Conversational Solfege Upper Levels Certification – The Hartt School, Hartford, CT

John Feierabend’s 2018 reissued book Conversational Solfege Level 3 (a.k.a. “Upper Levels” or just “CSUL”), is the same Ear-First Approach to thinking musical thoughts that sets Conversational Solfege apart, and it’s geared towards MS/HS performing ensembles. CSUL picks up the sequence where Level 2 left off, guiding students to think, read and write in most keys, meters, and regions of the staff. CSUL also offers a curriculum to teach musicians a Conversational knowledge of major and minor diatonic harmony, and its application to teaching improvisation and composition with performing ensemble classroom. Building on the conversational skill of “discovering the baseline” to create a harmony, introduced in Lev. 2, this curriculum leads students to use a bass line to inform tonal analysis to reveal the corresponding diatonic chord tones, and the many melodic counter-puntal possibilities that weave harmony together. Come prepared to sing.