PDF for Shake them 'Simmons Down

You can view the song from this blog post and find the file available for download here! I've notated the song in the key of C--transpose to whatever key best fits your needs. I also notated V chords as straight Vs, but you are of course free to spice them up as V7s, or get more inventive with the chord progression as a whole--whatever best fits your population!

Comments

Everyday Advocacy

Or, Top Ten Ways to be an Effective Music Therapy Advocate in the Workplace... But can I confess? I think these would work in any profession! 1) Be professional. Be on time, with an appropriate appearance and demeanor for the facility you are working in. Follow facility guidelines for charting, communication, scheduling, etc. Be friendly with everyone on the staff--no one is beneath you, and everyone can help you! 2) Know when to talk. Be open to teachable moments--those random hallway conversations or tangents during meetings where you can pipe in knowledgeably with a little nugget of music therapy gold. 3) Know when to zip it. Don't be preachy. Of course you're excited about music therapy and its benefits, why else would you be doing the job? But sometimes it is best to let your work speak for itself. People will notice positive results, but if you are constantly achatter or seen as exaggerating, you may drown yourself out. 4) Actively seek ways to add value ...

Book Review: Grateful Giraffe, a Yoga Story

I recently had the opportunity to review The Grateful Giraffe, by Giselle Shardlow. It is a sweet book featuring a variety of animals corresponding to yoga poses for children. I read the book and did the yoga flow with my kids one morning, and they really enjoyed it! Giselle has included tips for how to use the book and how to use yoga in general with kids, and I loved that! There are illustrations of kids performing the poses on each spread, which is very helpful for young ones who need information in as concrete a manner as possible. I also really enjoyed the flow--it was one that I could probably teach to my kids to use without the book eventually. We added a simple mindfulness component to the rest pose at the end. As we lay in rest pose, we talked about five things we could see, five things we could touch or feel, and five things we could hear. It was a nice way to bring closure to the activity and add in mindfulness. There is an extr...

Basic Drum Circle Exercise #2

This month in my music groups, we are exploring the element of rhythm. One of the easiest and most fun ways to do this is by playing in a drum circle. For my drum circles, we always play through a round or two of my basic commands, which you can see here . A simple exercise we start with early in the month is composing our own rhythm patterns! We begin with basic choices, such as: | BEAT—one sound on one beat (AKA—“ta” or quarter note) | ˉ | DOU-BLE—two sounds on one beat (AKA—“ti-ti” or beamed eighth notes) Z (REST)—no sound on one beat (AKA—“(no sound)” or quarter rest) Each student is asked to choose FOUR of any combination of those options. They may choose four BEATs, or BEAT BEAT DOUBLE BEAT, or some smart alecks l...

Songbird Studio

Search This Blog