MAOLTO Ne Gj i 4 « CANTABILE! 'q SIGHT SINGING : WORLD'S GREAT MELODIES © | | | | pe cae om | | | | AUGUST 2012INTRODUCTION Molto Cantabile! The title says it all This anthology contains 485 melodies from the folk, popular, and classical repertoires from around the world that are joyful to sifig. All the examples in the book-were chosen because they represent some of the most memorable music from. the past three centuries. ‘The book has been designed to provide college music majors with enough sight-singing challenges to cover four semesters. Levél One is comprised of melodies that are strictly diatonic. Levels Two, Three and Four provide increasingly more chromatic and disjunct melodies that take students up to the challenges of the early 20‘ century. The purpose is to provide students with a wide variety of pitch and rhythm material that can be read at sight to develop a higher levél of music literacy. As you can tell from the materials on the opening pages, this book assumes you can already read music at a rudimentary level. This is, by no means, a source for concert preparation. For that you will need. origirial materials. This book provides the rhythms and pitches of the great melodies but not the dynamics and articulation. The materials in this book.are for sight-reading purposes only. About nine percent of the book employs C clefs, a number sufficient.to familiarize students with challenges faced by players of the viola, bassoon, trombone, and cello The music from the folk and popular repertoires has been placed in a widé variety keys so that students will be comfortable reading multiple accidentals. The musi¢ from the classical repertoire has been kept in its original key. Levels One, Two, and Three. contain enough duets that studerits can preparetat least one a week for class presentation Ninety percent of the melodies have a range that is no greater than a twelfth, a reasonable limitation for students who are not trained singers..A quarter of the melodies are in time signatures other than 2/4, 3/4, and 4/4. The scales employed range from major and the three versions of minor to pentatonic, hexatonic, whole-tone, o¢tatonic, and Lydian- dominant. Be sure to consult the indexes at the back of the book. While it would be very nice to include more materials from the 20 century, copyright regulations make it prohibitively complicated and expensive. The original intention of this volume was to be compendious and inexpensive and that standard has been maintained A recommendation: sing all these beautiful melodies using every possible method including fixed-do, movable-do, numbers, and fa-la-la. You can even scat. Before you attempt to sing each melody be sure to preview it for rhythmic problems, large skips, and accidentals. When you perform pretend you are a feal singer or a musical instrument, If necessary, make believe you are Bobby McFerrin. Have fun with it and open your mouth By the time you have finished this book you will be familiar with a representative selection of war-horses from every musical genre from campfire to concert hall. On the first three levels do four pages a week. On the fourth level do'three. Enjoy the journey