Patrice Connelly teaches piano, viola da gamba, music theory and history from her studio at Stony Creek, near Woodford in Queensland. Students of all ages are welcome. Patrice studied music pedagogy, particularly relating to the viola da gamba, as the topic of her Master of Music thesis, and has had private pedagogy lessons with some of the world's top performers and teachers.

Patrice has taught at music workshops around Australia, and performed on viola da gamba in NSW, Victoria, WA and overseas. She founded the Australian Viola da Gamba Society in 2000.

In lessons, Patrice concentrates on the fundamentals, integrating a full understanding of music theory with practice, and including the history of music. She will often relate this to the art, architecture and history of the period. Sight reading, general knowledge, technique and repertoire are all included. Patrice prefers not to teach for exams if they aren't necessary, concentrating on giving a broad approach to music and musicality. Where students are learning history at school, Patrice will find music from that era so that they can relate this to their other studies.

For viola da gamba, one-off tryout lessons are always available. In an hour, you can come and try treble, tenor and bass viols, to see if you wish to take them up. If you don't, you never have to come back, but if you do, Patrice will facilitate the process. In the beginning stages, the viola da gamba is a much easier bowed string instrument to learn than violins and cellos, but to be a virtuoso on the gamba requires just as much hard work as on any other instrument.

Patrice recommends that children particularly learn at least a year of piano before going on to other instruments. This is because it gives a great musical introduction, and the piano keyboard gives a strong visual key to understanding music theory. Learning to read two lines of music and two clefs at once means that the player gets used to this from the start. Reading two clefs simultaneously when you have previously learned recorder, violin or another instrument that plays from a single clef is much harder. Even if piano becomes a secondary instrument, the skill of being able to read well and play something however rudimentary on piano is always useful.

Lesson Prices: $60/hour or $30/half hour. Missed lessons without suitable notice require payment.

All Patrice's students are eligible for a 10% discount on purchases through Saraband Music while they are studying with her.

For Patrice's Music education e-zine articles, click here