Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Bat
How’s your week going? I bet that some of you are prepping for Halloween recitals this weekend! (Or maybe you’re starting to prep Christmas music.) Whatever you’re doing in your studio this week, I hope you’re all having fun.
Check out this fun video my student and I made last night. We’ll call this rendition of a familiar tune “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Bat.”
Last week Abbey had told me about her bells, so I invited her to bring them into the studio for a little extra fun duet work. Later in the lesson she learned how to play an improvised solo version on the piano. 🙂
Now, Abbey’s not the only one who learned this song this week!
(But she is the only one who brought a glockenspiel. Now I really want one.)
I’ve used this activity with almost all of my students this week.
How’s that for lesson planning?
Last week I gave all of my students some prep materials: the minor Circle of 5ths pentascale chart and a sheet of Halloween warm-ups. This week we’re transposing “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star” into “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Bat.”
It’s been a fun activity everyone, and prep was easy. All I had to do was find a free lead sheet of the song and print out a bunch of copies. (Maybe someday I’ll make a fancy looking version here. Another project for another day.)
Here’s How We Used It:
- Littles learn about the minor 6 and the minor 3 while playing the melody by rote or from a simple lead sheet.
- Middles add simple a LH accompaniment, either in root position or inversions.
- Bigs learn to use different rhythmic patterns in the LH and embellishments in the RH. Or I make them transpose it into different keys 😉
Interested in trying this out? Get started by teaching your students to play their minor pentascales. Download this free Circle of 5ths Chart . 
Be sure to check out my other Halloween posts about Halloween Gear, Minor Vocal Warm-Ups, and Halloween Games!
