About
The recorder is a serious instrument that wears its accessibility lightly. A child can play it; a master can spend a lifetime with it.
This is a free recorder curriculum — no lessons to pay for, no app, no account. It runs from your first long tone on B through Telemann fantasias, across about ninety lessons in five levels. Notation is engraved for both soprano and alto, and every exercise plays back.
Pedagogy
The music library contains sourced melodies, complete movements and instrumental parts, alongside clearly named excerpts. Each page identifies the selected edition, the extent of the music and any transposition or omitted voices. Historical sources and modern editions have different reuse terms; credits and licence links accompany the readings.
The curriculum follows the established consensus of recorder method books: B, A, G first — left hand only — then the chromatic range, articulation, and ornamentation, ending in Baroque sonata movements.
- One new concept per lesson.
- Mastery-based progression rather than time-based.
- Theory taught in musical context, not as separate drills.
- Historical awareness for Baroque and Renaissance repertoire.
The recommended sources are Hugh Orr’s Basic Recorder Technique, Mario Duschenes’s Method for the Recorder, and the historical treatises of Quantz, Hotteterre, and Ganassi.
How it’s built
The site is a static set of HTML files generated by a single Python script, served over a CDN. There is no backend. Notation is engraved at build time by Verovio; audio playback uses a vendored Tone.js. No tracking, no third-party requests, and nothing is stored on your device.
The curriculum at a glance
- Absolute beginner · weeks 1–12
- First notes, from B·A·G to the C major scale; first songs.
- Early beginner · months 3–6
- Sharps and flats, faster rhythms, slurs, high E and F.
- Lower intermediate · months 6–12
- Key signatures, ornamentation, Renaissance music.
- Upper intermediate · years 1–2
- Articulation, Baroque style and ornaments, the top of the range.
- Advanced · years 2+
- Major Baroque works and virtuoso technique.
Contact and contributing
This project is open source. Read the source, file an issue, or send a patch on GitHub; for general questions, write to shantanu@breadpad.com.