Vision & Values

The vision of our studio is to enrich and equip students
​for a lifelong journey of music
​through a caring, creative community.

The studio is not made up of one individual to make everything work. All of us make the studio what it is.
​Our three core values are:

Caring

• environment of care & respect
• supportive, non-competitive 
• mutual commitment to teach & learn 
• grace-filled & truthful communication 

Creative

• your unique qualities valued
• inspiring & innovative programs
• ​creativity encouraged and ingrained in all of studio life
• challenges become opportunities for growth

Community

• ​everyone's active involvement
• teacher/student mentoring, student leadership opportunities 
• music & event collaboration
• serving the local community with our music

Let's live as a caring and creative community so our learning can thrive while we have fun!
Are you ready to be a part of this?

​Everyone is born with the potential to learn music
and my role is to guide you to discover and make music meaningfully.
​
In our studio, students are immersed in a rich musical environment from the start
by developing their musical skills on two instruments, the person followed by the piano.
This is based on the Music Learning Theory of how we learn music when we learn.

Learning Approach

To enrich and equip you for lifelong music-making beyond the walls of this studio
WHO, WHAT, WHEN & HOW

WHAT
What is Music Learning Theory?

HOW
How do I develop audiation skills?

WHO
Who will teach me?

Music Learning Theory is based on the extensive research and practical field testing of Edwin E. Gordon and others. It explains how we learn music like how we learn a language. When we learn a language, we go through a sequential process of listening, thinking and speaking while acquiring a large vocabulary before we learn reading and writing. The same occurs in the process of learning music. The music learning process is through listening first, then audiating, then improvising/performing before we come to reading and writing. Notation given too early before audiation often makes students rely on the music and stifles audiation.

At the heart of Music Learning Theory is what Gordon calls Audiation, hearing and understanding music meaningfully. It is the equivalent to thinking in language. Audiation is the foundation of musicianship and we develop this through a sequential learning process of listening, singing, rhythm chanting, movement and tonal and rhythm development, improvisation, then applying it to reading and writing music. 

Everyone begins with lots of listening and acculturation in a rich music environment of:

• Song in different tonalities (beyond major & minor)
• Chants in different meters (duple, tripe, mixed)
• Movement 

The goal of instruction in instrumental music is to learn to play an instrument

as an extension of the inner audiation instrument.

When students are able to "sing" through their instrument,

they play with better intonation, phrasing, expression, and rhythmic "flow".
​
- the Gordon Institute of Music Learning

In this video, hear Heather Nelson Shouldice,
a faculty member for the Gordon Institute of Learning, explain audiation and the sequential learning process. (source used with permission)

I will teach and guide you as you begin this journey. But having skills in audiation will help you learn how to learn and teach yourself. Think of it as taking a cooking class. There are classes that teach you how to cook certain dishes and there are ones that teach you how to cook to understand cooking so you can cook many dishes now and in the future. 

WHEN
When will I learn the piano?

~

Beginners of any age will require more time in preparatory audiation or audiation activities. Time at the piano may increase with age or experience. You may also wonder why we are not always sitting at the piano. Please read on...

Cooking up Music!
Don't measure your learning by the time you have at the piano. Equal amount of time may be spent on audiation activities as well as keyboard activities and sometimes one may require more time. Both are necessary. We must learn to let go of the assumption that learning to play the piano requires you to only be at the piano, just as how cooking can't all be spent cooking the actual food without any planning or food prep. For dinner tonight, if you throw a whole raw onion into the pan without thinking or planning your dish out, will it be ready to eat? Yes but it might take awhile. But if you know that you want to cook a certain dish, the onions need to be sautéed so they need to be chopped into small pieces, your onion will turn out well and ready for your dish. Similarly, there are some preparation we can do tonally, rhythmically or even harmonically before we sit down to look at a piece of music. 

Be patient with yourself or your child. Audiation is an inner skill so you may not be able to see it right away or concretely but you will start to notice it in the way you/your child learns music. Like language, you will eventually have conversations, write or read naturally and with less effort.  

FORMAT
Individual and Group Learning

~

Students will be in a combination of individual and group classes in the studio. 

​Students will work on their own skills and repertoire in a one-on-one setting with the instructor in weekly individual classes. Preschool students will begin with a 15-minute individual class. Kindergarten students and other young school-age beginners will begin with a 30-minute individual class. With teens and adults, 45 to 60-minute classes are recommended. ​Individual lesson times will increase as students gain more experience in music/piano or as younger students age. ​

~

Students are all in a group format in one form or another. We usually have main group activities focusing on tonal and rhythm development through singing, rhythm chanting and movement in our classes to develop audiation in all ages and levels. 

Group experience is a unique and core aspect of our programs at DMS. Students:

• find joy in making music with others
• are motivated to learn and practice 
• enjoy being in a group learning environment
• benefit from questions asked or insights shared by other students
• participates in regular duet or ensemble experience even as beginners
• gain independence in learning from peer interactions and observations
• deepen in their knowledge and skills when helping/teaching other students
• build confidence by playing for others in class and not only during public performance opportunities

There is one group class every afternoon from Monday to Thursday. Students usually attend this mixed-age group class on the day of their individual class and it could be either right before or after their individual class, or with a break in between their group and individual.  Adult group classes are in the mornings. On the first Saturday of every month, students will also attend Club Music, a group class with peers in their age group. During Club Music weeks, there is no week day group class.