As music educators, how can be build an audience? Should we worry about building one, or does it happen naturally?
I remember, when I was a student at CCSU, every music major was required to attend a specific number of concerts throughout each semester. This was a way to ensure that every performance had a audience and every person supported, heard, and saw their peers and mentors perform. A simple structure that "killed two birds with one stone" so to speak where everyone benefited. The down side to this? Any music major knows that their major is just about the busiest one imaginable. We take anywhere from 8-12 classes a semester, rehearse, practice, perform, and sometimes even work. When every minute of every day is accounted for, it makes taking an hour or two to attend a concert a frustrating task at times. As much as I always enjoyed a good concert, I'll be the first to admit that if this requirement had not been in place, I probably would not have attended half as many concerts during my undergrad as I did and not due to lack of interest but rather lack of time.
Why do I bring this up? Not to complain about having to attend concerts that I loved going to. Not to advertise the h*ll that music majors go through. But rather, to make the point that everyone is busy.
That is the reality of the world we live in. We have our jobs, our families, our relationships, our studies, and the very little and precious "us" time that we cling to for dear life and the fact is, the lives of our fantasy audience members is just as important to them as ours is to us. So how do we make taking the time to attend a public school concert a priority? We want our kids to perform for a good size audience. We want their families, their teachers, and the community to want to see and hear them perform. But with life always getting in the way, how can we build our audience?
For one thing, we advertise! A lot! We build up the music, we build up our students, we build up incentives. We make our concert the place to be. We schedule them at a convenient time and place, we make the admission free, maybe we even sell things during intermission. We impress upon student's families and our colleagues how much we appreciate their attendance and we work to make every concert an enjoyable experience that people want to come back to and one that our students are proud of.
The truth is, we can't guarantee an audience- no one can. But what we can do, is understand that life is busy and do our best to get our concerts put on the list of priority.
Sunday, April 17, 2016
Monday, April 11, 2016
10 Minutes of General Music Instruction- A Reflection
Today in my secondary methods class I had the opportunity to get up a teach 10 minutes of the 3 day lesson that I had written on "rhythm". For my 10 minutes I decided that I wanted to have the students do an activity that used their knowledge of rhythms in compound meter.
Overall, I think I had a good lesson planned but I could have executed it better than I did. While I think I was confident and clear in my instructions, I made two noticeable mistakes. The first mistake was not having a clear on the objective of the lesson. The point was to have students recognize, memorize, perform, and write rhythms that they had been practicing in compound meter. I think that if I had done a few things even slightly differently the objective would have been more clear and there would have been a better understanding among the students as to what they were doing. I should have set more restrictions on the lesson, this was my second mistake. I originally told the class that it was going to be common rhythms in compound meter but I wasn't going to tell them the time signature or the number of measures. After a minute I realized that this was too challenging and they would be more successful with a little more information. I then told them that the rhythms would be in 6/8 time and two measures long. By narrowing down the objective like this, the students were quickly more engaged and successful.
I think I planned a good activity that when put in the right context is really good for helping students put their knowledge to practical use. I just need to be more clear, in both my own head as well as the way I explain to the students, about what I specifically want to accomplish and how it's going to happen.
Overall, I think I had a good lesson planned but I could have executed it better than I did. While I think I was confident and clear in my instructions, I made two noticeable mistakes. The first mistake was not having a clear on the objective of the lesson. The point was to have students recognize, memorize, perform, and write rhythms that they had been practicing in compound meter. I think that if I had done a few things even slightly differently the objective would have been more clear and there would have been a better understanding among the students as to what they were doing. I should have set more restrictions on the lesson, this was my second mistake. I originally told the class that it was going to be common rhythms in compound meter but I wasn't going to tell them the time signature or the number of measures. After a minute I realized that this was too challenging and they would be more successful with a little more information. I then told them that the rhythms would be in 6/8 time and two measures long. By narrowing down the objective like this, the students were quickly more engaged and successful.
I think I planned a good activity that when put in the right context is really good for helping students put their knowledge to practical use. I just need to be more clear, in both my own head as well as the way I explain to the students, about what I specifically want to accomplish and how it's going to happen.
Creating A Love Of Music
I once had a college professor who compared teaching music to Santa Claus. Yes, you read that correctly; Santa Claus.
On the morning of my first day of leadership camp, my college band director asked me to close my eyes and try to remember what it was like when I was a little kid and I still believed Santa was real. She encouraged me to recapture that feeling of pure magic. That feeling of safety, hope, trust and love. The sense of security that whatever I wanted, Santa had the power to deliver no matter how hard or impossible it seemed. That feeling that there's someone out there who you can trust to lead you. That, she said, is how a music teacher should make their students feel about music.
She then went on to explain that we all start off innocent and willing to believe that music is magical in it's ability to take us to a unique place where no one else and nothing else can go, just like a child believing in Santa. Then when we get a little older, we eventually realize that Santa isn't real. He's not an all-knowing mystical figure, but rather represented by a real person made of flesh and bone. And while we are a little disappointed, we still feel that sense of gratitude towards the person (or people) working tirelessly to make us believe. And then some day, if we are blessed enough to be given the chance, we become Santa Claus so that we may create those feelings; that sense of magic, for someone else.
We have all felt the feelings that a music teacher gave us. That person instilled in us a passion and a love that runs so deep that we rise above and become that person for someone else. I believe that this, the ability to instill a deep love of music in our students, is our primary job as music educators. The only question is: how do we do this?
A few weeks ago, I watched the movie August Rush, the story of a young musical prodigy orphan (August) who uses his gift of music as a tool to find his parent. Throughout his journey he meets people of all ages, ethnicity, backgrounds, and performance abilities that impact him as both a person and as a musician. What each one of these people have in common is their love for music and the unique way in which they use it to express themselves. From each of these people, August takes a piece of their love of music and uses it to enhance his own love of music while it simultaneously leads him one step closer to his parents who are both musicians.
This film is powerful to me in many ways. For one, it is the compelling story of a beautiful child searching for his parents and his purpose. For another, it is a fair tale set to real life circumstances. But it also shows the power of music and it's ability to touch anyone and everyone who comes into contact with it. It shows it's power to move us, and create a humane side of us we otherwise may not have known.
I think that this is how we instill a love of music in our students: by loving it ourselves and letting that love guide our teachings. We do it by giving them something, even one little piece, of that magic that was created for us; a piece that they can take with them and keep forever until they are blessed enough to pass it along to someone else.
On the morning of my first day of leadership camp, my college band director asked me to close my eyes and try to remember what it was like when I was a little kid and I still believed Santa was real. She encouraged me to recapture that feeling of pure magic. That feeling of safety, hope, trust and love. The sense of security that whatever I wanted, Santa had the power to deliver no matter how hard or impossible it seemed. That feeling that there's someone out there who you can trust to lead you. That, she said, is how a music teacher should make their students feel about music.
She then went on to explain that we all start off innocent and willing to believe that music is magical in it's ability to take us to a unique place where no one else and nothing else can go, just like a child believing in Santa. Then when we get a little older, we eventually realize that Santa isn't real. He's not an all-knowing mystical figure, but rather represented by a real person made of flesh and bone. And while we are a little disappointed, we still feel that sense of gratitude towards the person (or people) working tirelessly to make us believe. And then some day, if we are blessed enough to be given the chance, we become Santa Claus so that we may create those feelings; that sense of magic, for someone else.
We have all felt the feelings that a music teacher gave us. That person instilled in us a passion and a love that runs so deep that we rise above and become that person for someone else. I believe that this, the ability to instill a deep love of music in our students, is our primary job as music educators. The only question is: how do we do this?
A few weeks ago, I watched the movie August Rush, the story of a young musical prodigy orphan (August) who uses his gift of music as a tool to find his parent. Throughout his journey he meets people of all ages, ethnicity, backgrounds, and performance abilities that impact him as both a person and as a musician. What each one of these people have in common is their love for music and the unique way in which they use it to express themselves. From each of these people, August takes a piece of their love of music and uses it to enhance his own love of music while it simultaneously leads him one step closer to his parents who are both musicians.
This film is powerful to me in many ways. For one, it is the compelling story of a beautiful child searching for his parents and his purpose. For another, it is a fair tale set to real life circumstances. But it also shows the power of music and it's ability to touch anyone and everyone who comes into contact with it. It shows it's power to move us, and create a humane side of us we otherwise may not have known.
I think that this is how we instill a love of music in our students: by loving it ourselves and letting that love guide our teachings. We do it by giving them something, even one little piece, of that magic that was created for us; a piece that they can take with them and keep forever until they are blessed enough to pass it along to someone else.
"Music is all around us, all we have to do is listen." - August Rush
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