Colored Music Notation
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The impact that color has on individuals is powerful, it can change a persons emotional state and stimulate neurons.“The Luscher Color Test, observes from experiments that when individuals are required to contemplate pure red for varying lengths of time, [the experiments] have shown that this color decidedly has a stimulating effect on the nervous system, blood pressure increases, respiration rate and heartbeat speed up…Pure blue on the other hand, has the reverse effect, blood pressure falls, heart beat and breathing both slow down. [1]. With the influence that color has, can colored notation help students to succeed in music?
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[edit] Music Education
In music education color is typically used in method books to highlight new material. “Stimuli received through several senses excite more neurons in several localized areas of the cortex, thereby reinforcing the learning process and improving retention [2]. This information has been proven by : “Chute (1978) reported that elementary students who viewed a color version of an instructional film scored significantly higher on both immediate and delayed tests than did students who viewed a monochrome version [3].”
[edit] Color Studies
[edit] The Effect of Color-Coded Notation on Achievement of Elementary Instrumental Students
Dr. George L. Rogers, DME is Director of Music Education at Westfield State College. He is also the author of 25 articles in publications that include the Music Educators Journal, The Instrumentalist, and the Journal of Research in Music Education [4]. In 1991 Rogers did a study that researched the effect of color-coded notation on music achievement of elementary instrumental students. Rogers states that the color-coded notation used in this study was not meant to replace the present notational system; rather, it was intended as a pedagogical aid for beginners [5]. The subjects used for this study were 92 fifth- and sixth-grade beginning wind players who attended two different schools. The experimental group used color-coded method books and supplementary materials in which each different pitch was highlighted with a different color using felt-tip markers. The control group used identical materials, but with the notation uncolored. The students were then tested in three different parts: 1) Students performed a 26-note melody from memory (The materials were presented either in color or uncolored notation.), 2) Students sight-read two 12-note melodies (One melody was presented in color coded notation, the other uncolored. The students were then asked which notation was easier to play), 3) Students named the letter names of the notes in two 7-note melodies [6].
The results of this study are as follows: Subjects in the experimental and control groups performed much the same on the task of playing music from memory. For the task of sight-reading, the experimental group scored higher than did the experimental group. However the control group (without color-coded notation) scored higher when sight-reading uncolored notation. In fact, the students who learned using color-coded notation scored significantly lower when sight-reading plain notation. An answer to this might be, the students in the experimental group memorized the colors instead of the notation. The third task of note naming seemed to be less of a challenge for the control group who learned to read notation than the experimental group who learned which color is which fingering on their instrument. The final question of the test: Which type of notation was easier to read colored/uncolored, in the experimental group all but three found the color-coded notation easier to play, in the control group 18 out of the 46 chose color-coded notation also easier to read. This is interesting, as most students prefer the method they were first introduced to [7].
[edit] Effect of Colored Rhythmic Notation on Music-Reading Skills of Elementary Students
In 1996 Rogers did another study researching the effect of colored rhythmic notation on music-reading skills of elementary students. Dr. Rogers states that the purpose of studying the effect of colored rhythmic notation was to answer two related questions: Will instruction involving the addition of color to standard rhythmic notation affect the performance of elementary music students on the task of clapping and vocalizing rhythmic exercises at sight. The subjects of this study were 134 first- and second-grade general music students. These two particular schools were chosen because most students were dealing with notation intensively for the first time [8]. The experimental subjects participated in vocalizing and clapping rhythms notated with colored chalk on the chalkboard as a regular part of general music classes. Control subjects read, vocalized and clapped identical rhythms noted in white chalk. In the experimental group contrasting colors were used to notate the different rhythmic values. The colors used were arbitrary and changed from week to week (so no one color was identified with a particular note or rest). The students used the Cheve rhythm syllables, consisting of ta’s for quarter notes and ti-ti’s for eighth notes. The students were tested by sight-reading two exercises from a chalkboard, clapping and vocalizing the rhythmic notation. One test was in colored rhythmic notation and the other was uncolored. The students performed the two exercises involving similar rhythms, with colored notation being applied randomly to either the first or second task [9].
The results of this study are as follows: Students in both experimental and control groups scored well, with a combined mean for all subjects of 10.66 out of 12 points. Students who experienced colored rhythmic notation during the treatment period scored somewhat higher as a group on both tasks [10].
[edit] Special Needs Students
Students who need academic assistance are often students who have learning disorders. Kent Gerlach clarifies some of the symptoms of learning disorders: “Difficulties for students with learning disabilities: Poor visual discrimination, Poor visual memory, Poor figure ground. Poor visual discrimination is difficulty distinguishing between: squares and rectangles, circles and ovals, m, r, h, n,r, p, b, d, g, and q. Also including 6 and 9, 21 and 12
Poor Visual memory is: Forgetting what has been seen. Forgetting what has been read.
Poor figure ground is: difficulty selecting one thing from a group, such as: a particular letter in a word a word in a sentence one addition problem in a group of subtraction, addition, and multiplication ones.” [11]
Dr. Rogers found that during the 1991 study on the effects of color-coded notation on music achievement of elementary instrumental students that: “The high level of dependence on color-coding among learning disabled and mentally handicapped students may reflect a situation similar to that reported by Chute in which students of different ability levels were affected differently by the presence or absence of color in instructional materials. Not only did the learning-disabled and mentally handicapped students in the experimental group score much higher on the tasks that involved color-coded notation than on the uncolored notation, but it also appeared that the color-coded notation enabled them to score as high as or higher than the other students [12]” Again in the 1996 study on the effect of colored rhythmic notation on music-reading skills of elementary students Dr. Rogers suggests that the scores of students identified as receiving extra academic assistance were examined separately and were found to be lower than the overall student sample, but were otherwise similar to the means for all students [13]
[edit] Conclusion
In conclusion, colored notation does seem to help early music students to learn notation and rhythms more than students with uncolored notation. In Rogers 1991 study of color-coded notation it is clear that students relied to heavily on the colors that were assigned to the notation, than on learning the notation. But the students were able to easily tell the different notes apart, perhaps by using different colors that are not assigned to a note the experimental students would have been able to read not only the colored notation better but also the uncolored notation. Dr. Rogers did change the 1996 study making the colors arbitrary. Using colored notation with early music students is an inexpensive and positive step in the right direction to helping the next generation of music students solidify the foundations of music.
[edit] References
- ^ Poast, Michael. Color Music Visual Color Notation for Musical Expression. Leonardo, Vol. 33, No.3. 2000, pp. 215
- ^ Rogers, George L. Effect of Color-Coded Notation on Music Achievement of Elementary Instrumental Students. Journal of Research in Music Education. Vol.39, No. 1(Spring, 1991), pp 64.
- ^ Rogers, George L. Effect of Colored Rhythmic Notation on Music-Reading Skills of Elementary Students. Journal of Research in Music Education. Vol. 44, No. 1 (Spring, 1996), pp 17.
- ^ Faculty Listing. Westfield State College. http://www.wsc.ma.edu/music/faculty/default.asp?who=. Accessed November 26, 2006
- ^ Rogers, George L. Effect of Color-Coded Notation on Music Achievement of Elementary Instrumental Students. Journal of Research in Music Education. Vol.39, No. 1(Spring, 1991), pp 66.
- ^ Rogers, George L. Effect of Color-Coded Notation on Music Achievement of Elementary Instrumental Students. Journal of Research in Music Education. Vol.39, No. 1(Spring, 1991), pp 67.
- ^ Rogers, George L. Effect of Color-Coded Notation on Music Achievement of Elementary Instrumental Students. Journal of Research in Music Education. Vol.39, No. 1(Spring, 1991), pp 71.
- ^ Rogers, George L. Effect of Colored Rhythmic Notation on Music-Reading Skills of Elementary Students. Journal of Research in Music Education. Vol. 44, No. 1 (Spring, 1996), pp 18.
- ^ Rogers, George L. Effect of Colored Rhythmic Notation on Music-Reading Skills of Elementary Students. Journal of Research in Music Education. Vol. 44, No. 1 (Spring, 1996), pp 19-20.
- ^ Rogers, George L. Effect of Colored Rhythmic Notation on Music-Reading Skills of Elementary Students. Journal of Research in Music Education. Vol. 44, No. 1 (Spring, 1996), pp 20.
- ^ Gerlach, Kent. Individuals with Special Needs. © Pacific Training Associates, Seattle, WA. Accessed Fall 2003.
- ^ Rogers, George L. Effect of Color-Coded Notation on Music Achievement of Elementary Instrumental Students. Journal of Research in Music Education. Vol.39, No. 1(Spring, 1991), pp 71-72.
- ^ Rogers, George L. Effect of Colored Rhythmic Notation on Music-Reading Skills of Elementary Students. Journal of Research in Music Education. Vol. 44, No. 1 (Spring, 1996), pp 21.
