My 7 year old grandson is taking piano lessons. One of the items on his Christmas list is a metronome (probably Mom's idea not his :). I don't know what to look for and how much I should plan to spend. I took a quick look at amazon.com and found both traditional mechanical ones and digital ones. Any experience or information that might be helpful?
Julia in MN
Julia, i got one for my daughter way back in the clarinet days. i think about
8 yrs or so ago and i paid about $55.00 or so. it's manual. and i got it at the local instrument/music store. amy in CNYGet the number of his piano teacher-- and ask if she has a preference. You may also be able to purchase one through her -- possibly utilizing a discount to the local music store (which many private teachers have).
I agree with asking the piano teacher, being a piano teacher myself. : ) Having said that, my favorite metronome was a wind-up one with an arm that moved back and forth, providing both visual and aural reinforcement. It was this one, but I know nothing about this store
If I were to get a metronome for myself to keep on my piano, I would splurge on a mechanical one -- wood case, shaped like a very tall pyramid, wind-up, with the arm that swings, and rather pricey. If it were to take with me to rehearsals of any of the choirs I direct, or for students, I would get a small portable one with an audible tick. If I wanted to keep an absolutely certain time as a church organist, I would get a small one that blinks a small light. (Church congregations tend to drag hymns slower and slower and s l o w e r and it can be a challenge to the organist not to slow down along with them.) HOWEVER -- isn't this student a bit young to want or need a metronome?!? There is always a risk of turning a student into a little robot rather than a musician!
I do agree with you on the lovely one and the student's age points you make Mary. I have a beautiful mechanical, mahogany polished case, one. It is lovely to look at - I hardly ever actually use it. I think the teacher counting should be enough for a 7 y-o. . In message , Mary writes
I've used the old-fashioned pendulum sort, which are pretty good but now very expensive. I've had both a wooden pyramidal Taktell (which could be set to different metres and different volumes - e.g. 3/4 would go DING! tock tock DING! tock tock...) and a plastic one which never seemed to give as much feedback. I also have a pocket metronome, like a pocket watch and only useful for measuring tempo (music critics use them) but it tends to jam. But I mainly use a computer now - there are several ways of doing it, I use the ABC notation system processor BarFly for the Mac.
A small drum machine would cost about the same as a traditional mechanical metronome, and you can do a lot more with it (like make it play in Bulgarian rhythms or give you a tango backline). But you'd have to figure out the risk of it becoming a geeky distraction from the real task of learning the piano.
Actually the main thing I used my mechanical metronomes for was timing photographic print exposures under an enlarger.
============== j-c ====== @ ====== purr . demon . co . uk ============== Jack Campin: 11 Third St, Newtongrange EH22 4PU, Scotland | tel 0131 660 4760 for CD-ROMs and free | fax 0870 0554 975 stuff: Scottish music, food intolerance, & Mac logic fonts | mob 07800 739 557
I have always found a metranome's clicking to be very distracting when playing, I do better with a visual timer then. Oddly I have no problem with the things when singing.
That is the way we went, but for us a drum machine has more uses than just keeping base time. If you end up looking at them as a possible metronome alternative make sure it is programable, but easily programable. Some of the low end ones either are not programable at all and do nothing but preprogrammed beats, or are so primatively programable that you have to do every beat for the duration of the time you will be playing. You would want something where you could program one measure and then put it on loop.
NightMist
Thanks. After recommendations from you and others to check with the teacher, I asked DDIL what my grandson's teacher recommended -- he recommends the same one you did.
Julia in MN
On Tue, 4 Dec 2007 11:46:09 -0600, Julia in MN wrote (in article ):
"Fraid not. Never even knew there was such a thing as a digital metronome. But I do remember liking that tock-tock sound from my piano lesson days. (Not that it ever did much but distract me from the lesson).
Maureen
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