Sight Reading Children's Songs 11-20 by Chick Corea

"Some people ask: “Are we going to some sort of children's concert? Some new compositions for children?” Whenever I can, I try to explain: this is children's music in about to the same extent as “Alice in the Wonderland” by Caroll Lewis is children's literature. Youngsters and adults enjoy reading them alike, don't they. They appreciate its simplicity, playfulness, sense for nonsense, but in particular – they return to the almost forgotten territory of a child's soul that they rediscover by way of words and paper." (http://quakvarteto.cz/en/childrens_songs)

                        About Sight Reading Them

Sight reading Children's Songs 11-20 is a lot more challenging than sight reading 1-10. I would place these pieces at an intermediate conservatory (private studio) level. These compositions require technical and emotional maturity form the performer. They are a lesson in form and atmosphere changes.
Nos. 11-20 explore the keyboard even more than the prior ten pieces. They explore leger notes, chromaticism and rhythms become increasingly harder to read though once again, the metronome markings help students make sense of them. Obstinati bass is not as frequently as before.
No.14, in particular, would be a resourceful piece to learn how to read or 'see' common tones between chords. There is much more information from the composer such as pedal markings, dynamics and articulations.
No.18 is great for teaching how to take advantage of the accompaniment (which switches from one hand to the other) as a tool for counting, and how by minimizing counting one can match the melody into it.
Nos.17 and 19 once again betray melodic* expectations imposing a bigger challenge to sight readers so they cannot predict what is coming next.
No.20 (short notes- brisk and light) is a fast and playful piece with hard accents and provocative rhythms.

             YouTube Links

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iTf92CAN6k
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5IlB0pyIwk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQQ5bN_1I30
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5ACWHNIcSQ
   
            Score and Corea's Poem

                    http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CCsQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fxa.yimg.com%2Fkq%2Fgroups%2F20774692%2F604394424%2Fname%2FChick%2BCorea%2B-%2BChildren%2526%252339%253Bs%2BSongs%2Bv2.pdf&ei=7YU2UtPXMNG7qQHDloDYDA&usg=AFQjCNHZbJkcrL6m0QbuUlKqnB1peoIBFg&sig2=ucO-Euvgy0s2yQRm0pv9Tg&bvm=bv.52164340,d.aWM

       * Expectations, Previous Experiences and Sight Reading

According to Lehman and Erichson (1996), our expectations are powerful. Expectations along with our previous knowledge are a big part of completing the score during sight reading. Therefore our previous knowledge of harmony, style and even music history, next to our experience (amount of sight reading, accompaniment and chamber music practice, ear training, and exposure to repertoire by listening or playing) are important tools for sight reading successfully. Research also shows that both text readers and music readers often perform automatic corrections in a suitable style and context when there are misprints without being aware of it based on expectations and experience alone.
According to my experience as a musician, modern and atonal music are harder to sight read because they betray our expectations. There are no familiar rhythmic, harmonic and melodic patterns.
In a similar study by Wolf, chess players experience the same problems when faced with random combinations on the chess board.
Visual closure exercises use expectations and previous experiences. See http://sightreadingpianomusic.blogspot.com/2010/05/exercise-viii-visual-closure-auditory.html 

                                                      
               Expectations also impact the audiences!

"The sadistic newness of The Rite's (Rite of Spring by Stravinsky) patterns, its stubborn refusal to conform to our learned expectations, is the dirty secret of its discontent. By disobeying every rule we think we know, Stravinsky forces us to confront the fact that we have expectations, that the mind anticipates certain types of order, followed by certain types of release. But in The Rite, these expectations are rendered useless. We do not know what note will come next. And this makes us angry." Proust is a Neuroscientist by Jonah Lehrer

               Acknowledgement

Thanks to my friend and former university classmate Marcos Kröning Corrêa for sending me Children's Songs and unlocking my curiosity to playing and writing about them.