In this column, I’d like to share with you a useful lesson that I teach my students, and that is the importance of rests, or silence, in music, and how to achieve it in a meaningful, controlled manner. I do this by teaching them some basic, stock jazz “riffs” that are both fun to play and beneficial for their general technique development.

Hello. My name is Mark Hale, and I teach general music and guitar to elementary school students, grades K-4, in Nashville. Having done this for a few years and experimented with various approaches, I have come up with what I believe to be a very effective and fun approach to teaching young, beginner-level students how to tap into the creative part of their brains and improvise melodies. I’d like to share this approach with you.

After learning a handful of stock chord shapes in first and second position — what are commonly referred to as “open” chords or “cowboy” chords — it can be liberating for your fretting hand to venture beyond the first three frets, move up the neck and get acquainted with the sweet sounds of chords played in the higher positions.