If your child is interested in the arts, musical theater summer camp can expose them to an array of artistic outlets and activities. This can be particularly important for children who are looking to participate in choir, band, or drama during the school year.
Here are some of the ways that musical theater summer camp can help your child improve their musicality and vocal range.
Musicality
Your child's ability to interpret and respond to music constitutes their musicality. Just about every artistic medium can be improved by nurturing your child's musicality.
Find the Pulse
Music, like all art, is rooted in pattern. When your child is able to distinguish patterns in music, they can process and respond to it intuitively. One of the first activities children often go through at musical theater summer camp is called finding the pulse. Children are put into groups of 5-10 and instructed to close their eyes and listen very intently to music. The instructors will play the music for short intervals and ask the children to replicate the pulse of the music by tapping their feet together after the music has stopped. Once the group feels like they've replicated the beat, the instructor will turn the music back up for the children to hear. This game, although simplistic, is critical for developing fundamental musicality skills. You can practice this same game with your child at home.
Mixed Mediums
Another tactic to help children develop musicality is to mix mediums. For instance, musical theater summer camps will encourage children to describe music in terms or colors or flavors. By priming children to associate music with other mediums and senses, they can transform abstract concepts more concretely and develop a nuanced vocabulary for expressing musical complexity.
Vocal Range
Your child's voice is a powerful musical instrument. Teaching them to harness the power of their voice is often one of the primary goals of musical summer theater camps.
Playing With Keys
Children know how to sing like they know how to walk. Although they can go through the basic motions, they often don't realize that they have the power to change just about every aspect of the act. Musical summer theater camps will often develop vocal range by having their campers sing "Happy Birthday" or "Twinkle Little Star" in a variety of keys. As students learn to differentiate between musical keys, their ability to utilize their vocal range increase as well.