Funding for the arts in our classrooms...

I have recently been asked the question, “Should we have to rely on parents and fundraising to run a modern BOJC program?”

           That is a very complex question that has numerous factors to consider. One school district are we talking about? In one school, I have visited recently basic textbooks have not been purchased for years while the school got grants for an expensive computer based reading program. I think many people would like to believe that schools always find a way to get the basics for Reading, Writing and Arithmetic but that is a myth. The federal government has grants and so does the private sector but they only have so much money and many needy school districts requesting the funds. While speaking to colleagues currently working in inner city schools I have learned quite a bit about the more impoverished inner city schools. In these poorer districts, students will not get the books they need to study history, buildings that are freshly painted when necessary, working intercoms in every classroom as a safety procedure, nor even special education paraprofessionals for every student who would benefit from their care. 

         One of my professors at the University of Bridgeport, Prof. Frank Martignetti has told members of the UB Master’s Degree program that some of the more affluent Connecticut districts allocate $25,000 for a musical each year. Another professor from my university Prof. Brandt Schneider has told those of us in his class that a good sound system may cost $50,000. Through my own personal research on the website: band shoppe.com, I have seen that the marching band jacket cost $104.95, shirts $42.95 and pants 34.95 and this is per student. This does not include hats gloves and matching shoes so the figure is easily $200 per uniform and you are assuming that the students will only wear one uniform per year in both hot summers and cold winters. One website that has published a sample budget put the yearly cost of their band at about $20,000. http://wumethodskr.wordpress.com/instrumental-program/sample-band-budget/  While choruses can be cheaper to run as the instruments are internal and many teachers choose to have students wear all black or black and white outfits there is still the matter of memberships to various competitive organizations such as Allstate $500 and transportation by buses to various performances a few hundred dollars and music purchases: over $1000. 

         Music programs can save children. I have heard many adults, former students from various schools approach me when they found out that I was a music teacher. These adults have reminisced about their days in the chorus, band or in the high school music and told me how important their music teacher was. Some have even said that without music they would have dropped out of school but they didn’t want to miss out on music classes. Also, music and the other arts are the culture of a society. People may live by technology but they live for the vital emotional connections that are part and parcel with culture. How can we give that up?

         The question about funding music programs through local tax money versus fundraising takes on whole new meaning. In districts that are affluent I think that it is entirely reasonable to have the school put appropriate amounts of money for music programs into its budget but in poorer districts this doesn’t seem practical. In a cruel system of financial inequalities, which types of deprivation educationally do we want our poorer children to suffer from? Freedom from poverty will always take higher precedence over the arts in our classrooms. If we can keep our cultural heritage alive through private fundraising then we must do so.

Technology in Music Education

                                    Technology in Music Education

         Technology is changing music education. Today we have apps for our phones that act as metronomes, A -440 pitch tuners, key transposition apps that make the life of the music teacher and music student easier. Music theory software is also teaching our students about music theory and is especially helpful in teaching students who do not already play an instrument. Students can just put on headphones run the programs and answer music theory questions that are also played so that students can hear their answers in real time. 

         Music technology has made recording music cheaper and accessible to everyone. Youtube would not exist without cheap recording software. This website is filled with garage bands, amateur singers and even choreographed musical numbers in schools. Music technology now affords our students to feel like real musicians by putting on their own music videos that can be seen by millions of people world wide. Students are engaged in real performance art and can see for themselves just how difficult it can be to create a polished music video or studio audio recording. This gives them a greater appreciation for the work of the artists that they already know and listen to. Furthermore, video and audio recordings do not just create more excitement and engagement in classroom work but also allows students to see and hear their own performances and to correct their own errors.

        I think though that the biggest change caused by technology is in composition. Today composition is a more real and viable element in music education. Students can work on projects online potentially using dozens of instruments that they would not have access to in the classroom nor would they likely know how to play. Now we have access to composition programs that allow students to create their own music and to hear it in real time. Two excellent free online composition programs are Noteflight and Muse Score which can be found at http://www.noteflight.com/login and musescore.org respectively. Noteflight has the advantage of being able to share your music with other users of the website. More sophisticated programs that required students to build their music from the ground up include Finale which has a limited free version, both can be found at www.finalemusic.com. As a first step some students are introduced to music looping with the product Garage Band from Apple but this is more music sampling and requires less musical thought as compared with the previous products.

         For blog sights that you can research for more information, I suggest visiting http://mustech.net which has online classes, reviews and explanations of music tech programs and http://musicianswithapps.com which gives reviews elementary school music play apps.

A Review of the Film: Young @ Heart

Young @ Heart: A movie that shows the social impact of choral participation

              Young @ Heart is a choir that performs rock and pop music by senior citizens. This film is a documentary directed by a British filmmaker Steven Walker who first came into contact with the Young @Heart Chorus while it was touring Europe. His film follows the group and interviews some of the individual members while they are preparing for a major tour. 

             The average age of the singers is 83 and the minimum age requirement is 73 years old. The Young @ Heart chorus is based in Northampton, Massachusetts and is directed by Bob Cilman. The films shows the interrelationships between the music, the singers, their families, their communities, their health and emotional welfare, the relationship with their audiences and with their choral director as well. Two members of the choir who are struggling with health problems die during the filming process and another singer Eileen Hall dies shortly after the filming of the movie.

             One man in particular whose heart is failing is singing while on oxygen and the other participants including the musical director Bob Cilman talk about the importance of having him perform with the group. Wives and other family members of failing members of the choir speak about the importance of the choir on their loved one’s lives. For some, getting better after a bout with cancer or heart disease means struggling towards a recovery that will include the chorus as part of their lives again. This is a goal that is important to them in their healing process and it is also important to the other members of the choir. Many members had never met each other until they sang together in the choir. Many members had never heard music from such artists as Coldplay but they learn with time to interpret the music and sing it well enough to thrill audiences. For this to be an authentic musical experience for these singers musical director Bob Cilman chooses music with emotional depth and doesn’t pull any punches, insisting that his singers learn the music. There are no excuses such as I’m old and I have never heard this type of music before. Everyone is there to learn the music and everyone has problems including health and personal problems they must overcome to learn the music and show up for rehearsals every week.

          I cannot help but think that part of the charm of hearing and seeing them is that they are showing all of us that you can still be vital and relevant to the world around when you are old. The positive and aggressive take no prisoners attitude of the members is encouraging to anyone who has thought about growing older and still having something to say to the world and to have purpose. As a future choir director, I don’t just think about the music as an art form. I think about the relationships that will be forged and how lives will be changed by having a positive group experience while working towards real and challenging goals. My own best memories of choir practice have been a mixture of hearing our group perform challenging music well and the caring community that we and the director had created for ourselves. The film, Young @ Heart shows the viewer exactly why choirs are so important both artistically and socially to everyone involved.

              

Midterm Paper

What are three important skills or traits for any music teacher?

Reference the Battisti and Boonshaft. 

         Three important skills or traits for any music teacher would be their

knowledge of the subject matter and other related subjects, their ability to teach and their ability to inspire. Music teachers need to know their subject matter otherwise they will be unable to teach it. They must choose the literature their students study. They must help student interpret the material through various lenses modern eyes, period performance, historical and cultural contexts. Teachers must know how to teach. Teachers cannot just bark out information. As our work is with music textbooks are not enough to teach with. We must give demonstrations of the subject matter, explain it as the students our taking in the sound and adjust performance techniques so that students learn from their errors. Finally, music teachers must teach to inspire. Music teachers ask much of their students, practicing for long hours after school and at home. The work is voluntary and performances are live in front of an audience who may judge them. For music to continue to be a part of our culture, we must also inspire people to continue with their musical pursuits beyond the classroom.

      A music teacher must have knowledge of the subject matter and any other matters that can be drawn upon to add further depth to our art form. As we music teachers often work alone in schools, we are called upon to be the first and last reference or expert in our field in the building. Furthermore, the field of music education in America does not have a required curriculum like the other fields like English or Math. Those teachers have textbooks that they are required to use by the school system and often have no choice or say in the curriculum whatsoever. As music teachers we are given the opportunity to decide what to teach, when and how with broad latitude. Therefore, it is vital for teachers to have both a broad and deep knowledge of music. 

       Author Frank Battista, writes in his book, On Becoming a Conductor, that real conductors are music educators as well. In chapter one of his book, pgs. 3-4, Battista writes that conductors must have basic musicianship skills, sight reading, the ability to hear a score mentally without sound, error detection hearing skills, knowledge of theory, harmony, music history and historical practices, composers and performance practices, score reading, the basic performing skills for singers as well as those needed on each instrument in the orchestra, their ranges and transpositions, etc. He further states that all conductors must have knowledge not just of period music but also of current music including popular music and knowledge of jazz as well. Peter Boonshaft also takes this view in his book Teaching Music with Promise, when he writes, “Knowing the score like the back of our hands is the first step,…surely the study of music theory, music history, performance practice orchestration and the like will bring a wealth of information to the table.” pg. 44 

        The ability to teach is also vital to being a good teacher of music. It is important to know how the human mind works, how it stores, processes and then transforms information as one does when making music.  Boonshaft comments on this in his book on page 174, “we have…new philosophies of how to assess learning, new ways to accommodate different learning styles, new designs for merging diverse educational content and the like.”

        Every conductor (and every teacher must be one) must communicate their evaluation of the music and their vision of it to the ensemble.  As this communication during performance often comes in fractions of a second Conductors must be clear and concise in getting across to their musician/students what they want them to learn. Battista when he writes of conductors must communicate ideas to the ensemble clearly through, “representative gestures, expressive mime gestures and explanation by word of mouth.” page 67.

     Furthermore, the music teacher must learn such subjects as muscle memory, how the body’s basic functions such as breathing work, how muscles interact with one another and the human body’s and their instruments limitations. Boonshaft writes about the need to instruct students on these topics on page 93 of this book. Concerning warming up, “Time spent getting students mentally and physically limber…It helps them ready their musculature…for lifelong literacy.”

     The ability to inspire others is a character trait that can be honed through reading psychology books, experiences in leadership as well but  not everyone who can read such books can become a good leader. Music teachers have a special kind of leadership. While they do inspire their students to work toward a specific musical goal such as playing a piece of music well in a concert they must do more.   

        With learning, we hope that our students never stop learning. For the health of their minds and souls we hope that they are learning until the day they die. Battista on p137 quotes Goya who said, “keep on growing…don’t go to seed!” Battista takes this further by writing: The choices in life are simple either one grows or dies.” CEOs do not need to inspire their workers into lifelong goals that extend beyond their work lives they merely inspire the best work they can from their employees for the duration of their time working for their companies. Military commanders do not need to inspire their troops for a lifetime just for the duration of their service in battle. Eventually every soldier’s service comes to an end. Boonshaft quotes Pericles in his book on music education on page 217, “What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but is woven into the lives of others.”

        A real music teacher inspires a lifetime of learning in the student for the arts. The student internalizes goals and sets up their own and works with their own discipline towards goals that far accede the scope of a class or a performance. They are self directed students. As the author, Boonshaft, writes on page 217, “the goal of our own planned obsolescence, teaching students as much about how to learn and why the joy of learning is as exciting as the subject matter itself.” Many including Harold Taylor who is quoted by Frank Battista in his book, On Becoming a Conductor, believe that music heighten the human experience and teaches us what it means to be fully human through an exploration of our emotions. Battista   page 142.

     To sum up the three most important skills and traits of the music teacher, we must have a broad education both in music and related fields, we must be able to teach effectively and we must inspire so that music does not die as a subject of human endeavor. Music teachers must know before others can learn from them. They must be able to express what they know in such ways that students will understand the new material.  To do this the teacher must know how others think, the general processes of the human mind as it learns. They must also know how that people’s  mental strengths and weaknesses vary so the teacher must be able to relate the material in such ways as to capitalize on students strengths. Finally, the music teacher must inspire for art to exist we must know how to create it and to appreciate its value to our souls so that we may better understand our own feelings and for the emotional connection we have with others in our culture.