A lady once told me that when she was a little girl in a school choir, her music teacher instructed her to just mouth the words and to not make a sound. As the children around her carried the tune, she remained silent.
That was yesterday’s solution to singing out of tune: just discourage the person from singing at all.
Singing is one of the best things about being human. It’s a joy to sing! And any which way we sing gives us joy:
- Singing with the car radio
- Singing the national anthem at a sports game
- Singing in a choir or in church
- Singing around a camp fire
- Singing when we fall in love
- Singing when we try to soothe a baby to sleep
In short, humans love to sing. To believe that someone sings out of tune because they’re born that way, that it can’t be helped and then prevent them from singing, is a travesty.
I can’t think of anything else in the world that universally gives a sense of shame or failure as singing out of tune. It’s almost the ultimate sign you can’t belong.
When a music teacher notices that a student is singing out of tune, can it be helped?
Yes!
Let me make a bold claim. The game I’m offering in this blog post has had a 100% success rate with my students. Every student who has played this game with me has learned to sing in tune.
Yes, it is possible for someone who sings out of tune to learn how to sing in tune. The younger, the better.
The catch? You can’t skim this blog post. Don’t skip over parts and assume you’ve got it based on headings and a sentence or two.
To enjoy this success yourself, read every word. It will be worth your time.
1. Never say this
Children who feel under threat cannot learn effectively. Their brain will shut down, as fear prevents learning.
If a child is asked to sing but already feels insecure or self-conscious about their singing abilities, they won’t. Any hint of criticism or assessment from the teacher will only shut them down and make them unwilling to try.
To be clear, a teacher should never say, “You sing out of tune.” Or any variation on that statement.
The first task of the teacher is therefore to lower the threat, to make the child feel comfortable and willing to try.
This is accomplished by introducing a game. Actually having fun and being silly is part of it. Being competitive is part of it.
The game requires you to act like a kid. If you’re not willing to act a little (as in, perform like an actor), it won’t be much fun, and the child will stand to make little gain.
The teacher losing intentionally sometimes is part of it (faking a loss but pretending the loss is real). Kids love outsmarting adults. It makes them willing to play the game, which requires them to sing.
Without knowing it, before long, they’ll be singing in tune. I’ll add, they won’t even realize that they’re going from singing out of tune to singing in tune. They won’t know the point of the game. To the piano student, it’s only a fun matching game.
2. Raise the challenge
After lowering the threat, the second precept of a good teaching strategy is to raise the challenge. Children love a good challenge. Through challenge they stretch their abilities, improve, get better and grow. A challenge turns on the light and fully engages them.
A challenge is anything that cannot be accomplished on the first try. A challenge requires sustained effort, input, deeper thought and problem-solving.
If a child doesn’t first try and fail, then strive, then succeed, they won’t learn anything. These three steps are essential to learning. Therefore, failure isn’t something to fear, it’s something to welcome because it means you’re on the path.
The Pitch Match Game requires a back-and-forth between the student and the teacher. And it is a challenge for both.
To someone who cannot sing in tune, matching a pitch with their voice is a challenge. But if the teacher were also expected to do the same, it wouldn’t be much of a competition.
So rather than expecting the same skill from both players, the teacher is expected to up their game with a bigger challenge.
In the first half of the game, the student will witness their teacher trying hard and putting in effort. The part the teacher has to play is actually very tricky. Let’s call it a “handicap”, like in a round of golf between unevenly matched players.
And, like golf, in this game you want a low score. A score of “1” means that you got the match on the first try, with the best possible result. In the box you’ll write the number of tries it took the teacher and student to match the pitch. The one with the lowest score wins that round.
I explain the game in more detail in the next section.
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3. The Pitch Match game
Game step 1. First, the student sings a note. It can be any note.
The teacher then tries to play the matching key on the piano keyboard. Unless you have perfect pitch, this is a challenge. If you do have perfect pitch, you are going to have to fake some failures. Otherwise the game will be no fun, the student will lose interest in playing, and they won’t learn how to sing in tune.
But there’s a deeper reason for asking the student to sing first. In order to get someone to sing in tune, first you need to understand their comfortable vocal range. This first sung pitch from the student gives you that starting point.
Here’s why any other approach will fail. If your student had a naturally high voice, but you tried to get them to sing mid-range, it wouldn’t work. If your student’s voice were more in the mid-range but you tried to teach them to match a tone in the higher register, it wouldn’t work, either. It only makes sense to follow the student’s lead on their own singing range. I guess this is why some kids do sing out of tune. In a music class, the teacher starts on a higher note than the child is comfortable singing, so the student drones along on lower pitches, where they are more comfortable singing. What is true is that most of those who sing out of tune will sing below the pitch, not above it. To me, this signals that they should learn to sing on lower pitches to begin with.
The other reason the student sings and the teacher matches first is so the student can watch the teacher trying to match a pitch, which is difficult. After they witness effort and having fun, they’ll be willing to put in effort, too (and it will feel like fun).
Game step 2. Next, the teacher chooses a piano key near the student’s first pitch and plays it. You’ll choose this pitch because it is within the child’s comfortable singing range, which increases their chances of matching it.
Some kids will be able to match every pitch with confidence. For these kids, the game will be short-lived in lessons because it’ll offer no challenge to them. Usually things with more challenge are more fun. Easy things are a bit boring. So, for these kids the game will simply drop off the radar.
For other kids, it will be hit-and-miss. These kids will have the most fun, because they’ll love the competition and the challenge.
Still other children may never have sung before, and they may not know how to connect their voices to their breath supply and support a sustained sound. For these kids, the game can evolve a little into you challenging them to producing a clearer, more stable sound.
I highly recommend that you watch the following videos. You will see the Pitch Match Game in action and will learn some tricks on how to help when your students need to work harder to match the pitch. Notice that each video is only one to three minutes long. This doesn’t take a lot of lesson time, but over several lessons, it is very effective.
Just think about that. In one to three minutes each week, you can help a human find their voice.
4. Girl student
September 24th – This is our second time playing. One of us needs two tries and the other gets it first try! The competition is fierce!
October 1st – “Let’s play the Pitch Match game!” “YAY!” With some wobbly attempts, we work on a bit of breath support to make the sound clearer. The overall score is a surprise and we are baited into the next challenge!
October 8th – History repeats itself in a very strange turn of events. One competitor pulls ahead by one point.
October 15th – I challenge the student to sing in a different range. Then, she finds it tricky to match the pitch this time, so here’s a creative strategy for giving a little extra help. And it works!
Notice by the end of the game above that I offered to continue playing it. I didn’t say, “You’re still missing the match sometimes, so let’s keep going on this.” I simply stated that I thought we could have more fun if we kept playing it.
This ‘to be continued’ approach will help the child eventually match every time, and learn to sing in tune.
5. Boy student
September 2025 – Here’s this student’s first time playing Pitch Match. He wanted special help from his mom, and here’s how we included her for extra support. This built his confidence enough to even try. Note: Part of this video is sound only, but it’s definitely worth listening to.
October 4th – The student is still holding back a little, but there’s a quicker response this time. His mom is a great sport. Without her we might not be able to play this game, so these videos give a hint on how to help hesitant singers.
October 7th – On a roll, I bring out my pirate voice in this one. Notice what we celebrate and what we choose to let go for another lesson.
December 9th – This student usually hums with a lifted tongue, which constricts the sound. So, here’s how I get him to sing with an open mouth and better air support. This is building confidence beyond just matching the pitch to learning how to sing.
6. This FREE printable makes it easy!
I invented this game for my students to help them learn to sing with dignity. It’s challenging and fun!
You have the advantage of drawing upon the decades of my teaching experience, to use this with your own students.
It’s easier with the FREE printable!
7. A bonus bit of silly humming
The free printable that goes with this blog post has a bonus sound experiment at the bottom, encouraging children to try this exact same experiment.
When I was a child, I used to ride along on our wheeled vacuum cleaner while my mother vacuumed our house. And our vacuum cleaner had a very distinctive tone (I believe it was D4 on the piano).
I would experiment with my voice, humming along but not always in tune with the vacuum. I’d begin below the pitch, then scoop my voice up very slowly, feeling the interactions between the pitch of my own voice and the pitch of the vacuum cleaner. As I got closer to the vacuum’s tone, sitting just microtones below it, I could feel the two pitches fighting each other. In organ tuning, this is called a “beat”, when two pitches go wah-wah-wah against each other. Then, when my voice finally matched that of the vacuum’s tone, the two would melt together in a silky smooth phase that seemed lighter than air. What a sensation! Then, I’d do it all over again. I’m not even sure my mother was aware that I was experimenting with the science of sound waves in my own little child-like way.
Nowadays I have a central vac, so it’s not possible to hear the motor or hum along while we run the vacuum. Other families may be in a similar situation. So, I thought I’d include some audio recordings of vacuum cleaners here from YouTube. Can your student find the pitch and hum along?
These sound samples aren’t very long, so maybe the student can play them several times and hum along — below, above and matching the pitch to listen to all the ways matched and mismatched pitches interact.
Singing can be a human’s greatest glory or hidden shame.
If a person knows how to sing in tune, they can confidently belt out the national anthem in a group, join a good choir and sing along to music at the piano.
If a person sings out of tune, they’ll forever hide it from others. They will be left out of one of the most bonding experiences humans can have: singing together.
Piano students who sing in tune stand to do better on their ear training, and better in music, period. They can internalize their understanding of music and phrasing in a more personal way. Singing in tune offers many benefits, artistically, intellectually and socially.
What are you waiting for?
Get started with the FREE printable!
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Video of the Week
Treasure Chest (Early Elementary, Beginner). A Spanish sound adventure that includes sing-along lyrics so young piano students can practice singing!
This rote pattern piece on white and black keys includes a teacher duet. The student’s fingers imagine gemstones and the teacher creates the effect of strumming a Spanish guitar. Student part encourages non-legato playing and helps develop healthy beginner technique and listening for beautiful tone. The student pattern repeats up the piano and includes hand-to-hand octaves. From the print and eBook First Impressions, or check out the Treasure Chest eSheet!
Curious about First Impressions?
Impressionist rote music for beginners, with teacher duets! Find out more!
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