Serving Teachers, Students, Parents and Professionals Virtually Anywhere
John Gardner
19 yrs experience as a high school band director. 14 yrs as college adjunct faculty. 30+ yrs in the fundraising industry and 24 yrs as a small business owner. (Don't add all those up.). Experience in both the fundraising sales and education worlds give me a unique combination of perspectives in both. I love working with the youthful enthusiasm of today's teenage achievers and with those who work with them.
Also 6yrs as proprietor of VirtualMusicOffice.com, which offers a wide variety of virtual services including web/blog design/hosting/managing, social media management (scheduling posts/tweets for maximum impact and brand enhancement) and small business consulting - specializing in school product fundraising.
Joan and I both come from broken homes. Her parents were divorced, remarried and divorced again. Her mother wouldn’t allow any contact with her father. For our wedding, Joan walked down the aisle alone. Joe was there for the ceremony but left immediately following. My parents’ divorce had less animosity. Our father was still in our lives. There were visits and support.
But we were both on the receiving end of what we wanted to ensure would never happen to our children. Part of that commitment meant that we would never allow our parents, or anyone else for that matter, tell us how to raise our children.
Need-blind admissions could mean a better school for less money.
“Need-blind admissions” was a term our students did not recognize and yet it can be a major difference in where you go to school and how much you pay. Read on for a definition, description and a listing of colleges that profess to have need-blind admissions.
It is a Boarding School (students live on campus) near Boston
Established 1787
Some people who had ties to the school included George Washington, Paul Revere, and John Hancock.
There are 1154 students on a 500-acre campus with over 100 buildings/sites on their campus map
It is a high school, grades 9-12
Graduates include two Presidents Bush, Jeb Bush and one of the Facebook founders.
48% are students of color
44 states and 45 countries are represented
They have faculty from every Ivy League school. ⅓ of faculty have PhD’s
The “head of school” has a Harvard Law Degree
Every student must be on an athletic team
They have NO AP classes
Harvard calls them a “feeder school”.
They have a student/teacher ratio of 7:1. (Harvard has 7:1, Yale has 6:1, Public Schools avg 28:1)
For the past three years, more than 20 Andover students have gotten into each of the following top schools: Brown, Columbia, Harvard, MIT, Princeton, Stanford, and Yale.
What does this have to do with getting into a better college for less money?
As you can see from the last bullet point above, going to a prestigious high school can be a ticket (or at least a significant advantage) to getting into a top university. Similarly, graduating from a top-tier university can be huge when it comes to getting into a graduate school, medical school, law school or a high-level job.
But top-tier universities have top-tier, seemingly unaffordable prices.
Schools like Notre Dame, Duke, MIT and most of the Ivy League schools cost $70,000+ per year. And because we mid-westerners focus so much on the big state schools and lower prices, the downside can be that we get what we pay for.
If you and I are competing for a spot at graduate school at Harvard, or to get into Yale Law School, will your [Big State School] degree get the same consideration as one from Duke, Notre Dame or MIT?
If I have an engineering degree from [Big State School] and you have one from MIT and we both apply for a position at NASA, your chances are better than mine.
But we don’t consider many schools because of the ‘retail price tag’ we see. That is a huge mistake. In some cases, you can go to a top-tier school for less money than you would pay a state-school.
Increasingly, universities are finding out that accepting students “need-blind” increases both diversity and the overall quality of a student body.
Some top-tier universities (and we had assumed all) consider both your credentials AND your financial ability to pay as part of the admissions process. Not so.
A “need-blind” policy means that they consider ONLY your academic and personal credentials when making a decision to accept you. Then, AFTER they accept you, they consider your finances. And at that point, if you cannot pay the full price, they will use other resources (their endowment, government financial aid, etc) to “get you there”.
THIS PAGE from Notre Dame’s site shows that they meet “100% of every student’s demonstrated financial need”. That means you have to prove it. If you have available funds, they will require that first. And part of your “package” may include loans — but from the amount of loan on the Notre Dame page is manageable.
THIS PAGE is a 2-yr old listing of colleges with need-blind admissions policies. I do not know if it is exhaustive, so check with schools you’re considering. And, as Mr. Petek suggested,
If your first choice does NOT offer need-blind admissions, but your second choice does, that could be a determining factor in where you go to school.
There are surprises every year at Solo/Ensemble contest. I would spend the day encouraging, listening, supporting, congratulating, and consoling. Without question, the experience students gain from participation is strong.
Life is not always fair, and neither are judges. A high school principal once commented to me after a disappointing marching band result that…
“They should judge these things the way we do basketball; points happen when the ball goes through the basket.”
At the end of the day of a Solo/Ensemble festival a few years ago, when two directors were complaining to the site official about the same particular judge, the official response was that…
“…that score represents a personal, professional opinion. That is what we hire them to do.”
There are problematic (for me to justify) judges in solo/ensemble festivals: …
You’ve heard it before. We promise. But you probably didn’t know it was written for Cincinnati. In the midst of an election that has divided us, we present to you the story behind this iconic song that was written 74 years ago, specifically to unite. Video by Carrie Cochran, Photojournalist and Meg Vogel. MORE: http://cin.ci/2frupXR
I was putting together a practice sheet for a student when I found I’d already done that. I may post that another time…..but at the end of it, I had some quotes….from me, my son’s trumpet professor and my clarinet professor. Oh, I may also do a more substantial post of my teacher’s comments, these were some of his rare positive ones.
“You should not have to tell someone you are good. BE good. PLAY good (well). And if you ARE good, others will tell you…. and that IS good.”
–me
“Always be modest and humble…..until you put that [trumpet] in your hand and step up to perform ….and then you become one mean, arrogant, confident, son of a [band parent]!” –Dr. CD, Professor of Trumpet at Tennessee Tech University (son’s teacher)
“Fast notes…! So what! NASA can teach monkeys how to wiggle fingers and push buttons. Fast notes deserve to be musical too!”
“Why do you insist on getting nervous when you perform? That is wasted energy and nerves make mistakes. Consider how many people in the audience could do what you are doing. Do what you know you can do and make them stand up.” –Dr. PM, Professor of Clarinet at University of Kentucky
Most participants in high school solo competitions are only in the performance room long enough for his/her performance and maybe for a couple friends’. They could learn so much by sitting and listening/observing for a while.
During some down time in between local student performances at a state level contest, I sat in a few performance rooms just to hear examples of what other students around the state are doing. I did not expect to see the wide range of performance quality given that I was at a STATE level contest and everyone participating had already received a GOLD (top) rating at district competition. If I had to summarize that experience, it would be with the conclusion that…
…not all music education results are created equal.
What is this fascination with calling politicians Fascist or Hitler? I find it grossly sickening, personally offensive to the extreme, and worthy of an immediate block of anyone I know who states that on my page. Oppose the candidate….that is fair. Criticize some of the things he has done. That is fair. I have too.
But this Hitler stuff has gotta stop — before somebody really DOES get killed.
Hitler is reported to have killed 11 to 17 MILLION people (NOT including the 20 million that the U.S.S.R. lost via his invasion), including approximately 6 million Jewish people in medical experiments (like tying together women’s legs as they are about to give birth), shootings, hangings, decapitations, mass poisonings, forcing mothers to choose between multiple children, starving, work camps and burning in ovens. How many died in boxcars en route to extermination camps? Do we have any extermination camps like that?
How many people has the current candidate killed? Compare that to the many stories of former workers or critics of former presidents who mysteriously suicided or otherwise accidentally died or disappeared.
Hitler imprisoned/killed”Gypsies” (Roma and Sinti), Homosexuals, people with mental and physical disabilities (my polio-inflicted mother would have been in that group), some religious groups, political opponents (wait! Who is doing that?), and black people living in Germany. Compare what he sanctioned in the ghettos of Warsaw with any of the genuine injustices in this country. Think Anne Frank and what she went through hiding in an attic for years before succumbing to disease in a Nazi death camp — along with her sister and mother.
He established the Einsatzgruppen, which were tasked with carrying out mass killings. They massacred entire villages with machine gunning and even filled village churches with women and children and then setting them ablaze. Did anything comparable happen when the current candidate was actually the POTUS?
Fascist Hitler executed over 80 of his own generals (that is worse than firing or being on the receiving end of a “mean tweet”, btw). Remember Field Marshall Rommel, his incredibly successful “Desert Fox” commander? Because he eventually recognized the evil, Hitler sent executioners to his home and offered him the choice of suicide by poison or public humiliation and trials. He did get a fake hero burial and his family was taken care of… because that helped the Hitler image.
He refused to recognize the accomplishments of non-Germans, and especially black Americans who won medals in the Berlin Olympics.
Is this the man desperatos are comparing to a presidential candidate?
Imagine Hitler serving fries at McDonald’s. Photo opp that it was, just visualize THAT comparison.
Sometimes I sit in the clarinet room during the upper level solos at Solo and Ensemble festival. There is a painful pattern of poor choices in music selection and interpretation, including the selection and performances of Sonata and Concerto pieces.
Choosing a Sonata vs Concerto for the wrong reason(s)
A brief music theory overview.
A Concerto is generally written for a Concert Hall …. for a Concert …. featuring a soloist with an orchestral accompaniment. It is normally 3 movements long; a bombastic first movement, a beautiful and contrastingly slow second movement and a flourishing climatic final movement.
Ensemble parts are usually boring, because the soloist is the feature. Only during the brief “Tutti” sections does the ensemble get to play much more than light, soft accompaniment. The Concerto is designed to “show off” the masterful soloist and it normally takes the instrument to the limits in tempo, technique and range. Mozart wrote his Clarinet Concerto for a friend considered to be a prodigy.
For a concerto performance with just a piano accompanist, as what is always the case for solo festival, the pianist is playing a simplified transcription of the orchestra score. In most cases, other than the potential of some 16th note runs in the piano part during the “tutti” sections (which can be edited or left out without drastically changing the piece), the piano parts are relatively simple, or can usually be simplified without changing the intent of the piece.
Historically, a Sonata was written as a chamber hall piece, written for a solo instrument and solo accompanist, often to be performed in a smaller setting than a large concert hall. I won’t get into the form of each of the normally 4 movements, but a sonata is more a “duet” where both instruments are of equal importance. The Sonata is usually less of a flashy piece, rather demonstrating what the two instruments can do together, often involving subjective interpretations of tempo and dynamics.
The Problems
….in picking the Concerto, the most common disappointment is when the student performs the piece at a ridiculously slow tempo. I’ve heard a Rondo (generally a 3rd movement 6/8 time performed in a 2 beats per measure pulse) played IN SIX. Or… the flashy first movement at half the intended tempo. I’m all about telling students they can be slightly under the published tempo to help with accuracy, but drastically changing the tempo also completely changes the piece, in my opinion. If you can’t play it the way it was written or intended, choose something else. Of course, the other option is to commit the practice to get it to performance grade, because the only sound worse than the super slow tempo is the sloppy technique of an ill prepared piece, evidencing a problem to be addressed in a separate post perhaps…..HOW to practice.
When it comes to the Sonata, I can almost envision the selection. The student is pointed to the band library solo/ensemble music drawer and begins looking through the solo options. Scared of the heavier use of black ink on the concerto, the student pulls out a sonata because it looks easier.
Yeah, eighths instead of sixteenths, hardly any ‘runs’. This piece is for ME.
The pianist, who often only gets 1-2 times to practice with the student, and who is probably also accompanying 10 other soloists, has had neither the time to adequately prepare the tougher piano part, nor the understanding of how the two go together……hence the painful disaster at contest as a result of poor interpretation.
Solutions / Recommendations
Pick a piece to highlight the soloist’s strength.
If your strength is technical proficiency (you can play fast, i.e. runs and arpeggios), the 1st or 3rd movement of a concerto can be a good choice. If a beautiful tone and vibrato are what you do well, then perhaps the 2nd movement of a concerto or some other solo form; such as an ‘air’ or a sound portrait type piece, might be a better choice. If you are good at playing with a wide range of emotion AND have access and rehearsal time to a good accompanist AND time to spend with a music coach who understands the particular piece selected, THEN….a sonata can be a strong choice.
Some of the lowest scores at contest are sometimes given to a decent musician who butchered a sonata, not due to poor musicianship, but to poor interpretation and understanding.
Get some expert coaching and/or listen to professional examples of that piece performed.
If you are studying privately, you should have the expert coaching you need. Your band director can often be a good source. As a director, however, I made an error a few years ago when I interpreted an Adagio tempo for a soloist. Mine was a good metronome interpretation, but not knowing that particular piece, I didn’t realize that the traditional method of performing that solo was to interpret the Adagio at the eighth note pulse and not the quarter note. The first time I heard a judge critique, I blamed the judge. The next time, when it was a different judge saying the same thing, I concluded I was mechanically, but not musically correct.
Sometimes it is difficult to find expert coaching in a geographic area for some specific instruments. Band Directors are usually expert in at least one instrument and may be proficient on multiple, but are not expert at all. The director can help with basics of notes, rhythms, dynamics, articulations, performance pedagogy, etc. But for interpretation, in the absence of a local coach, consider additional options:
1. Internet research. You should be able to find critique or comments on a variety of solo pieces, often as part of either a contribution from a college professor expert or from research data published in intellectual papers.
2. YouTube and other video presentations. CAUTION: Anybody can post videos and some are hideous. Better sources might include college senior music major recitals. Or look for multiple presentations of a particular piece and give extra consideration to the one with the higher number of views…..or to those that represent the pattern rather than the exception from your list of options.
3. Forums or discussion groups. Search to see if others are asking similar questions or having discussions about a particular piece. Often there will be at least one “expert” contributor.
4. Find a Skype coach. Colleges are using Skype to interview applicants. So are employers. When distance is an issue, it is an acceptable alternative. Music lessons or coaching via Skype are not common but are becoming more acceptable and available.
Music students from the local schoola participate in ISSMA (Indiana State School Music Association) sanctioned solo and ensemble district and state level competitions. ISSMA copyrights their judging forms so I can’t show those.
Many categories for solo contests are fairly universal, and as a template for the categories I will use here, I have selected categories posted on a high school site outside Indiana. For each category; the title and considerations are copied, the comments are mine.
INTONATION:
Accuracy to printed pitches.
In Solo performance, are you in tune with the piano (or the recorded accompaniment)? You should tune carefully before you begin, both to check intonation and to ensure the instrument is ready to go, especially if you have been waiting for a while. No instrument is completely “in tune”, i.e. tuning one note is not enough. You need to know what notes or octaves have what tendencies on your instrument and adjust accordingly. Flutes can roll in/out to help, trumpets have a 3rd valve slide and all brass instruments have alternate fingerings to compensate for typically out of tune notes (especially 1 & 3 valve combinations). Trombones are almost without excuse, right? Otherwise, you can bend your pitch up or down by adjusting your embouchure — or by using alternate key combinations. Practice with a tuner to determine which notes are in/out of tune. If you study privately, hopefully your teacher is helping you with the lesser-known key combinations and techniques as you strive for a higher level performance.
In Ensemble performance, try to tune before going into the performance room, but take the necessary time to get it right before you start. If the last sound the judge hears before you start is noticeably out of tune, you are in trouble in this category.
Tone is influenced and affected by many factors; instrument, mouthpiece, reed, and performer. If you have a step-up instrument and/or a better mouthpiece than the one that came with your 6th grade year instrument, then you should have some equipment help in tone production. But a good musician can make even lesser quality equipment sound good, while a poor musician can fail to produce what the equipment will allow. In other words, it is more than just the equipment — the judge is judging YOU!
Vibrato will likely be considered here for those instruments that are, at least at the higher levels, expected to play longer tones and melodic sections with a warm, controlled vibrato, typically oboes, bassoons, flutes, saxes, trumpets, trombones and baritones. French horns and clarinets generally are not expected to use vibrato.
Resonance, control, clarity, focus, consistency, warmth….all go to the currently accepted tone for your instrument. The best way, even if you are studying privately but especially if you are not, is to LISTEN to professional recordings. Online videos can be helpful, but some of those are posted by people not better trained or farther advanced than you. Resonance implies a deep, full, reverberating sound vs one that is weak and tentative. Is yours controlled or does it change drastically per octave or when you have skips of large intervals? When I think of clarity, I want to hear the instrument and not the reed, tone without fuzziness or buzziness. Consistency requires control. When someone talks of warmth, I think of a full flavored soft-drink or coffee vs something watered down. Warmth implies some emotional involvement (more below) in your sound.
RHYTHM:
Accuracy of Note Values, Rest Values, Duration, Pulse, Steadiness, Correctness of Meter.
Note values covers a lot. When a quarter note is followed by a rest, do you go all the way to the rest? When you have a dotted eighth-sixteenth pattern, do you sub-divide to ensure the dotted 8th gets 3/4 of the beat….and not 2/3? A common rest mistake is similar; not giving it enough value or rushing to the next note, which gets into Pulse. If it were possible to hook up a heart monitor to the way you play, you don’t want the screen to look spastic, or as if you are having a heart attack. You should have a clear, easy to read (hear) ‘beat’.
Is your tempo Steady, i.e., you don’t slow down during the faster parts and increase tempo in the easy sections?
Your heart rate increases when you run, but your tempo should not change when you play runs.
Practice with a metronome. If it feels like the metronome is pushing you, you’re dragging. If it seems like it is slowing you down, you’re rushing. If possible for 8th note meters (5/8, 6/8, etc), set the metronome so the 8th note gets the click. Obviously that becomes more difficult the faster the tempo.
TECHNIQUE (facility/accuracy):
Artistry, attacks, releases, control of ranges, musical/mechanical skill.
A question I’m often asked in a playing test setting where the student is going to be graded on how he/she plays something is; “How fast should I play it?” My answer is always,
As fast as you can play it accurately.
Facility speaks to how quickly or effortlessly you can play something, to your mechanical skill. Are you up to tempo on a technical passage or are you slowing it down so you can get all the notes. Balanced with facility is accuracy. If you slow it down and get it right, the judge might ding you a little on facility but should credit you on accuracy. The opposite is not true, however. If you play at tempo and miss lots of notes, you have demonstrated a lower level of both facility and accuracy. For the highest credit, practice it slowly, get it right, the gradually speed it up (with a metronome) to tempo. Accurately at tempo is the goal.
Is it better to play it slower and accurately, or at tempo and miss some notes?
Judge response: If you want MY highest rating, play it correctly at tempo.
Two terms above go together; artistry and musical skill. Have you interacted with Siri on the iPhone? That is a mechanical voice. Failure to demonstrate artistry or musicianship (musical skill) would be like listening to someone who speaks in a monotone, or someone who writes without any capitalization or punctuation. Similarly to the impact of a well-delivered preacher’s sermon, politician’s speech or orator’s dramatic reading, your artistry will affect your audience…and the judge.
When it comes to attacks and releases, most attack better than they release. Work at both. In a slower, melodic passage, can you start the note on pure air minus the tongue, or at least get the sound started without the sound of the articulation? Sometimes thinking of a football can work with a picture of how sound (or phrases) begin and end. Don’t start with a thud and don’t end with a chop off. Sometimes you need the tongue to stop the sound, but ending with the air is preferred.
Do you struggle with low notes on a saxophone or high notes on a trumpet or clarinet? Or any instrument? That is about consistency and control. It is more than just blowing and wiggling fingers. Can you maintain a dynamic level as you change octaves? A clarinet descending from high to low actually needs more air at the lower levels to maintain the same volume. Do you have some notes that pop out? That demonstrates a lack of control.
Record yourself using a computer device (such as iPad free app “Recorder Plus HD”) that shows your recording level. When you review, look for sudden peaks or valleys in volume… Sometimes you can get a visual of control issue.
And notice that, with this judging sheet category, “note accuracy” is assumed rather than mentioned. Playing right notes is the minimum of any performance and if that is all you do, you should expect a mediocre rating or result. In a previous article, I likened this minimal notes-only approach to driving a car and staying on the road while avoiding the other signs along the way.
There is a lot of overlap in these categories. Interpretation involves HOW you play WHAT you play. Are you in the style of the piece. Trills and grace notes in a Mozart piece are different from those from more recent composers. The style of a rondo is different from that of an intermezzo. When it comes to phrasing, are you adding fluctuation to the sound? Is it going somewhere? Is there a beginning, a peak and an end to a phrase? Do you play the way you speak? Phrasing can also include articulation (next category) and dynamics. Just as tempo was a part of fluency and accuracy described earlier, it is also part of interpretation. If you play a technical concerto by Mozart or Weber and you take the allegro section at half tempo to get the notes right, you have mis-interpreted the tempo.
Articulation
Few things are more obvious to a trained musician than to hear the errors of sloppy articulation; slurring everything, constant tonguing or a random combination.
Music performance can include articulation interpretations, but if you are changing what is marked on the paper, you need to mark your changes on the judge’s copy. Make sure the judge knows that what you played was what you intended.
If you have an extended 16th note run that is market all staccato, and you struggle with playing that, and you don’t want to reduce the tempo, then you might want to slur two, tongue two in a grouping of 4 sixteenth notes, for example. Mark the judge’s copy. He/she could still ding you a little for your articulation interpretation, but less than if you made the change without marking the original.
The other main weakness in articulation is the technique, i.e. HOW you articulate. Have you ever heard someone with a speech impediment? The challenge in fixing those is that most of what is happening is going on inside the mouth. Speech therapists are trained to do that. Do you need a specialist?
For a reed player, are you touching the reed, the roof of the mouth, or are you making some sort of ‘k’ or other throat sound to stop the air? Not all articulations are created equal. If you make the judge spend time trying to figure out what is going on inside your mouth (articulation technique), you are hindering your success.
Performance Factors
Choice of literature, appropriate appearance, poise, posture, general conduct, manerisms, facial expression.
Choice of literature: Demonstrate your strengths, hide your weaknesses. If you struggle some with rhythms, have trouble with fast passages, perhaps you should choose a slower piece. If you struggle with vibrato, don’t select the slow, melodic romantic-style ballad.
Appropriate appearance has nothing to do with your beauty or your weight. If you go to a job interview that would require you working in a business office and you arrive in jeans with holes and a t-shirt advertising an alcoholic beverage, you start with the wrong impression. Most solo/ensemble festivals will accept clean casual. Understand that most of the judges are college professors, where their performers are often required to wear tuxes and formals. Don’t shock them. If you come to the performance room looking like you have dressed for success, that you are showing respect for the judge, the audience and the event, you will earn credit in this area.
Poise and posture. Look like a performer. If standing, consider having both feet flat on the floor. If sitting, move forward on the chair with both feet on the floor. Poise includes the idea of selling both yourself and what you are doing. A college professor was advising a modest, yet talented musician and explained it this way:
Humility is a virtue. It is okay to be meek and mild….UNTIL you put that [instrument] in your hands and walk out onto that stage. THEN I want you to be an arrogant, confident, mean son-of-a-[band parent]. Take the stage. Command and control the audience.
My college professor told me to…
…make them stand up.
General conduct / manerisms, facial expression. Avoid toe tapping. Don’t grimace when you make a mistake. You’re in the spotlight and everything is important.
This is generally a catch all category and judges can use it to give you a higher rating here than maybe they were able to on other areas. This should be the category in which everyone can do well.
I was putting together a practice sheet for a student when I found I’d already done that. I may post that another time…..but at the end of it, I had some quotes….from me, my son’s trumpet professor and my clarinet professor. Oh, I may also do a more substantial post of my teacher’s comments, these were some of his rare positive ones.
