Music Is Not for Insects

PLEASE ATTEND YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD SCHOOL.

Here in Seattle, our school board has adopted new attendance area boundaries. “These boundaries define the schools to which students will receive an initial assignment, based on their address.” For some this is good news. For others, bad news, especially if the school you attend has no music program…

MUSIC FOR ALL STUDENTS?

In light of these boundary changes, we are looking to restructure our instrumental music program district wide. With hopes of providing more articulation between elementary, middle and high school music programs, we have a lot of work ahead of us. As in any large urban school district, the disparity between music programs at various school is usually tied to demographics and parent resources. Elementary instrumental music is the program that will probably see the most changes; we are the ones who start students on their instrumental career…

OUR CURRENT SITUATION-

In addition to teaching elementary general music and choir at my school, I also teach instrumental music in the same building. This is not the case with most of the elementary music programs in our district. Instrumental music starts in 4th and 5th grade. Most elementary music students are served by a teacher who is also at several other schools in the district. These itinerant music teachers are at one school for usually have a day once a week and typically see students for one 30 minute lesson a week. Most teach small groups of like instruments. There is not a “band” or mixed ensemble that meets each week until perhaps a dress rehearsal before the concert. *Nearly every kid is pulled out of another elementary classroom to attend an instrumental music lesson with the teacher. Some students in under-served areas receive some free after school tutoring. It’s not until middle school (grade 6 in Seattle) that students have the opportunity to sign up for band or orchestra as a class that meets everyday.

HOW IS INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC ORGANIZED IN YOUR DISTRICT? Please advise…

My question to you my elementary music colleagues is this: what are you doing in your district for instrumental music that is working? Is it supported by your district? Is there a new paradigm we should consider? Are there enough instruments for all your elementary students? Do all your schools have instrumental music? How often? Do most continue playing at middle school and beyond? Are students pulled out of class? Please comment with any ideas, suggestions and input I can share with my district music administrators.

I saw this on a sign here in Seattle. I haven’t posted in awhile and thought this would be something worth sharing…stay tuned.

The Stanford Mobile Phone Orchestra in Concert

Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lXh2n0aPyw&feature=player_embedded

In a previous post, I mentioned I would be delivering a presentation to some high school and adult music tutors volunteering with Seattle Music Partners. Thanks again for your feedback. Below is my presentation. It may not completely make sense, but I hope it will be helpful.

It’s not reality but augmented reality with my wife and I participating in a music video with my “buddy” John Mayer:

Here is John talking about augmented reality and the first music video to use the new technology:

Hello music ed blogging community. I have the opportunity to speak to several wonderful music volunteers this next weekend. They are mostly high school aged music students who will be tutoring with Seattle Music Partners, a non-profit that provides after-school music lessons to underserved elementary and middle school students in Seattle’s Central District.

I have 30 minutes to give them some tips about how 4th-6th grade instrumental students, mostly beginners, can be successful. I plan to talk about-

• What you can expect when teaching beginners- their developmental abilities.
• How to structure an hour long lesson
• Practice tips
• Ways to keep beginners motivated between lessons
• Resources for teaching (books, websites, games, etc)

I would be grateful for your input on any of these items. Leave a comment and I’ll be sure to give you credit in my notes. Any “this has worked for me” gems you can provide to help and inspire these wonderful volunteers.

I will also make my presentation available in a future blog post. Thank you blogging colleagues! I look forward to your ideas.

If you are looking for a way to inspire your drummers to practice, you should check out the Roland RMP5 Rhythm Coach pictured below:

But before I begin this review, in light of the recent FCC ruling that bloggers must disclose payments for reviews, I would like to make the following disclosure about this review:

Music is Not for Insects in no way received compensation or a “freebie” from Roland for this favorable review. Even though the blog owner wished he would have received some free stuff from Roland, perhaps a shout out or even a keychain, this review of the Roland RMP 5 Rhythm Coach was made out of my own experience (and sweet frustration) using this awesome tool for percussion students.

Ok- now that is out of the way, let me tell you about my experience with this cool rhythm tool I will be using with my percussion students.

NOT AN ELECTRONIC RUBBER DRUM HEAD

As you can see from the photo, this is an electronic snare drum with a mesh drum head that triggers an electronic drum sound when you hit it with your drum sticks. Not a new idea- electronic drum kits have been around awhile, but the feel of the drum head is really great and you can adjust the tension on the drum head to get the right feel for your students. As with most electronic drums, you can adjust the volume, the type of drum sound (snare, tom, cymbal) and output the sound to headphones or a powered speaker or PA via an external jack. But the cool part of this rhythm task master is the Coach mode.

ACCURACY IS AN UNDERSTATEMENT

Want your percussion students to focus on proper technique and accuracy? Set the RMP5 to “Coach Mode-Accuracy Score” and you can create exercises for your students that will kick their rhythmic behinds. Here is how it works:

1. Set your metronome to desired BPM.
2. Select Coach Mode-Accuracy Score.
3. Wait for the 2 measure count off.
4. Try to play exactly with the metronome.
5. The rhythm coach will show if you are behind, dead-on or ahead of the beat on the built in display.
6. After a pre-determined amount of measures, you receive an accuracy score of how well you played.

Immediate feedback in the form of a percentage of hits right on the beat will be displayed after you play. Sounds easy? It took me 15-20 minutes of constant focus and concentration to get a perfect score playing simple quarters notes at 120 BPM! I nearly cried…but I did it! And took a picture to prove it (see Roland video below to watch coach mode in action):

Imagine how your kids will respond to the challenge. I found myself standing taller, focusing on my matched grip technique and making sure my strokes were the same height to get that perfect score.

SMOOTH OUT THOSE STROKES

There is also a “stroke balance” feature that will give you a visual cue as to how even the weight of your strokes are…get rid of that galop sound in those double stroke rolls and paradiddles. There is also a feature where you get a count off and you play through a cycle of half, quarter, eighth, triplet and sixteenth note patterns. Step it up to 6, 7, and 8 group patterns and you can really get your chops cooking. Price? Not cheap…about $250 on the street but I think it will be a valuable resource for my students.

HOW WILL I USE THIS IN MY INSTRUMENTAL CLASSROOM

I’m hoping to have this set up in a corner of my room and have my drummers rotate through using the Rhythm Coach during rehearsals. With a pair of headphones to keep the noise down, and one eye on them to make sure they don’t abuse the equipment, I expect this to be a valuable tool for my drummers. I will have them keep track of their accuracy scores and develop some friendly competition within the section. I’ll keep you posted on how it goes.

Coach Mode-accuracy score video

The L.A. Philharmonic has a new music director: Gustavo Dudamel. And to celebrate the new maestro’s first season, you can try a clever little conducting game on their website. It’s kind of like Guitar Hero meets Berlioz on your computer keyboard. You can even download the game as a free app on your iPhone. Who knows…this might actually spawn a whole set of classically based “Guitar Hero” like games.  Hmmm…what would be the classical equivalent of “Through the Fire and Flames” the most difficult song on the first version of Guitar Hero? Webern? Schoenberg?