Dannhauser's three books of Solfége des Solféges

[BestStudentViolins.com]

Is anyone familiar with Dannhauser's three books of Solfége des
Solféges ? I read somewhere that these were good for aspiring
conductors to study, but the books look like vocal works. TIA

[Roland Hutchinson]

BestStudentViolins.com wrote:

They are not intended just for conductors, but for all musicians.

They are old, standard textbooks for teaching fixed-do solfege.
The other, equally ancient, series used for that, with many more volumes, is
by Lavignac.

The reason that they look like vocal works is that most of the exercises are
excerpts from amazingly obscure 19th-century French operas.

The reason they are recommended particularly for conductors is that they
drill you to death on instantly naming the lines and spaces in all the
clefs (while singing along). This is not only useful for reading the clefs
as such, but also applicable to reading the parts of transposing
instruments in which orchestral scores abound.

A more concise and specifically focused course in solfège for clef-reading
for score-reading purposes is the one-volume _Manuel pratique pour l'étude
des clefs_ by Dandelot, which can be had both in its original version and
in a newer revised edition. This one is strictly for learning clefs -- it
does not attempt to teach you basic sightsinging skills, which you are
supposed to have acquired elsewhere.

--
Roland Hutchinson Will play viola da gamba for food.

NB mail to my.spamtrap [at] verizon.net is heavily filtered to
remove spam. If your message looks like spam I may not see it.

[BestStudentViolins.com]

Yes, thank you Roland. That is interesting. I was able to find 25 of
what are apparently 40 of the Lavignac:

http://beststudentviolins.com/sheetmusic.html

What I could find was the whole first name of the composer Dannhauser.

I am not familiar with this material, so I am looking forward to
working with it.

Thanks~

[BestStudentViolins.com]

On Jan 25, 9:19 am, "BestStudentViolins.com"

If you look at that same link, there's also a new ed. of the Georges
Dandelot

[BestStudentViolins.com]

Roland, I quoted you here on Maestronet:

http://www.maestronet.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=319289

I hope you don't mind.

I wonder if the reason 25 of the Lavignac are available, and not 40
volumes, is an issue of a different publisher?

[cste...@sympatico.ca]

On 24 jan, 18:47, "BestStudentViolins.com" <SunMusicStri...@gmail.com>
wrote:

> Is anyone familiar with Dannhauser's three books of Solfége des
> Solféges ?  I read somewhere that these were good for aspiring
> conductors to study, but the books look like vocal works.   TIA

I have the book Théorie de la musique by Dannhauser. It is the revised
and augmented edition (ca. 1979). It is the REFERENCE at the Montreal
Conservatory.

Christian

[BestStudentViolins.com]

On Jan 25, 10:45 am, "cstess...@sympatico.ca" <cstess...@sympatico.ca>
wrote:

Yes! I found one, used, on Amazon and no modern versions. Is is only
available in French?

[Ben Crowell]

Roland Hutchinson wrote:
> BestStudentViolins.com wrote:
>
>> Is anyone familiar with Dannhauser's three books of Solfége des
>> Solféges ? I read somewhere that these were good for aspiring
>> conductors to study, but the books look like vocal works. TIA
>
> They are not intended just for conductors, but for all musicians.
>
> They are old, standard textbooks for teaching fixed-do solfege.

Is there anything about them that makes them only applicable to
fixed-do? Are they basically just large anthologies of melodies?

I was shocked at what they charged for the Ottman anthology at the
community college where I took the musicianship sequence, so as
a geeky-fun project I made my own free anthology:
http://www.lightandmatter.com/sight/sight.html
I spent a fair amount of time searching for public-domain materials
that I could use as sources of practice melodies, but I had never
come across the Dannhauser books. Maybe I should buy them or see if
I can get them by interlibrary loan, and see if I can grab a bunch
of material from them to augment my book. My book focuses on easy
material, because that's the level of my own skill at sight-singing.
Easy material is difficult to find -- especially very easy material
that, e.g., only has steps in it, or only has steps plus small leaps
within the tonic triad. If I took examples from Dannhauser, I would
probably put them into G and F clefs.

[Roland Hutchinson]

Ben Crowell wrote:

> Roland Hutchinson wrote:
>> BestStudentViolins.com wrote:
>>
>>> Is anyone familiar with Dannhauser's three books of Solfége des
>>> Solféges ? I read somewhere that these were good for aspiring
>>> conductors to study, but the books look like vocal works. TIA
>>
>> They are not intended just for conductors, but for all musicians.
>>
>> They are old, standard textbooks for teaching fixed-do solfege.
>
> Is there anything about them that makes them only applicable to
> fixed-do? Are they basically just large anthologies of melodies?

Some exercises, and lots of melodies.

The order of presentation (starting with a lot -- and I mean really a _lot_
of C major, then other keys introduced gradually) is not something that one
would do in teaching movable-do to adults. The examples and brief
instructions on how to do the solfege and use the exercises are of course
all worked in fixed-do, but you could ignore those and just solfege the
tunes in any system you want.

There is better material out there for teaching movable-do. If you are
looking for cheap things for the elementary stages, try Google books and
archive.org which both have lots of early-20th century school music books
which are designed for teaching sight-singing (with movable do or by
numbers), unlike their post-WW II successors.

[BestStudentViolins.com]

Yeah, the Lavignac are incredibly expensive; I can't image why that
is. But the Dannhauser is within reach, and I'm going to get them.
Interlibrary loan for the Lavignac.

I don't know if it's just the schools I've gone to, or the specific
classes I've been in, but in general, I think most students don't sit
down with this stuff (or similar, modern materials) and work through
them. In my experience, the standard "Ear Training and Sight
Singing" (ear straining and sight screaming), is not very effective,
is put up with for show, and does not result in much solid music
learning.

[Ben Crowell]

BestStudentViolins.com wrote:
> In my experience, the standard "Ear Training and Sight
> Singing" (ear straining and sight screaming), is not very effective,
> is put up with for show, and does not result in much solid music
> learning.

I think I got a heck of a lot out of it, but of course like anything
it depends on prior training plus motivation. I still remember the
wannabe opera diva in my sight-singing class who insisted that it
was a waste of her time, because when you're a real opera star they
have coaches who teach you all the music.

[BestStudentViolins.com]

On Jan 25, 8:33 pm, Ben Crowell

<crowel...@lightSPAMandISmatterEVIL.com> wrote:
> I still remember the
> wannabe opera diva in my sight-singing class who insisted that it
> was a waste of her time, because when you're a real opera star they
> have coaches who teach you all the music.

<pft> that's a good one

[BestStudentViolins.com]

I posted this on Orchestralist, and, as I expected, there was a
conductor on there who said that they had just gone through an
extensive, two-year regimen of solfege. He said it made an enormous
difference, and he gives examples of how.

I suspected the conductor list would respond because I got the list of
recommended books from p. 23 of Frank Battisti's _On Becoming a
Conductor_. Not just this, but the footnotes throughout the book
provide a pretty good reading list.

I don't know about making anybody do anything, but if I study it, I'm
sure I'll incorporate it in the lessons. I'm also studying classical
guitar again, this time with a better instrument. It's lovely, really,
so much fun. It makes you think about the form and chord structures a
little differently.