You are Going to

Learn to Play the

Recorder!

Presentation designed by
Linda Barnhart
Paramount Elementary
School

Note to students:
This presentation was designed to help you learn to play the
recorder. You move through the lesson by clicking the mouse to
move from slide to slide. Click on the
symbol to play sound
clips. Take your time to read and practice each slide. You should
be able to play a song on the recorder when you finish this lesson.

Note to teachers:
You know when you have students that come in the middle of the
year, it can be difficult to catch them up on the recorder. I tend to
forget to cover the basics and they end up jumping in in the
middle. This was developed to help with that problem. It
introduces the student to the recorder and gets them started. I do
not normally move this quickly in the classroom, but here the
student can practice and repeat the lesson as necessary. I hope
that you will find this a helpful tool in your classroom.

This is a recorder

This is a halo holder that I

have on my recorder.

Your Recorder Comes with a cleaner.

We dont use the cleaners in my room.

In my class we use these to conduct with.
Why?
The part that you need to clean is the mouthpiece.
This rod does not clean the mouthpiece.
You need to add a small strip of cloth to the rod to
use it to clean. Many students end up with too big a
strip of cloth and the rod gets stuck in the recorder.

To Clean Your Recorder

1.

Turn the recorder so that the thumb hole is

away from your body

2.

Cover the area below the mouthpiece with

your thumb and give a quick blow into the
mouthpiece. (If you do this correctly you
should not hear it.)

3. Wipe off any moisture that is on your thumb

and repeat two more times.

The Recorder has been around

for a long time.
The recorder was very popular in Europe in
the 1500s and 1600s. It was then almost
forgotten until the early 1900s, when
instrument maker Arnold Dolmetsch became
interested in it. Through an accident his
recorder was lost. Luckily, he had taken
careful measurements and based a new
instrument on the old design. This was the
beginning of a revival for the recorder. 1
1.

Taken from the Kingfisher Young Peoples Book of Music 1996

This is a little song to help you

learn how to hold the recorder.
The recorder in your
right hand is where we
will begin...

Be sure to hold the

bottom and move it to
your chin

 With your left hand give a

thumbs up.

On the back it must go.

Add 1 its B

Add 2 its A

Add 3 its G you know!

Proper Hold
This is the proper way to hold the recorder.

This is too high.

This is too low

Cover the Holes Completely

It is important to completely cover the hole with your finger!
If you dont, air will escape and you will squeak.
This hole is completely covered
and no air can escape.

This hole has a small

place
where air is escaping.

If you are covering the holes correctly you will see small round
bubbles on your fingers.

Proper sound production

There is a correct way to blow into a recorder.
First, you should blow GENTLY. Think about blowing bubbles.
You should start and stop the sound with your tongue. Put your
tongue on the roof of your mouth behind your teeth. The sound
should start and stop there.
Some people think of saying the sound dud or doot when they play,
but be careful not to vocalize the sound and end up saying it out
loud.
Listen to this sound produced correctly.
Listen to this sound that is not produced correctly.
Can you hear the difference?

Music is written on the Staff

This is a staff

This is a Treble clef

For the recorder we play in the Treble Clef

The staff is made up of five lines

These lines are labeled

E
G
B
D
F
We use many silly sentences to remember these:
Every Good Boy Does Fine
Empty Garbage Before Dad Flips
Every Gorgeous Babe Does Flirt
Elephants Get Big Dirty Feet
Elvis Goes Belly Dancing Fridays

The staff has four spaces.

These space notes are labeled

F
A
C
E

For the first song on the recorder we will use:

This is a B on the recorder.

This is a B on the Staff.

Play four short Bs. It should sound like this.

This is an A on the recorder.

This is an A on the Staff.

Play four short As. It should sound like this.

This is a G on the recorder.

This is a G on the Staff.

Play four short Gs. It should sound like this.

Now Play B-A-G

The pattern we are going to play is
quarter, quarter, half note
or ta, ta, ta-a.
It sounds like this:
On the staff it looks like this:

Click to play movie

Repeat that phrase.

A phrase is a musical sentence.
Click to play movie

Now for the third phrase.

We will play four gs, then four as. These notes
are eight notes and we count them ti-ti-ti-ti ti-titi-ti.
It will sound like this:
And it will look like this:
Click to play movie

Play the fourth phrase

Click to play movie

You just played your first song!

The song is
HOT CROSS
BUNS and the
whole thing
looks like this:
Click here to
hear the whole
song:

Hot

cross

buns!

Hot

cross

buns!

One

Click to play movie

Hot

pen - ny,

cross

two a

buns!

pen- ny,

Practice
this until
you can
play it!

Hot

cross

buns!

Hot

cross

buns!

One

Click to play movie

Hot

pen - ny,

cross

two a

buns!

pen- ny,

Now lets review what youve learned.

Staff
This is called a _______
A staff is made up of _____
5 lines.
This is called a Treble
__________
clef
This note is a _____
B
This note is a _____
A
This note is a _____
G
A phrase is ________________
a musical sentence

Review
the notes
on the
recorder

Three fingers and the thumb

play what note? ______
G

Two fingers and the

thumb play what
A
note? ______

One finger and the thumb

Play what note? ______
B

Congratulations!
You have learned a lot!
Now you can go play your song for
your teacher and you are ready to really
get started with the recorder!