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Teaching

In this section, I'm uploading a collection of documents that give a snapshot of my approach to teaching bassoon.  Ultimately, I believe the lesson teacher has three primary roles: teaching students the fundamentals of their instrument so that they can harness its expressive potential without technical hindrances, synthesizing what the student learns in music history and theory courses in order to create well-informed musical interpretations, and most importantly, inspiring the student to achieve ever increasing levels of artistic performance and satisfaction.  The documents here offer a few examples of how I approach these three roles in lessons.  While many of these documents are aimed at college level bassoonists, I enjoy teaching all ages and use forms of these concepts with all of my students. 

The first category is my approach to the daily routine, a group of fundamental exercises to be performed in a key of the day.  Rather than just a sheet of drills, this document has a lot of text explaining the motivations and goals for each exercise, as well as how to apply what it teaches to other music.

Daily Routine

The Four Fundamentals

Harmonic Progression

Audition Preparation

I'm also including a set of performer's guides to several of the bassoon's best known solo pieces.  These guides are designed to walk someone through my approach to forming an interpretation of a piece, an interpretation that is rooted in analysis of the entire score and placed in a historical context.  Each also includes some biographical information about the composer and some ideas for other resources for further study.  Rather than trying to force my own interpretation on students, my goal is to teach thought processes that equips students to think critically and perform faithfully to the composer's intent.  

Mozart Concerto in B-flat major Performer's Guide

Weber Concerto in F major Performer's Guide

Saint-Saens Sonata Performer's Guide

Telemann Sonata in F minor Performer's Guide

Bassett Metamorphoses Performer's Guide

 

 

Reed-making Resources:

Fine-Tuning Your Bassoon Reed

Creating a Blank

Conor bell teaches a reed making class to a group of students

Photo by Jennifer Grubbs

2022 Tennessee Mid-State Videos

9-10 Lyrical

11-12 Lyrical

9-10 Technical

11-12 Technical

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