Sources of Material and Training

RECOMMENDED SOURCES OF MATERIAL
(highly recommended ones marked with a *) 

Colourstrings books & CDs
(Very fine, Kodály-based material; the CDs feature fine, well-tuned singing, with solfa versions & marvellous orchestral arrangements.) 

Singing Rascals songbooks & CDs:
            *Pentatonic
            *La
            *Do 

All the above are obtainable from Colourstrings International:
                www.colourstringsbooks.com 

Kodály songbooks
(Very carefully chosen songs, excellent for finely-wrought vocal musicianship training.)

*Michael Stocks & Andrew Maddocks: Growing With Music (KS1)
*Michael Stocks & Andrew Maddocks: Growing With Music (KS2 book A) 

obtainable from the Voices Foundation:
    www.voices.org.uk

*Helga Dietrich: Children’s Songs
*Helga Dietrich: Rhymes, Mother Goose
*Helga Dietrich: Fishy, Fishy in the Brook
*Lucinda Geoghegan: Singing Games and Rhymes for Tiny Tots
*Lucinda Geoghegan: Singing Games and Rhymes for Early Years
Zoltan Kodály: Fifty Nursery Songs
*David & Yuko Vinden: Songs for Singing & Musicianship Training 

plus many others: see their websites for suggestions 

            All the above, and much more, are obtainable from the British Kodály Academy:
                    www.britishkodalyacademy.org 

Steve Grocott CDs
(Fun songs, excellent material for rhythmic, movement & instrumental work, accompanied with great style and finesse.)

*Bright Sparks
Tiny Sparks
More Sparks
Hit the Right Note
Deep in the Deep 

All the above are obtainable from Steve Grocott:
                    www.dronesmusic.net

Some rhyme/songbooks worth dipping into 

Lois Birkenshaw: Music for Fun, Music for Learning
*Sandra Boynton: The Going to Bed Book
*Margaret Wise Brown & Clement Hurd: Goodnight Moon
Barbara Cass-Beggs: Your Baby Needs Music
Eleanor Gamper: Music with Mr Plinkerton
Jean Gilbert: Musical starting points with young children
Raffi: The Raffi Singable Songbook
Ana Sanderson: Banana Splits
Mary York: Gently into Music 

        … and many others besides… 

Raffi CDs & books
(Excellent fun songs, though atrociously sung on the CDs…)

Singable Songs for the Very Young
Rise and Shine
One Light, One Sun

           and several others… 

Some CDs worth dipping into 

Children’s Favourite Songs vols. 1-4 (Larry Groce et al)

*Songs from my Childhood vols. 1&2 (Lynn Stanford) [arranged beautifully and played exquisitely on the piano; get them from www.danceclassmusic.com]

Spud and Yam [available from Steve Grocott, see above] 

            … and a few others…

RECOMMENDED SOURCES OF FURTHER TRAINING 

*Stepping Notes Music School (Nikhil Dally)

            www.steppingnotes.com 

*Jimmy Rotheram: this man is brilliant. He gets singing and movement and playfulness, and does them all together.

            x.com/MusicEdu4all 

*Colourstrings (especially their “music kindergarten” courses)

www.colourstrings.co.uk 

*Dalcroze: teaching music through body movement

www.dalcroze.org.uk 

                        especially any courses run by *Karin Greenhead 

*British Kodály Academy      

            www.kodaly.org.uk 

especially any courses run by *Len Tyler

                        or *Judith Brindle                             

                        or *Lucinda Geoghegan

                                    (see also National Youth Choirs of Scotland: www.nycos.co.uk) 

Steve Grocott: very creative, lots of fun, and a fine musician, interested in instrumental improvisation

 www.dronesmusic.net 

Tonalis: Michael Deason-Barrow, a Steiner-influenced music teacher, based in the West Country; offers a multitude of varied courses.

  www.tonalismusic.co.uk 

Alexander Technique: not just posture, but a wonderful method of deep-level body awareness

            www.stat.org.uk                       

Margaret Morris Movement: a good source of therapeutic movement training for the non-dance-specialist.

www.margaretmorrismovement.com 

plus many of the teachers who train for the organisations listed above

INTERESTING BOOKS 

specifically on music education

Gilles Comeau: Comparing Dalcroze, Orff and Kodály
Nikhil Dally: Kodály, Kinaesthetics and Karawitan, esp. pp. 22-26
*Katalin Forrai: Music in Preschool
Jane Frazee: Discovering Orff
Lucy Green: Music, Informal Learning and the School
Virginia Hoge Mead: Dalcroze Eurhythmics in Today’s Music Classroom
*Emile Jaques-Dalcroze: Rhythm Music & Education
*The Selected Writings of Zoltán Kodály
*Christopher Small: Music, Society, Education
Cecilia Vajda: The Kodály Way to Music 

on other educational issues relevant to the music teacher

F. M. Alexander: The Use of the Self
Kim Brooking-Payne: Games Children Play
*Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi: Flow
Peter Dixon: The Silver Toilet Roll
*Michael Ende: Momo
*John Taylor Gatto: Dumbing Us Down
Michael Gelb: An Introduction to the Alexander Technique
Carla Hannaford: Smart Moves
*Eugen Herrigel: Zen in the Art of Archery
*John Holt: How Children Fail
Alan Thomas & Harriet Pattison: How Children Learn at Home

AND A WONDERFUL  MOVIE 

*Three Idiots (starring Aamir Khan, dir. V. Chopra) [Don’t be put off by the fact that it is a Bollywood comedy; it is a wonderfully profound exploration of education, vocation and self-realisation.]