Scotia Suzuki School of Music

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org Read the Blog HERE and get your FREE Valentine's Day practicing activity. You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE I called my daughter yesterday. It was her moving day and she and her husband had rented a van and were moving by themselves. Now you need to know that my daughter is pregnant with her second child, due in just over a month. She works as a middle school science teacher and she has another few weeks before

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org Read the Blog HERE and get your FREE first African Safari Practicing (1 of 6) Adventures. You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE where I share HOW I happened to find myself teaching music in a remote Kipsigis village quite suddenly one day 6 years ago! Link to join the email list so that you don't miss any of the 6 adventures. Did you know that I have traveled to Africa twice to teach music in a little school in N

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org This blog is part 3 of the memory series. To read parts 1 and 2, see blogs #54 and #58. You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE Do you want to memorize easier with a review program? Are you feeling overwhelmed by a HUGE piece of music that you need to learn and memorize by a deadline? Today we are talking about making memorizing advanced repertoire easier, and I mean WAY easier, by using a review system that works. H

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE Everyone is feeling tired and ready for a break this time of year. Are you wanting to slow down and spend time with family for the holidays? Me too! You have worked so hard establishing a daily routine to include practicing this year. The holidays don’t just sabotage our diets, they can also affect our daily routines and daily practice is often missed. What to do? Everyone is di

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE Cultural appreciation is when someone seeks to understand and learn about another culture because they want to broaden their perspective and connect with others cross-culturally. Cultural appropriation , on the other hand, is simply taking one aspect of a culture that is not your own and that you do not understand and using it for your own personal interest or entertainmen

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org This blog is part 2 of the memory series. To read part 1, see blog #54. You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE You have a new piece to play. You can play it through with the music no problem BUT without your music, you are completely lost by the second line. It’s so frustrating and the thought of performing in a concert down the road by memory nearly gives you an ulcer from the stress! What to do? Well, first let’

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE Each year, I always find it so surprising the first time I have to use the word “December”. What? Is it nearing Christmas already? It can’t be possible. The holiday season sneaks up on me every year and is closer than I think. Are you like this too? There are so many fun festive events happening over the next weeks in preparation for Christmas day. Those eager to spread ch

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE Gratitude is being appreciative of the big and small things in your life. People that are appreciative also are humble, and when you are humble, you are also “teachable”. This is what we want right? You need to be “teachable” to be a good student, right?! Being appreciative makes you more humble because you recognize other people’s kind acts, something that was kind that some

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org This blog is part 1 of the memory series. To learn more, see blogs #58 and #61. You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE Learning to play music by ear, remembering songs without any sheet music and being able to harmonize on demand- these are skills that many adults who start music later in life spend years mastering. Yes! Me included! I recently started singing lessons again since my university days when I dabbled in

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org Read the Blog HERE and get your FREE pumpkin percussion activity download You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE Who doesn’t love pumpkins and what is more fun than a cool rhythm? When my children were younger we attended a few African dance and drum workshops. At one of these workshops, we all learned a beat on the djembe. It was so fun and catchy! We enjoyed it so much that we still frequently use it at our school

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org Read the Blog HERE and get your FREE download about hoop dancing You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE September 30th marked a new Canadian national holiday in 2022 - National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. Please take a short moment and listen to the message about this important holiday from Sasha, a member of the Nova Scotia Youth Ambassadors. (Sept 2022) .- CLICK HERE See Blog #50 for 10 ways to teach yo

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org Read the Blog HERE and get your FREE download about Hoopdancing You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE This week marks the first of a new Canadian national holiday - National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. Both the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation and Orange Shirt Day take place on September 30th. Orange Shirt Day is an Indigenous-led grassroots commemorative day to recognize and raise awareness surrou

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org Read the Blog HERE and get your FREE download activity for teens. You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE Starting a second child in music lessons in the same instrument with the same teacher? When you have a second child: Remember your first baby - recording by photo and video every cough, every step and cheering on every “first time” doing anything. Second child? It’s so easy for them to learn from the first siblin

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org Read the Blog HERE and get your FREE download activity for teens. You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE This summer, I went on an adventure to an incredible place in Nova Scotia called Cape D’Or. WOW - it was amazing! A friend of mine was moving to a tiny community in Nova Scotia about 3 ½ hours away from me. I wanted to see them and bring them a housewarming meal. I just so happened to have a few days that I coul

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org Read the Blog HERE and get your FREE download activity for teens. You can also Watch / Listen to the Live HERE Last week we talked about teens and the two things that THEY would like to change about music practice, as well as nine ways to help teens have successful practicing this coming year. If you missed it, it's #46 Success with teeneir Music Practice - you can read the Blog or watch /listen to this episode from th

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org Read the Blog HERE Watch / Listen to the Live HERE Let's talk about teenagers and how to help them start the year off with their best foot forward in their music studies - whether they're at the beginner, intermediate, or advanced level. Last year I interviewed a lot of teens about practicing. I asked them the simple question - If they could change anything about practicing, what would it be? Can you guess what they sai

By Christy | the Practicing Pro w ww.ScotiaSuzuki.org Make an easy BOX KITE - to celebrate summer music practicing The end of summer is coming and the frequency of music practicing is DOWN. When you know that listening and reviewing is SO IMPORTANT, this can definitely be frustrating. You want to return to lessons excited and feeling ready to "learn" instead of "ready to get the rusties out", right??!! Let me help make it much easier for your practicing child or for all of yo

By Christy | the Practicing Pro w ww.ScotiaSuzuki.org I’ve seen it so many times before: summer is almost over and despite your best efforts, that summer music practice goal just didn’t get met. The beach was calling, and so was summer camp and that bbq you got invited to. The camping gear was packed up and the piano keys got dusty. Life seems to speed up when it’s nice out. Many student musicians are on “vacation” from their regular weekly lessons until they head back to the

By Christy | the Practicing Pro w ww.ScotiaSuzuki.org Is my child too stressed? How can I tell? Stress is an important part of life - all children are stressed from time to time but how much is too much? What should you look for and what do you do when you see signs of stress in your child? Having conversations about stress with our students and our children can be a tricky and sensitive task when it’s constant and related to doing too many activities. Having a busy schedule

By Christy | The Practicing Pro www.ScotiaSuzuki.org I have a teenage student, Amy, who never misses her daily practice. She used to really struggle! What is her secret? She bundled her practicing with something she finds easy and never misses! How did she do that? Amy discovered that She didn’t feel motivated enough to do her practicing until the day or two before her next lesson. She wanted to be prepared for her lesson and knew that if she didn’t learn the main things fro