FUNCTIONAL HEARING

(updated January 16, 2008)

A Contextual Method for Ear Training

Arthur Gottschalk & Phillip Kloeckner
Scarecrow Press, a division of
Rowman & Littlefield, Lanham, MD




Gottschalk Bio & Resume
(pictured: a performance of Gottschalk's song cycle Beat in Munich, 1999; Gregory Wiest, tenor)

(click here for audio samples of Gottschalk's work)

For MP3 files of electroacoustic works, click:
Voices in my Head
Strictly Biological
Sometimes I Feel Like a Dog on Linoleum
Pirouette

or visit The Spectrum Press. at
http://www.spectrumpress.com

MIDI Files

Practica Musica Files

MacGamut Files

Error Detection/Score Reading Exercises

(click here for ear-training resources on the web)


Going far beyond traditional topics and approaches, FUNCTIONAL HEARING incorporates numerous unique and groundbreaking ways to train the ears of developing musicians and to encourage them to acquire a high level of skill. Principal among these features are:

An integrated approach, strongly dependent upon the perception and awareness of tendency and function, in which ear-training and sight-singing are taught within specific diatonic contexts.
Separate units devoted exclusively to teaching specific techniques for taking melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic dictation.
Pitch puzzles, pitch patterns, and error detections that help students bridge the gap between their cognitive and aural perception od intervals.
Use of familiar melodies as a means of remembering the sounds of intervals and establishing a diatonic context.
Deatiled explanations of composite rhythms: how to perceive and notate them, including the use of the least-common-multiples method.
Unique home exercises that challenge students to think about and practice the skills presented and drilled in class.
Several units devoted to hearing, analyzing, and performing sequences.
A logical and systematic approach to transposing at sight and reading standard instrumental clefs that relates these skills to each other.
Careful descriptions of assymetric meters and subdivisions.
Specialized instructions for writing, hearing, and performing canons, hockets, and catches.
An organizational plan that facilitates coordination with the general outline of most undergraduate theory courses.
Compatibility with all commonly used syllable systems.
A convenient lay-flat binding that allows the book to stay open on a music stand.
Generous amounts of blank staves bound on perforated pages for convenient use in class and homework assignments.

Recommended Software
MacGamut and Practica Musica. These are versatile and user-friendly Macintosh-compatible programs which work well with personal computers in a variety of configurations. (A Windows '95 version of Practica Musica should be available from Ars Nova by the end of 1997.) Both software companies have agreed to make available on the internet a set of supplemental materials for their programs that will make them more directly compatible with the methods of instruction encountered in Functional Hearing.

Internet

Information about Practica Musica may be obtained from Ars Nova Software at 1-800-445-4866, by fax at 206-889-8699, or from the World Wide Web at http://www.ars-nova.com. MacGamut Music Software International may be contacted by phone at 1-800-305-8731 or by fax at 614-263-9359. To ask questionsor to offer any comments about Functional Hearing, please contact the authors at gottsch@rice.edu, or contact the publisher, Scarecrow Press, Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, 4720 Boston Way, Lanham, MD 20706.