Screaming Hairy Armadillos
by Alison Lund on 09/20/12
Today's pearls of wisdom are primarily inspired by the predictable response of my cat whenever one of the younger students elaborates upon "Old MacDonald" with a few particularly convincing "everywhere a meow meow"s.
Anyway, the ensuing conversation of course turned to the YouTube cat virtuosi. After my cat's performance I was in no mood to encourage any further antics, so after the lesson we spent a few moments googling "piano" and some of the more exotic animals we could potentially add to Old MacDonald's menagerie. The kid was betting on iguanas. Dad upped the ante with rhinos. And I hit the jackpot with Mr. Armadillo here.
Which raised an issue: what kind of noise DO armadillos make? A little further research led us to discover some remarkable species, including the self-explanatory "Screaming Hairy Armadillo". Even more intriguing: the "Pink Fairy Armadillo".
And what does all of this have to do with learning or teaching the piano? As a shining example of how things work in the Land of Ms. Alison, these exciting discoveries became leverage for the following student assignments:
(a) Transposing Old MacDonald into a different key for each species (there are 20, so that's almost enough to cover all the major and minor positions)
(b) Playing them all with eyes closed (seeing as Armadillos are practically blind)
(c) Playing them all with many subtle shades of Armadillo mood, tempi and dynamics (because Armadillos have very sensitive dispositions)
(d) Producing a composition about the "Pink Fairy Armadillo" which is to be performed in an appropriate costume c. Halloween. And I expect the notation to be written in Armadillo pawprints. And the lyrics to be hilarious. And furthermore it must scan well and rhyme while avoiding any mention of Armadillo transmission of leprosy to humans.
Natch.
