arrange • compose • conduct
Posts discussing education, both in and outside of music
We talked in rehearsal today about the skill of initiative, in the context of working our way through John Wooden’s Pyramid of Success. One of my students succinctly defined it as, “Doing things without being told to do them.” (He also said his mom is often telling him to find […]
I hear some educators bemoan the lack of discipline in their students – “They are too entitled,” professors will say, or “They have no work ethic,” or “Ruined by their helicopter parents.” To start: I do think helicopter parenting is a problem, work ethic is vital, and no one should […]
Some high school music educators get accused of playing favorites, or “Only really caring about the future musicians.” They mean future music majors and future music/performing professionals. Yes, I care about encouraging my future musicians to flourish. Future music professionals.Future music educators.Future church choir members.Future college choir members.Future community choir […]
If you’re looking for the best songs, ask everyone. As I’m working through the song selections for our annual Cabaret, sometimes I think that I should put tighter rules around the songs – even going so far as to making a limited song list students should select from. The thing […]
I’m in the middle of my annual (well, almost annual…thanks, 2020) speed-writing of 30-40 band arrangements for a Cabaret performance our choirs present. I’m doing it for the first time in Dorico, which is costing my some speed at the beginning, but I think will lead to better looking and […]
John Wooden famously wrote, “You haven’t taught until they’ve learned.” In my opinion, a teacher should view every success as a result of the student’s hard work and every failure as a result of the teacher’s ineffectiveness. I try to give all the credit for a good performance to my […]
One of my challenges as a leader is to accept the power differential between me and my students. Personally, I tend to think of myself as a peer to my students – students of any age. We are all fellow travelers on a journey of learning, and I know that […]
Students get ticked off when we introduces shades of gray into black and white concepts they learned long ago. There’s a good reason to do it, of course. We want to introduce students to concepts before they’re really ready to comprehend it all, so we introduce a simplified version. Later, […]
I have been doing a fair bit of tutoring trigonometry this fall – my son has a strong mathematical mind, but his previous trig units came during the first weeks of the pandemic and then in an all-online (teacherless) Algebra 2 class, so he’s been playing major catch up, and […]
Every ensemble I’ve ever led has had some balance of satisfied:unsatisfied. For many students, we need to work very hard to teach them to be unsatisfied. We are teaching them to be critical listeners, to be motivated to practice, to aim for excellence. But for other students, we have to […]