Taking the Orff Approach to Heart

Taking the Orff Approach to Heart, this compendium by North American Orff educator Isabel McNeill Carley, contains 29 original essays and articles. It is a companion book to Making It Up As You Go, Brasstown Press 2011, which presented additional essays and articles. Carley writes with skill and humor on topics from theory to practice, integrating music, speech, movement, and improvisation. Also included are a Foreword by Karen Stafford; an Editor's Introduction by Anne M Carley; a Biographical Note about the author; informative essays on Carl Orff and the Orff Schulwerk, developed by Orff and his colleague Gunild Keetman; a short essay about the significance of the pentatonic scale in Orff education; diagrams of the pentatonic scales and modes in C, F, and G; a glossary; biographical notes on names cited; published resources and references; a selected bibliography of works by the author, and information on her other recent publications. Introductory headnotes for each article.Some materials have never before been published; others are repurposed with permission.Dip into this book for inspiration, or read it cover to cover to immerse in the world of elemental music education for all ages.

Taking the Orff Approach to Heart, this compendium by North American Orff educator Isabel McNeill Carley, contains 29 original essays and articles. It is a companion book to Making It Up As You Go, Brasstown Press 2011, which presented additional essays and articles. Carley writes with skill and humor on topics from theory to practice, integrating music, speech, movement, and improvisation. Also included are a Foreword by Karen Stafford; an Editor's Introduction by Anne M Carley; a Biographical Note about the author; informative essays on Carl Orff and the Orff Schulwerk, developed by Orff and his colleague Gunild Keetman; a short essay about the significance of the pentatonic scale in Orff education; diagrams of the pentatonic scales and modes in C, F, and G; a glossary; biographical notes on names cited; published resources and references; a selected bibliography of works by the author, and information on her other recent publications. Introductory headnotes for each article.Some materials have never before been published; others are repurposed with permission.Dip into this book for inspiration, or read it cover to cover to immerse in the world of elemental music education for all ages. Contents:• 1. The Case for Creativity• 2. That Lovely Two-Headed Betsy Higginbottam• 3. Create or Perform• 4. Music Plus: Five- and Six-Year-Olds in the Classroom• 5. Playing With Our Materials: Speech Play• 6. Speech Play Resources• 7. At the Foot of the Mountains, Or How Mrs. Dow Made a Song • 8. Introducing Ostinati with Murray Volume I• 9. Tips for Teachers of the Recorder• 10. How to Introduce the Orff Ensemble• 11. Practicing Some Neglected Ensemble Techniques• 12. Master Class: Composing and Arranging for the Orff Classroom • 13. Teaching Music to Preschoolers• 14. Concerning Rabbits• 15. The Next Ten Years: A View from the Early Days• 16. On Patterns In A Music Gestalt• 17. First Encountering Gunild Keetman• 18. Improvisation Makes It Happen• 19. The Inclusive Art of Music• 20. The Essential Role of the Recorder• 21. Using the Recorder• 22. On Setting a Program's Goals• 23. The Schulwerk's Origins and Early Music• 24. The Orff Approach in Church• 25. On Being Simple-Minded• 26. My Theory of Education• 27. Educating All of the Human Mind• 28. Little Is Possible Without Healthy Roots• 29. Imparted Grace: The Central Role of Music in Education

Isabel McNeill Carley was one of the co-founders of today’s American Orff-Schulwerk Association (AOSA). She served on the AOSA Board, edited The Orff Echo magazine for its first fifteen years (1968 -1983), and contributed to the AOSA Recorder and Curriculum Task Forces in the 1990s. In recognition, AOSA established the Isabel McNeill Carley Library and honored her with the AOSA Distinguished Service Award.For sixty years, she devoted herself to her work as a music educator and composer. A leader of Orff certification courses in the United States, she taught workshops for AOSA chapters and Title III programs, participated in national and state-level Music Educators National Conference (MENC, now NAfME) events, led trainings in Europe and Asia, and presented sessions at national and regional AOSA conferences. Throughout her long working life, she taught music privately and in school settings, both to children and adults.As a performing musician, IMC sang alto, and played recorders, keyboards, and percussion. She also wrote arrangements of works from the Medieval and Renaissance instrumental repertoire. Her numerous published works include compositions for recorders, Orff ensemble, piano, voice, and percussion. (See the selected bibliography in the book.)Born in 1918, she grew up in Toronto and Chicago, returned to Chicago for graduate school, and married James Carley there in 1943. After ten years in the Western US, and now the parents of three, they moved to Indianapolis, Indiana. He was a professor of sacred music at Christian Theological Seminary and she built her music teaching, performing, and composing career. Twenty years later, they moved to the mountains of Western North Carolina where they spent another thirty years together. Isabel retired from active teaching in 2004, and the couple made a final move to Maryland, where James died in 2006 and she in 2011.