by Alyssa Grey

Improving Students’ Aural

Skills on the AP Music
Theory Exam
Abstract: In the past six years, more than 40,000 students have failed the AP Music Theory
Exam. Students have struggled especially when sight-singing or taking melodic dictation in
compound meter and minor tonality. Research has shown that students can improve these
specific aural skills through learning pitch and rhythm patterns, improvisation activities, and
learning from musical literature. This article includes research-based practical applications for
helping students improve their aural skills for the AP Music Theory Exam.
Keywords: aural skills, AP Music Theory Exam, dictation, music theory, sight-singing, test
preparation

Alyssa Grey while calling the video for a livestream concert of the Wind Symphony at the University of North Texas
Photo courtesy of Alyssa Grey.

Alyssa Grey is a teaching fellow in music education and the digital instruction coordinator of wind studies at the University of
North Texas in Denton. She can be contacted at AlyssaGrey@my.unt.edu.

NAfME is glad to offer one hour of professional development recognition to you for reading this article.
Copyright © 2021 National Association
Please follow the link below and complete a short quiz to receive your certificate of completion. for Music Education
http://bit.ly/APAural DOI: 10.1177/0027432121994658
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www.nafme.org 47
E
very year, more than 18,000 stu-
dents choose to take the Advanced
Placement (AP) Music Theory
Exam. They are musicians who wish to
enhance their knowledge and may be
considering a career in music. AP Music
Theory courses are important compo-
nents of high school curricula and pro-
vide an opportunity for students to gain
a deeper understanding of a musical
topic at the collegiate level. The exam is
designed to align with one or two semes-
ters of college music theory and enables
students to pursue advanced theoretical
topics while developing aural and dic-
tation skills.1 Though nearly 19,000 stu-
dents took the test in 2019, more than
one-third received a failing grade of 2
or lower.2 The combined failure rate for
all AP exam subjects in 2019 was slightly
higher than the failure rate for Music
Theory alone.3 In 2020, nearly one-third
of students failed the exam.4
As with many of the AP exams, the
test is divided into two major sections:
multiple-choice (45 percent of a stu-
dent’s grade) and free-response (55 per-
cent). During the free-response portion
of the Music Theory Exam, students are
asked to sight-sing, complete melodic
and harmonic dictation, and compose
using Western common-practice style.5
They are given approximately one hour
twenty minutes for 75 multiple-choice
questions, one hour ten minutes for
seven aural skills free-response ques-
tions (45 percent), and ten minutes to
sight-sing two excerpts (10 percent).
Every year, classroom AP theory
teachers and college faculty partner
to form a Test Development Commit-
tee and create new exam questions.
They form an initial draft and give it to
content experts and psychometricians,
who conduct mathematical analyses to
determine question difficulty. The test
is then examined by a chief reader and
higher ed co-chair before being read
by a new group of higher ed experts.
In 2019, 18,950 exams were scored by
ninety-one readers and twenty-five lead-
ers from across the country.6
Although secondary and postsecond-
ary theory teachers meet yearly to deter-
mine the suitability of exam content and
48
question difficulty, it is concerning that
a consistent number of students have
failed the test in the past few years.
Approximately 39 percent of students
failed the 2015 exam, 7 40 percent in
2016,8 39 percent in 2017,9 and 34 per-
cent in 2018.10 Though it contains only
nine questions, the free-response section
constitutes more than half of a student’s
overall score.11 In 2019, the average stu-
dent score was only 51 percent out of
100 percent in the free-response section.
These numbers are alarming, partic-
ularly for students who take AP Music
Theory with aspirations to pursue a
career in music. Just over 3,000 schools
offer the AP Music Theory Exam.12 Over
the past six years, more than 40,000 stu-
dent exams have received failing scores.
Tens of thousands of students enrolled in
a collegiate-level course have struggled
to demonstrate the necessary theory and
aural skills abilities. An AP exam score of
3 is considered the college course grade
equivalent of B−, C+, or C.13 For those
students who received a 2 or lower,
their corresponding college course grade
could have been less than a C. It is worth
noting, however, that a variety of circum-
stances and factors can influence student
success and are beyond the control of
classroom teachers. Despite these chal-
lenges, educators have an opportunity to
identify consistent student struggles and
try to bridge potential knowledge gaps
within the timeframe of an AP Music
Theory course.
Where Do Students Struggle?
Between 2015 and 2019, the average
student received less than half of possi-
ble points for a majority of the questions
in the aural skills section. Each melodic
dictation and sight-singing question is
worth a maximum of nine points. The
questions include various combinations
of major or minor tonality, treble or bass
clef, and simple or compound meter.
For example, in 2019, Melodic Dictation
Question 1 was major/bass clef/simple
meter and had an average student score
of 4.06. Melodic Dictation Question 2
was minor/treble clef/compound meter
and had an average student score of
3.21. Sight-singing Question 1 was
minor/treble clef/simple meter with an
average student score of 4.75. Sight-
singing Question 2 was major/bass clef/
compound meter with an average stu-
dent score of 3.63. Each year, there are
two major, two minor, two treble clef,
two bass clef, two simple meter, and
two compound meter excerpts repre-
sented by various combinations within
the four questions in this section.
Students have consistently struggled
when aural skills questions included
minor tonality and compound meter
rhythms.14 Items in minor almost always
scored lower than major, and compound
meter frequently scored lower than
simple meter. Excerpts that combined
minor tonality and compound meter
received the lowest scores. In 2016, for
example, Sight-singing Question 2 was
minor/treble clef/compound meter and
had an average student score of 2.41. In
2017, Melodic Dictation Question 2 was
minor/treble clef/compound meter and
had an average student score of 2.73.
These numbers are alarming consider-
ing nine is the maximum score for each
question. There have been only five
questions within the aural skills sec-
tion over the past five years where the
average student score was 4.5 or higher.
The highest average student score since
2015 was a 5.43 in 2018 for Sight-singing
Question 1, which equates to 60 percent
correct. The excerpt was in major tonal-
ity, bass clef, and simple meter.
Music educators can benefit from
practical classroom applications inspired
by research to help students develop their
aural skills.15 For the purposes of this arti-
cle, aural skills refers to taking dictation
and sight-reading. This article includes
practical applications drawn from the
research for improving students’ overall
aural skills, with special consideration for
minor tonality and compound meter.
Research and
Recommendations
Patterns
Eighty percent of AP theory teach-
ers16 and 95 percent of college theory
Music Educators Journal March 2021
teachers17 surveyed have suggested that
teaching common pitch and rhythm pat-
terns is important for developing stu-
dents’ aural skills.18 AP theory teachers
have reported that using a specific sys-
tem to teach rhythmic and tonal patterns
(e.g., Kodály, Gordon) can help stu-
dents build tonal, harmonic, scalar, and
rhythmic familiarity and develop their
aural skills.19 Though there are a variety
of systems available, instructors have
taught tonal exercises using moveable
do for both major and minor, moveable
do with la-based minor, or a numbered
scale system. While a majority of teach-
ers have used the “one-e-and-a” count-
ing system to teach rhythm, others used
techniques from Eastman, Takadimi,
Galin-Paris-Chevé, or Gordon. Although
some systems only offer syllabic labels,
others include set tonal and rhythm pat-
terns of varying lengths.
Singing and chanting patterns can
help students better understand melodies
and rhythms within a specific context.20
Theory teachers have suggested that stu-
dents who develop familiarity with tonal,
rhythmic, and melodic patterns can
be better prepared to recognize those
motives during listening examples and
in written notation. They especially rec-
ommended using patterns as a means of
developing dictation skills through sight-
singing. Other teachers have suggested
that students miss notes when they take
dictation because they lack a rhythmic
framework and do not know how to
space the notes rhythmically.21 College
music theory teachers have encouraged
practicing rhythm and pitch patterns and
suggested that pattern practice could
help address specific problems students
face during dictation.22
There may be limitations to teaching
patterns using a fixed-syllable approach,
such as the traditional rhythmic “one-
e-and-a” system or using numbers for
scale degrees. When counting rhythms,
big (macro) and small (micro) beats are
labeled similarly in both simple and
compound time. The exceptions are
rhythms in triple, in which some educa-
tors say tri-pl-et or 1-la-li. Though stu-
dents can use this counting system and
become successful musicians, using a
www.nafme.org
FIGURE 1
Macrobeat, Microbeat, Division, Odd, and Elongation Patterns
fixed-syllable approach can limit con-
textual understanding and may present
additional challenges. For example,
1 2 3 4+ 5+ 6+ could be correct syllabic
labels for rhythms in both 6/4 and 6/8
meter. A student trying to dictate the
rhythm would first have to establish if
the example were simple or compound
meter before they would be able to
notate the exercise. Similarly, singing
melodic excerpts using scale degree
numbers does not help determine tonal
context. In a numbered scale-degree sys-
tem, 1 3 5 and 4 2 7 could correctly rep-
resent the intervals in a tonic and then
the dominant 7 chord in both major and
minor tonalities. Additionally, identify-
ing 1 as the resting tone can be a chal-
lenge in pieces that modulate, and scale
degrees do not allow for the inclusion of
chromatic tones. Although fixed-syllable
systems can be successful, determin-
ing metric context and tonality become
extra steps in the dictation process.
Systems that use context-specific syl-
lables can help students differentiate
tonality and meter. One approach that
uses distinct labels is Edwin Gordon’s
Music Learning Theory. The syllables
Gordon recommended vary with tonal
or rhythmic function.23 For example, a
student who chants steady eighth notes
in 2/4 would say, “Du De, Du De”; in
6/8 “Du Da Di, Du Da Di”; and in 5/8
“Du Ba Bi, Du Be” or “Du Be, Du Ba Bi,”
depending on the grouping. Although
these examples contain only eighth
notes, the labels change to help identify
rhythms in simple, compound, or odd
meters. When using a Music Learning
Theory approach, the syllables are also
different for each tonality. While the
resting tone in minor tonality is la, the
resting tone in Mixolydian is sol. One
method book that uses Gordon’s sylla-
bles and patterns is Jump Right In: The
Instrumental Series. Divided into two
volumes, these texts can be a resource
for an instrumental performance-based
approach to developing aural skills.
After initially presenting rhythms by
rote, the books include notated patterns
in 2/4, 4/4, cut time, 3/8, 5/8, and 7/8.
Rhythms build from quarter and eighth
notes to dotted rhythms, sixteenth-note
divisions and syncopations, and labeled
elongations. Tonal melodies and pat-
terns are presented in major, minor,
Mixolydian, and Dorian tonalities in
several keys.24 In Figure 1, both tradi-
tional “one-e-and-a” counting (TC) sylla-
bles and Gordon Music Learning Theory
49
(MLT) syllables are presented in several
meters for comparison.
Dictation Development
AP and college music theory instruc-
tors have made various recommenda-
tions for teaching students how to do
melodic and harmonic dictation. Many
high school music teachers believe that
students who develop familiarity with
common pitch, rhythm, cadential, and
harmonic patterns can better recognize
musical ideas and eliminate options
when taking dictation. They have sug-
gested that teachers keep instructions
as simple as possible and slowly build
dictation skills from small to large
concepts, initially isolating pitch or
rhythm.25 Other teachers have recom-
mended similar strategies, such as mak-
ing predictions about material, hearing
implied harmonies, and using a process
of elimination.26 College theory instruc-
tors have suggested that students focus
on retaining the beginning and end of a
selection, sketch rhythms in shorthand,
and write solfège syllables.27 One of the
greatest challenges when teaching dic-
tation, however, is that there is no con-
sensus on the most beneficial method
of instruction.
High school and college faculty do
agree that students struggle with dicta-
tion, especially when completing a dicta-
tion in compound meter. As a significant
amount of popular music is in duple
meter and major tonality, it is likely
that students face these challenges due
to lack of familiarity. Before students
will be able to understand compound
meter on a theoretical level, they need
to experience it through aural activi-
ties. However, students in music theory
classes are sometimes taught elements
of music before they understand a con-
cept aurally.28 Though AP teachers have
used recognizable melodies as teach-
ing material to help reinforce dictation
development,29 students are less likely
to have gained confidence for music
that is in compound meter. The more
experiences students have singing and
performing music in challenging tonali-
ties and meters, the more likely they are
50
to recognize and notate those complex
rhythms and tonal sequences in unfa-
miliar music. Teachers should consider
alternate musical activities to help stu-
dents build their aural skills and transfer
them to written notation.
Improvisation/Dictation
Sequences
AP Music Theory teachers have sug-
gested that students can improve their
melodic dictation skills through a cog-
nitive framework of building a musical
vocabulary, connecting aural and writ-
ten theory, and sight-singing. 30 One
combination and application of these
skills is for students to create their own
music. Consider employing improvisa-
tion as a pathway to composition and
dictation. Improvisation activities can
allow for repetition and reinforcement
of tonal and rhythm patterns in several
meters and tonalities. Rather than only
aurally recognizing patterns, students
are able to apply their inner hearing in
a creative written form. After they have
notated a melody, students can prac-
tice sight-singing their compositions.
According to one AP theory teacher,
“[I]f they have heard the melodies, and
can sing them a cappella, if they can
look at them and then sing them again,
they own that pattern.”31
Students who improvise and com-
pose can practice developing appro-
priate voice-leading and part-writing
skills that can transfer to improve their
aural discrimination and notation ability
when completing a dictation. Through
improvisation, students can connect
their aural and written theory skills by
performing and then notating various
chord types, cadences, and phrases,
and they can critically listen to and
respond to their colleagues in perfor-
mance. By including common caden-
tial and rhythm patterns in their own
creations, students can better recognize
and understand melodic and rhythmic
structure. When taking a prescribed dic-
tation, teachers have reported that stu-
dents had difficulty transferring rhythms
from aural to written form and often
expressed defeatist attitudes, such as “I
can never do this.”32 Students may be
more interested and invested in creat-
ing their own music than in copying a
dictation exercise yet through related
activities are able to practice comple-
mentary musical skills. These additional
opportunities can also be used to cul-
tivate familiarity with compound meter
and minor tonality.
The following are tonal and rhyth-
mic improvisation and dictation activi-
ties inspired by personal classroom
experiences and the research of Edwin
Gordon. 33 Although each has a pre-
scribed teaching sequence, educators
are encouraged to modify activities to
best meet students’ needs.
Tonal
The tonal activity can be completed
using the improvisation sheet or blank
staff paper. At the top of the page, ask
students to write the chords and pitches
for their improvisation. If working on
minor tonality, consider beginning with
“tonic – i” and “dominant – V7.” If stu-
dents are practicing compound meter,
improvising in 6/8 can be appropri-
ate. Although students can indepen-
dently do this activity, it can become
an opportunity for group performance
if they are given a specific concert key
and meter. In the first full staff system,
either provide students with a four-
chord progression or let them pick their
own, such as i–i–V7–i. Progressing one
measure at a time, use a syllable sys-
tem and ask students to sing their note
choices for each chord and then write
it down. When initially doing this activ-
ity, they may experience more success
when only notating macrobeats in the
given meter. Sing chords two, three,
and four, repeating the process and
moving on to line two. Once students
have notated their improvised composi-
tion, accompany them on an instrument
and have them sing and play the whole
piece. Students can enhance their com-
positions by adding nonharmonic tones.
This can also be an opportunity to prac-
tice singing from a notated example and
discuss voice leading in the common-
practice style.
Music Educators Journal March 2021
Rhythmic
The suggested rhythmic improvisation
and dictation teaching sequence varies.
It can be completed by using a set of
dry-erase whiteboards with blank music
staves, by laminating and reusing staff
paper, or by using manuscript paper and
a pencil. Figure 2 illustrates an example
of the complete sequence in compound
meter. As dictation questions on the AP
exam are typically four measures long,34
students will benefit from dictating four-
measure rhythms. Consider the follow-
ing as a potential teaching sequence:
•• Provide students a specific meter and
number of measures. Students may
benefit from keeping a steady big
beat in the heels of their feet during
the exercise. Chant a rhythm pattern
using counting syllables.
•• If engaging in dictation, students
immediately repeat the pattern three
times in a row without stopping.
Their hand should move from left to
right over the staff while they speak,
as students will notate different
things while chanting. If dictating,
students can try to copy the pat-
tern. If improvising, students should
respond by chanting and writing
their own rhythm while following the
same process.
Students:
1. Notate the stem of each note as
it is spoken.
2. Connect the beams of any small
beats and/or divisions.
3. Add noteheads and dots.
Students may experience greater ini-
tial success by first improvising and dic-
tating shorter and simpler melodies and
rhythms. Some AP teachers have recom-
mended gradually building the length
of dictation exercises, starting with
unmeasured groups of notes, or even
making measures one and three in an
exercise identical. 35 Through sequenc-
ing and scaffolding, students can build
the skills necessary to dictate extremely
complex rhythms and melodies. Diverse
dictation activities such as improvisation
can help students experientially and
www.nafme.org
FIGURE 2
Student Rhythmic Dictation Exercise Example
intuitively understand music theory.
Their experiences singing and chant-
ing pitches and rhythms can also help
during the sight-singing portion of the
exam, as they may be more familiar with
and recognize common patterns.
Using Musical Literature
Traditional music theory courses have
often focused primarily on music of
the common-practice era and Western
art music tradition.36 Considering the
increasing diversity of students in our
schools, traditional music theory course-
work may not reflect vernacular and
popular music styles most relevant to the
current generation of students. Teach-
ers, however, must still spend a signifi-
cant portion of class time teaching music
theory of the Western tradition, as AP
exam content remains structured around
eighteenth-century forms, harmony, and
style.37 Until the test is revised, teachers
can use the rhythms and melodies of
Western musical literature as authentic
aural content for the theory curriculum.
AP Music Theory teachers38 and col-
lege theory faculty39 have often used
classical music as instructional material
for dictation and sight-singing. Rather
than finding or creating exercises, con-
sider using examples from the Western
canon to improve aural and written
understanding. Many of the students
may perform in a music ensemble. What
common rhythmic or tonal ideas can
students transfer from their ensemble
music to the theory classroom, and vice
versa? The following is a list of ensemble
literature with potential theory concepts:
•• Grainger’s Lincolnshire Posy—unique
chords
•• Bach, various—inversions and
counterpoint
•• Ives, Variations on “America”—
diverse tonalities
•• Whitacre, various—nonharmonic
tones
•• Holst’s The Song of the Blacksmith—
meter changes
•• Barber’s Adagio for Strings—several
types of cadences
Students may approach a concept differ-
ently if they have experienced it before
theoretically analyzing it. It is likely
that any literature students are perform-
ing will contain elements of music that
teachers can transfer to the music theory
classroom. Teachers may also find that
students demonstrate increased interest
in discussing music theory when con-
cepts directly relate to music they are
performing.
Literature from the Western musical
canon can also be used to develop stu-
dents’ comfort with minor tonality and
compound meter. Figure 3 includes cho-
ral and instrumental excerpts in minor
tonality that can be used for sight-singing
and melodic dictation exercises. Stu-
dents can use a neutral syllable such as
“du” when singing rather than adding
the complication of lyrics. Two of the
51
 FIGURE 3
Sight-Singing (Marked with *) and Melodic Dictation Excerpts
excerpts are in duple meter, and two are
in compound meter. Two include acci-
dentals, and two are in natural minor.
The excerpts include varied intervals,
skips and stepwise motion, and common
rhythms in duple and compound meters.
Students can benefit from making
predictions about melodic, harmonic,
and rhythmic content before listening
to an excerpt.40 Consider guiding stu-
dents to try to visually identify tonality,
sequences, and rhythmic motives and
anticipate potential cadences. They can
then compare their observations of a
notated excerpt with what they hear or
sing. For example, students may be able
to visually determine that the excerpts in
Figure 3 are all in minor tonality. If pre-
paring to sight-sing, they can approach
example one with the knowledge that
there are skips of a fourth and fifth and
one type of accidental. In the second
example, there is scalar movement that
includes a sixteenth-note rhythm. Before
dictating example three, they may notice
52
that the first phrase starts on the resting
tone but the second begins on the sev-
enth scale degree. In the fourth example,
phrases one and two have almost identi-
cal rhythms, and it is the tonal content
that changes. Using theory knowledge
to make decisions and predictions about
melodies is a useful dictation strategy41
and can raise scores by helping students
avoid careless mistakes.
Transferring Skills
Researchers have suggested that stu-
dents can improve their sight-singing
and dictation skills through learning a
variety of pitch and rhythm patterns and
using a syllable system. Through build-
ing an extensive vocabulary of patterns,
students are more likely to recognize
and make predictions about material in
sight-singing and dictation excerpts. As
students have faced considerable chal-
lenges with selections in minor tonal-
ity and compound meter, teachers can
include those specific types of patterns
for students to practice. Educators can
consider selecting and making use of
a syllable system for teaching patterns
that changes based on the context of a
musical example. Students may be bet-
ter at sight-singing and taking dictation
in less familiar tonalities and meters
when they have experienced a variety
of patterns and understand how to use
syllabic labels.
Students may reinforce their knowl-
edge of tonal and rhythmic patterns and
improve their dictation skills through
improvisation and composition. In a
tonal improvisation, students must rec-
ollect and order appropriate pitches
within a given chord and harmonic
sequence. In a rhythmic improvisation,
students must recognize and chant vari-
ous subdivisions within a specific meter.
A student who has developed a vocabu-
lary of patterns can draw on that knowl-
edge to identify common motives and
to combine pitch and rhythm sequences
Music Educators Journal March 2021
in new ways. Students are likely to be
engaged when creating their own music
and can gain necessary practice notating
melodies and part-writing. These expe-
riences can transfer to improved sight-
singing and dictation skills, as students
practice singing and notating their crea-
tion when they improvise a new compo-
sition. After writing a melody, students
can add nonchord tones and embellish-
ments, and practice transposition.
As AP Music Theory Exam content
is centered around eighteenth-century
common practice, teachers should con-
sider using examples from the Western
musical canon and students’ ensemble
literature. Teachers can extract material
from performance literature to create
exercises that highlight specific chords,
less common cadences and tonalities,
and phrase structure, or for sight-singing
and dictation. Students who transfer
information from their theory classrooms
to ensembles can make practical appli-
cations of theoretical concepts in a per-
formance setting. Both Western classical
literature and ensemble pieces contain
numerous examples of music in com-
pound meter and minor tonality that can
be used to develop students’ aural skills.
ORCID iD
Alyssa Grey https://orcid.org/0000-0002-
1590-0576
Notes
1. The College Board, “AP Music Theory:
About the Course,” 2019, https://
apstudents.collegeboard.org/courses/
ap-music-theory.
2. Ron Rodman, “AP Music Theory: 2019
Reading Results,” PowerPoint presented
at AP Annual Conference, Orlando,
Florida, July 2019.
3. The College Board, “AP Score
Distributions—All Subjects 1999–
2019,” 2019, https://secure-media
.collegeboard.org/digitalServices/pdf/
research/2019/2019-Score-Distribution-
All-Subjects.pdf.
4. The College Board, “Student Score
Distributions: AP Exams—May 2020,”
2020, https://secure-media.collegeboard
.org/digitalServices/pdf/research/2020/
Student-Score- Distributions-2020.pdf.
www.nafme.org
5. The College Board, “AP Music Theory:
About the Exam,” 2019, https://
apstudents.collegeboard.org/courses/
ap-music-theory/assessment.
6. Rodman, “AP Music Theory.”
7. The College Board, “AP Music Theory:
Student Score Distributions—Global
AP Exams—May 2015,” https://secure-
media.collegeboard.org/digitalServices/
pdf/ap/ap15-music-theory-score-dist.pdf.
8. The College Board, “AP Music Theory:
Student Score Distributions—Global AP
Exams—May 2016,” https://secureme
dia.collegeboard.org/digitalServices/pdf/
ap/ap16_music_theory_scoring_global
.pdf.
9. The College Board, “AP Music Theory:
Student Score Distributions—Global
AP Exams—May 2017,” https://secure-
media.collegeboard.org/ap/pdf/ap17-
music-theory-aural-scoring-global.pdf.
10. The College Board, “AP Music Theory:
Student Score Distributions—Global AP
Exams—May 2018,” https://apcentral
.collegeboard.org/pdf/ap18-music-theory-
global-aural-nonaural-score-distributions
.pdf.
11. The College Board, “AP Music Theory:
About the Exam.”
12. The College Board, “Number of Schools
Offering AP Exams (by subject)*,” 2019,
https://secure-edia.collegeboard.org/digi
talServices/pdf/research/2019/Number-
of-Schools-Offering-AP-2019.pdf.
13. The College Board, “AP Score Scale
Table,” 2019, https://apstudents
.collegeboard.org/about-ap-scores/
ap-score-scale-table.
14. Rebecca Jemian, “Chief Reader Report
on Student Responses: 2018 AP Music
Theory Free-Response Questions,” The
College Board, 2018, https://apcentraly
2ffarwztgd04mxuwfj25nrfrvo-origin
.collegeboard.org/pdf/ap18-music-theory-
chief-reader-report.pdf.
15. Andrew S. Paney and Nathan O.
Buonviri, “Developing Melodic
Dictation Pedagogy: A Survey of
College Theory Instructors,” Update:
Applications of Research in Music
Education 36, no. 1 (2017): 51–58.
doi:10.1177/8755123316686815.
16. Nathan O. Buonviri and Andrew S.
Paney, “Melodic Dictation Instruction:
A Survey of Advanced Placement Music
Theory Teachers,” Journal of Research in
Music Education 63, no. 2 (2015): 224–
37. doi:10.1177/0022429415584141.
17. Paney and Buonviri, “Developing Melodic
Dictation Pedagogy,” 54.
18. The AP Music Theory Exam Chief Reader
also suggested that students could
improve their aural skills by practicing a
variety of common patterns. See Jemian,
“Chief Reader Report on Student
Responses.”
19. Buonviri and Paney, “Melodic Dictation
Instruction,” 228.
20. Ibid., 230.
21. Andrew S. Paney and Nathan O.
Buonviri, “Teaching Melodic Dictation
in Advanced Placement Music
Theory,” Journal of Research in Music
Education 61, no. 4 (2014): 396–414.
doi:10.1177/0022429413508411.
22. Paney and Buonviri, “Developing Melodic
Dictation Pedagogy,” 57.
23. Edwin Gordon, Learning Sequences in
Music (Chicago: GIA, 2012), 59–91.
24. The teacher versions of this series
for band, recorder, or strings include
the written rhythm syllables. Richard
Grunow, Edwin Gordon, and Chris Azzara,
Jump Right In: The Instrumental Series:
Teachers Guide (Chicago: GIA, 2001).
25. Paney and Buonviri, “Teaching Melodic
Dictation,” 407.
26. Buonviri and Paney, “Melodic Dictation
Instruction,” 231.
27. Paney and Buonviri, “Developing Melodic
Dictation Pedagogy,” 55.
28. Bruce Dalby, “Music Learning Theory
Methods in the Undergraduate Music
Theory and Ear Training Curriculum,”
in The Development and Practical
Application of Music Learning Theory,
ed. Maria Runfola and Cynthia Taggart
(Chicago: GIA, 2005), 359–82.
29. Paney and Buonviri, “Teaching Melodic
Dictation,” 408.
30. Ibid., 400.
31. Ibid., 400.
32. Ibid., 408.
33. For an in-depth overview of Edwin
Gordon’s research, see Gordon, Learning
Sequences in Music.
34. Ibid., 397.
35. Paney and Buonviri, “Teaching Melodic
Dictation,” 407.
36. Dalby, “Music Learning Theory
Methods,” 369.
37. The College Board, “AP Music Theory:
About the Course.”
38. Buonviri and Paney, “Melodic Dictation
Instruction,” 232.
39. Paney and Buonviri, “Developing Melodic
Dictation Pedagogy,” 55.
40. Paney and Buonviri, “Teaching Melodic
Dictation,” 409.
41. Paney and Buonviri, “Developing Melodic
Dictation Pedagogy,” 55.
53