It quite does away with the 'hymn-tune' style of early
composition, which is such a trap to many amateurs.
Side by side with this work it is advisable to get the class to
extemporize chants, under the same restrictions as have been put on the
melodies, i.e. they will begin by using only tonic and dominant chords,
then adding the subdominant, and so on. The double chant will give
opportunities for more than one modulation being introduced at a time.
This work will prepare the way for figured basses, and more formal
harmony. The children will learn to avoid consecutive fifths and eighths
because they gradually notice the ugliness of them, which seems a better
plan than to learn to avoid them as a 'rule'.
There is an interesting reference to methods of teaching harmony in the
Board of Education Memorandum on Music, issued in 1914.
The writer says:
'It cannot be emphasized too strongly that the current method of
teaching harmony, whereby pupils are taught to resolve chords on paper
by eye, quite regardless of the fact that 99 per cent.
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