The Orff Echo is the national, peer-reviewed quarterly journal and philosophical voice of the American Orff-Schulwerk Association. Our mission is to demonstrate the value of Orff Schulwerk and promote its widespread use; to support the professional development of our members; and to inspire and advocate for the creative potential of all learners. Non-members may contact the editor for information.
Interested in writing for The Orff Echo? Check out how to get involved in the process:
Extensions to articles published in The Orff Echo can be found in the AOSA Resource Library.
List of Orff Echo Articles
Ontogenetic Approach to Teaching Improvisation
Multi-case research study of teacher-educators’ use of improvisation in upper elementary general music classroom that includes an ontogenetic approach.
The Orff Echo Index: Focus Topics
Since 1994, most issues since of The Orff Echo have a focus topic around which feature articles are organized. Issues may also include articles on topics other than the focus topic.
Why Artistic Citizenship?
Exploring eudaimonia, music educators prepare students to make music as ethical action for the positive transformation of their own and others’ lives; they infuse school music with an “ethic of care.”
Groove Is in the Heart: What Music as Social Life Has to Teach Us about Best Orff Practices
Teaching styles, practices, and outcomes serve participatory and/or presentational music-making goals. Exploratory improvisation, community building, formal lessons on notation are blended purposefully.
Justice Choir: A Movement To Create Change Through the Power of Singing Together
Teachers can promote compassion and social and environmental justice using songbook resources for solidarity, equality, peace, empathy and protest; they create moments of empathy and reflection, lead group singing at marches, rallies, vigils and schools.
Embodying Change in a Time of Global Crises
Embracing the body and power of movement when considering the ever-changing world, Living Systems Theory, and emergence.
Reflections on Participatory Music in Japan
Reflections on participatory music making found in Japanese culture and in school and informal music traditions.
Songs to Lift Us Up: Artistic Citizenship through a Multicultural Playformance
A guide to a school-wide performance using culture bearers and World Music Pedagogy principles to teach and showcase music in an Orff-inspired program.
Blue in the Sea: Music, Dance, and Visual Arts
Professional Book Review: Thaxton reviews the Lopez-Ibor book and says that it embodies the author’s lifetime of inspiration and teaching.
Music to Make a Positive Difference
Project based lessons or project based learning (PBL) can lead to culminating experiences where students use music as a means to affect change. Collaborative performances between choirs and community groups can also help bring understanding between different members of society.
Because
Children’s Book Review: This book tells of a young girl and her path to becoming a composer after hearing Schubert’s eighth symphony. The overarching theme of our effect on others threads throughout the story, and the message expands beyond the music room.
Ada’s Violin: The Story of the Recycled Orchestra of Paraguay
Children’s Book Review: This tale highlights human ingenuity and the power of music education in even the most difficult circumstances. Based on a true story, it follows the children of Cateura, a slum and landfill for the city of Asunción, on their journey to becoming the Recycled Orchestra of Paraguay.
Attending Summer Courses: Why We Do It
Three researchers trace some of the motivations for attendance at Orff Schulwerk Teacher Education Courses.
Music, Education, and Diversity: Bridging Cultures and Communities
Professional Book Review: This book is a gem sparkling with wisdom for teachers who want to create communities in which music cultivates cultural understanding. The author advocates for teachers to plan curriculum that expands beyondvgreat European classical traditions to include
sounds and processes of diverse cultures.
Music as Social Life: The Politics of Participation
Professional Book Review: Turino sets the stage for the social meanings and functions of music through a variety of lenses, moving from anthropology to psychology to philosophy.
For the Classroom: Passing Thoughts
This article about tradtional passing games from the Solomon Islands is reprinted with permission from The Bulletin of the Orff Schulwerk Association of New South Wales.