes that make up the scale) is relative – it gives the
distance between notes, rather than fixed, so the first note of the scale (the
Do) can be any musical note. By using solfa to teach the pitch side of musical
listening and performance skills, the Kodály approach ensures that musicians
have a natural and instinctive understanding of the notes they hear. Handsigns are used to help focus, as a
visual aid and to show relative pitch spatially. This even further reinforces the power of the solfa system in
ear training; the student associates each pitch not only with a memorable
syllable, but also with a specific hand motion made at a specific level. Thus
the hand signs complement and strengthen solfa learning.
Pulse (or the heartbeat) of a piece is taught using lots of games
and movement – this needs to be solid and ‘felt’ – this is where the Dalcroize
method (which focuses on movement) also comes into my teaching. Once this is
solid, the concept of rhythm (or the words of a song) can be introduced. Rhythm
is often a neglected area of ear training. Many students simply don’t know how
to effectively develop their rhythm skills, or how to connect them to the rest
of their music learning. The Kodály approach provides a clear systematic way to
think about and speak rhythms in music which very much complements the solfa
system for pitch, and removes much of the maths or counting of a more
traditional approach. This is called rhythmic solfa, or French rhythm names, which actually sounds
the way it is eg instead of a crotchet (a 1 beat note), we use ‘ta’. Instead of
quavers (half a beat), we use ‘titi’, and for a minim (2 beat note), we use
two-oo. This means that you can say or clap a piece using the rhythmic solfa
and it sounds right eg ta ta titi ta (try it! 🙂). It removes the need for
counting 1 2 3+ 4 as you’re playing and instead you ‘feel’ the rhythm using
rhythmic solfa – these are very simple examples, but it works for far more
complicated rhythms too & it no longer means that you need to be good at
maths to do music! (Kodály believed music was for everyone!).
One final, but very simple thing is also at the heart of Kodály - that you teach from the simple to the complex in simple, logical steps (vitally important, though also inherent in any good teaching style!). All this is why I use the Kodály approach – it is such a powerful, accessible and rounded way of teaching that I wish I’d learnt this way as a child!
