I find that music educators tend to have very strong opinions on the Fixed vs. Movable Do debate. Since this is one of the big questions we are facing in creating Little Musician, I think it is important to find out what current Brill parents think about it.
If you could, also please reply your choice and what country you are from/currently in on this thread.
Thanks!!! :biggrin:
You already know this, but I’ll vote anyway. Movable Do. I’m in the United States. I don’t have that strong of an opinion on it, I think that both have merit. In Aural skills in college, we did movable do for 3 semesters and fixed do the fourth. The switch was hard, but it gave me an appreciation for both. I’m teaching my children movable do.
I like the option of fixed Do with possibility of introducing movable Do later on, practically speaking not sure how to implement it in LMs, but just a thought for what its worth
I’m not certain that it will be possible to introduce movable do later on for those kids that do develop perfect pitch. You have to understand that for someone with perfect pitch who learned it on solfege, Do is C. It becomes almost a moral issue to them. What if I told you that whenever you write on this forum for now on, D is the new A and you must shift all your letters accordingly. And then tomorrow, Q is the new A. You would go crazy trying to do that!
There is a chance, however, before we get too far into the training, introducing too many new keys, that if we wean the kids onto note names and then move do, they might be okay with that. It all depends how strongly they have latched onto solfege as their mental labels for absolute pitch. If we can get them to latch onto note names (which I think is much more useful anyways, unless you live in France where they don’t use them), they might let go of solfege and allow us to use it as labels for the tonal relationships instead. Imagine if I told you that you had to abandon the Western alphabet and start using a new one I invented instead!
I don’t know, I guess a lot of things are possible with kids this young. 
Uncharted territory . . . isn’t it great? 
This is a tough call to make. It’s not like teaching Spanish, where Spanish is mostly the same in Spanish speaking countries, or math, that is concrete all across the board. You have a world audience to address, and music isn’t a one-size-fits-all. Yikes! I guess the ultimate question to ask is, “Who is my target audience?” Which countries have been your primary customers, and what do they want? I’m from the United States, and if 95% of my customers were from the States, I would gear it for them. The baby signing time videos teach American sign language, without regard to Russian, Armenian, or Japanese sign language. There are probably Russians who don’t buy it because they don’t want to teach American sign language to their kids. Rachel Coleman is okay with that, and the Russians aren’t offended that she didn’t think to include them.
I don’t think you can please everyone on this issue. Decide who your target audience is and cater LM to them. If there is enough demand, and if there is a market for it, make two or more different versions. This sounds less like a philosophical decision and more like a business decision. Let the money do the talking.
Sorry if that sounded cold. I’m not trying to be.
Well, I agree with you. That’s why I wanted to find out what the majority of people wanted, but I guess they don’t have much of an opinion… I would assume the the majority of people who buy these products live in the US and Hong Kong, although apparently there are a lot of people in India, Malaysia and Singapore. The common thread here, I guess, is former British occupancy. lol But seriously, that brings each of these places the English language and some cultural similarities.
Wikipedia says:
“Movable do is frequently employed in Australia, China and Japan (with 7th being si), Ireland, the United Kingdom, the United States, Hong Kong and English-speaking Canada (although a few American conservatories use French-style fixed do) … movable do (used in Britain, Germany, Indian classical music, and the United States).”
“Fixed do is used in Spain, Portugal, France, Italy, Belgium, Romania, Latin American countries and in French-speaking Canada as well as countries such as Bosnia and Herzegovina, Russia, Poland, Serbia, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Greece, Macedonia, Iran, Lebanon, and Israel where non-Romance languages are spoken. . . . fixed do (used in China, France, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Romania, Russia, South America and parts of North America, Japan, and Vietnam)”
Obviously there is some contradiction there… :rolleyes: