Flute with Diana Y.

I am a professional flutist based in California, and teaching flute to kids is my passion. I am constantly refining my teaching skills by regularly attending teacher training courses, masterclasses with renowned flute pedagogues, and performers, as well as staying updated on all the new teaching techniques. Some recent courses that I have attended to improve my teaching have been the "Flute Roots" pedagogy course with renowned flute educator Dr. Katherine Emeneth, as well as the "Music minus Pain" course for teachers with Body-mapping expert and flute teacher Dr. Lea Pearson. When you enroll your child in lessons with me, I can guarantee that making sure that your child not only makes progress in their playing, but also enjoys the process will be my top priority. Not only do I strive to provide the best lesson experience possible, but I will go above and beyond to help your child learn, by providing detailed lesson notes and assignments after every lesson, recording videos of their repertoire/exercises for them to listen to throughout the week, as well as letting the student send me little audio recordings of their playing mid-week, and giving some feedback, so that they can feel supported and completely on track in between their weekly lessons. In my flute lessons I aim for helping the student to achieve good technique, and learn to play with a beautiful tone, and to make steady progress in learning the flute, but I also aim for making sure that the student is enjoying their lesson experience: I create a positive, and encouraging atmosphere in lessons, consider the student's learning style, as well as their musical interests. Though most of the repertoire studied in lessons is selected by me, to best fit the student's level, I always give the student several options of musical pieces to choose from, as well as encourage them to bring music which they are interested in playing. I want my students to learn from me all the necessary skills for being a good musician, but to also develop a love of music, and to enjoy the process. A little bit about my own experience as a flutist: I have played flute since the age of 10, and went on to study Flute performance in college: I attended the "Saint-Petersburg Music College named after N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov" in Russia. It is one of the best music colleges in the country. I have been lucky enough to have amazing teachers, while studying there: Natalya Zaznobina--an "Honorary worker in the arts of the Russian Federation", Dr. Alexander Kiskachi--a wonderful flute professor, and expert in child music education, and Olesya Tertychnaya--the first flute of the Saint Petersburg Philarmonic Orchestra. They have taught me a great deal about not only being a great performer, but also on being a good teacher, and I channel the knowledge I gained there into my lessons. During my studies in Russia, I have also extensively attended masterclasses with such "stars" of the flute-world as Emanuel Pahud, James Galway, Denis Bouriakov. I have also performed with various orchestras, chamber ensembles and as a soloist. I have been performing with "Apollo Arts", a California based non-profit organization for years, and even performed as Principal Chair Flute with my college orchestra in a performance at the world-famous Mariinsky Theater. I had to leave and go back to the US, due to family circumstances shortly before graduating, so I have transferred to the Sacramento State University music department, and will be completing my BM in Flute performance under the guidance of Dr. Katherine Apple. I believe in slow but steady progress, guided by the system and curriculum which I create individually for each of my students. All of the lessons which I teach are not spontaneous, but carefully crafted and planned out by me, according to what the student most needs to work on at the moment, and structured around what will be most beneficial for the student. I build my lessons on a ladder system: ensuring that the first level is completely understood and absorbed by the student, before moving on to the next level of difficulty, constantly deepening and widening the knowledge and skills of the previous levels, as we move up. Besides learning the basic technical and musical skills needed for playing their instrument, I make sure to teach my students about music theory, music history, music form and structure, spending some time in each lesson to offer them some knowledge in these areas. I believe that positive reinforcement should be at the core of all musical education, and that is something that I practice daily in my teaching career. The materials used will largely depend on the student, but, generally, with beginners I use either Blocki Flute Method Book 1, Flute 101, or A tune a day for flute book 1 (the book used will depend on the student, and how they learn--after a few lessons I will decide which one will work best for them). Often I will use a combination of 2 books. There will also be supplementary material, which I will send out prior to the lesson, which the student can then print out or have on a computer screen. For intermediate students I use Flute 102, A tune a day for flute Book 2 (or a combination of both) + supplementary materials, such as etudes and excerpts from standard flute repertoire. For advanced students, we will probably not use any method book, but we will use a combination of flute repertoire, etudes, and studies, which will be selected by me. ***I encourage students to bring music to lessons that they have a personal interest in working on--whether it be classical, or contemporary music, music from movies , etc. I am always happy to support the students' musical interests. However, this will be supplementary material, and will not replace the usual work with a method book and repertoire selected by me.