What to do when a student cannot pitch a note? Options

[hammer action]

One of my students is having trouble correctly pitching a note (singing it back i mean). She's 15, not self-conscious of singing, but knows herself that she has difficulty singing back a note that is played on piano. I'm not a singing teacher, so wondered what the best approach to this would be? Obviously for the aural tests, she'll have to do this. She's studying the grade 5 pieces and came to me from another teacher who apparently didn't help at all with the aural and she either scraped a pass or failed that part in previous exams. Naturally i want her to do well and will do everything i can to ensure she gets a good mark, but i'm a bit baffled by how i can resolve this. Any help would be great thanks (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[owainsutton]

One technique in this situation is to have her sing a note - any note - and you find it on the piano. Make sure she's able to then hit the same note again. Then build up very simple echo-singing skills, as in the earlier grades, starting on that note. Then you can start transposing simple patterns, do-re-mi for instance, up or down chromatically to expand the control of pitches over a wider range.

[Susie]

If she has problems singing from the piano, then you can sing the note and she pitches it from your voice, which in general is easier than from the piano.