Allow me to share the story behind the performance and the rating from this 46-yr old piece of falling-apart paper.
Throughout high school, Robert Roden was my clarinet teacher. I was the first chair clarinet at Holmes HS in Covington, KY. He also taught the first chair clarinet student from Simon Kenton (where he was Band Director) and at Campbell County HS. We were all in the same grade and had been competing with each other throughout high school when it came to District and All State ensembles.
For Solo Contest senior year HE GAVE ALL THREE OF US THE SAME SOLO!
It was a crazy difficult Theme and Variations on “Au Clair de la Lune”.
It created quite a stir as it became a bragging rights contest between the three bands.
When the schedule came out, I was third to go.
Pressure.
The first girl went – got a “I” (Superior) Rating. The room was fairly full with mostly students from her school.
More pressure.
The second girl went – got a “I” (Superior) Rating. Again, the room was fairly full.
Pressure cooker.
When I went, there were students from all three schools who couldn’t even all get into the room.
The piece is structured with a theme, piano interlude, variation, interlude, variation, etc.
The judge is Earl Thomas, clarinet professor at Eastern Kentucky University. He knew me well as I had studied with him four summers at the Stephen Collins Foster Music Camp at his school.
As I am ready to begin, Thomas says,
Mr. Gardner, I don’t think I have ever heard this piece performed at the high school level and this is the third time I am hearing it today.
(I explain we three had the same teacher).
Cruel.
Well sir, since I have already heard this piece twice, can we just cut out the piano interludes? Just play each section, pause, and go on to the next.
For those who know me, I hope you would agree that my biggest strength is technique while my biggest challenges are endurance (and nerves). I could play fast, but I really needed those breaks. GONE.
I got so worried about losing the interlude breaks that I forgot to get nervous about performing….. I always wondered if, knowing me, he did that on purpose just to see how I’d respond.
At the end of my performance, HE STOOD UP FOR ME …. and then gave me the highest rating of the three. Yay!
My decision to become a band director came during the Morehead State University Band Clinic during my 7th grade year. I purchased my first baton at the clinic. I was primarily influenced by three of my teachers.
James Copenhaver (Dr. Copenhaver, 34-yr Director of Bands at the University of South Carolina) was my beginning teacher during my first year (and his first year of teaching) and high school band director for two years. I wanted to be just like him. He pulled me aside Freshman year and said something like….
If you want to be a band director, you’re going to have to go to college. Your family may not be able to afford that…so I suggest you use your four years in high school to make yourself good enough that by the time you graduate, colleges will want to pay you to come.
They did.
Robert Roden taught me how to play clarinet during my high school years. I never heard him play (heart condition), but he had a good way of describing what I should do to play well. At my band director’s urging, he allowed me to “audition” for a spot in his studio. After hearing me, he made me a deal…
“You play well. I can help you get better. But you can’t afford me. As it turns out, I have a bad heart and can’t do yard work or heavy lifting. So, if you would be willing to cut my grass or shovel my snow, or do any other jobs around my house as needed, then I will provide you clarinet lessons until the day you show up here unprepared. Do we have a deal?”
Yes. And he kept his word. Senior year I received a “I+” (not a legal ranking) at solo festival, was 1st chair in All-State, 1st chair in an Honor Band (top spot in the top band out of six at the clinic), 1st chair at two summer music camps, and 1st chair in the United States Collegiate Wind Band that toured Europe and the U.S.S.R.
Tragically, he died in a fire at a dinner club where he was playing. He got out of the building, but went back in to get his music. My father was an off-duty Fire Chief on the scene.
The third person was my college clarinet professor. He was a terrible human, hated teaching girls, hated teaching clarinet (wanted to be orchestra director)…..but set his standards high and used fear, intimidation, and humiliation to force improvement. At least he taught me how to prepare.
My musical career from 5th grade through college was about performance and competition. My first teaching assignment was a small rural school (I had gone to a large inner-city high school) was a shocking experience for me. When I would encourage a parent to provide for private instruction, I was told that I was the teacher. When recommending a step-up instrument, I was asked what was wrong with the one they bought. Since there were limited resources, I refocused on the concept of teaching students how to achieve success. In 2005, when I had an opportunity to meet with a group of former students, not a single one had gone into music as a vocation, but all had children in band because of the positive experience they had. I felt reinforced. Because of the way the bar had been set for me, I set the bar high there, expected them to reach it – and most did. As a group, they achieved much success, reaching 4th in state in two of my four years with over 20% of the high school in the ensemble.
Now, back in education after two decades away (which means I’ve missed all the current training over that time), I describe myself as the old guy with youthful enthusiasm. I would have to label myself a social efficiency-ist, which I realize sets me in confrontation with a lot of current teaching and training. I’ll try to keep an open mind.
Here are some statements I put in a brochure I send to parents of potential private instruction students. I call them my Gardner-isms:
Good Grades Do Pay – and I can prove it.
Colleges Pay for those who Play – well!
It doesn’t matter whether you win or lose — until you lose.
If the notes are on the paper, it is your job to play ALL of them.
If you’re going to play it, you might as well play it right.
The view from 1st chair is much better.
Private Lessons can be like paying for college — one week at a time.
Be prepared: Make sure your parents are getting their money’s worth.
Santa isn’t the only one who knows whether you’ve been bad (no practice) or good.
You can’t sight read in your lesson and get away with it. I’m better than that.
Like the ice skater who misses the quad, missing notes in public can hurt.
Anybody can be mediocre. Not you. Not with me. Don’t even think about it.
You can practice hard now and have fun at performance, or you can have fun now…
Do you really want to pay me to tell you it was good — if it wasn’t?
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.
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
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.
There was a fun “Prize Program” that went with our Candle Sale for the band. Yes, it was one of MY (Priority Fund Raising) sales. Here was the prize description at the bottom of the letter (highlight added).
AT THE ICE CREAM PARTY
CA$H BA$H
Tape the Directors to the Wall (BYODT)
Ice Cream – All You Can Eat
Variety of Door Prizes
Pig Races (Names drawn)
FUN…FUN…FUN
ICE CREAM PARTY for ALL who sell $100+
The Ice Cream Party was for all who sold over $100. There were about 50 people who qualified. The challenge was to eat all the ice cream, with the guarantee that if all the ice cream was gone, we would reschedule and do it again. NOTE: They didn’t eat all the ice cream.
BUT there would be other fun that only those at the party would experience.
CA$H BA$H was a cash give away. Students would draw tickets for amounts of cash ranging from $1 to $50.
DOOR PRIZES were random prize items I brought from my warehouse.
PIG RACES will need to be another story, but they were battery operated pigs that wriggled and grunted, or walked forward. There was zero control. Names were drawn for participants. Winners got cash or door prizes.
BYODT (Bring Your Own Duck Tape) was to be a highlight. Here’s how that went down…….
The students placed two chairs against the back wall in the band room; for Mr. Campbell and myself. And then, they had plenty of time to tape us to the wall with what they brought for the occasion
Obviously, I would require more tape.
When they finished, they gently removed Mr. Campbell’s chair from under him. He slowly slid down to the floor. So they all went about adding more tape to me.
Then….
…instead of gradually pulling out the chair, it was kicked out from under me, the way you might do if you were hanging someone….
It was such a violent (relatively speaking) maneuver that it pulled me away from the wall and I went crashing to the floor. I landed hard and, yes, it hurt……but the kids were laughing so hard I covered it up and laughed along with them.
And yes, they did help remove the tape from me and the wall.
On October 15, 2011, I got a call from my brother telling me the nursing home called to say they didn’t expect Mom to make it through the night. I was not only 120 miles from where she was, but I was over another 100 miles on the other side of Huntington.
The band was about to perform for final competition and would still be in Chesterton for another couple hours waiting for results. One of the parents offered to leave the competition (missing the band’s performance) to drive me back to Huntington. Mom had not been very conscious for a while. I knew if she had been, her strong desire would have been for me to…
“Stay with the band”.
I did, and it was 1:30 AM when we arrived back to Huntington. My plan was to sleep for an hour and then take off for Covington. It was about 2:00 AM when brother called again to say, “She’s gone.” I wouldn’t have made it even if I had kept driving — and probably not even if I had immediately left the competition.
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.
