Weekly Inspiration: Dorian Jam

Some of the best teaching moments in my classroom happen spontaneously, without prior planning or expectations. My favorite musical moment of this week was improvising with my choir the last two minutes of rehearsal. As buses were lining up outside the music room windows, my fourth graders and I were interacting in Dorian tonality. I started by improvising a simple repetitive chord root melody, and invited the altos to join in. As they got comfortable with it, I demonstrated a slightly different part for the sopranos, using the fifth of the tonic chord. 

Finally, I added an improvised melody over the two-part harmony. There was a magical feeling in the air: we were making music together, spontaneously, without any preparation or memorization. The music brought us to a logical conclusion as we organically slowed down and struck the last chord. I am inspired to continue exploring this musical journey with my students next week. Perhaps we can try a different chord progression in Dorian, or explore Mixolydian. But I must remember to plan less, and musik more!