1st week - Intro and allocating practice groups
2nd week - Hari Raya
3rd week
Practice was at 3 pm. lecturer described the Gu Zheng. It has strings that are coloured to indicate a certain number. Strings were made of twisted silk and had polyester wrapped around it. She gave clear instructions on how to wrap the plectra around our fingertips and how to play the strings using the plectra. She also gave us scores and instructions about how to read the scores, which does not have notation but numbers and symbols on it. They represent different things through the symbol. While she goes around to tune the Gu Zheng, we tried out the scores and played some songs. It was a good time spent on trying to play the instrument. She gave help whenever we need and teaches us along the way.
During theory class, she showed alot of interesting audio tracks and videos about traditional Chinese folk tunes. These Chinese songs were not composed by a composer eg. the Chinese opera, work songs, etc. Songs were spontaneous and were used for communication purposes, such as question and answer, call and response. The way Chinese people sing are different from the western style, where it is fueled by financial needs.
Overall I learnt alot from this lesson, but if I were to just show recordings and videos on the screen in secondary schools, the students may not be able to appreciate because they might think it is funny and try to imitate. But on the other hand, the students must be exposed to these musical scene so that it increases their musical knowledge. Probably, I might show one or two videos. But the interesting facts were about the origin and purpose of these songs that captured my attention. It was interesting.
