Abstract
Engaging Musical Practices: A Sourcebook for Instrumental Music
edited by Suzanne L. Burton and Alden H. Snell II. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2015; rowman.com.
Engaging Musical Practices: A Sourcebook for Instrumental Music makes for valuable supplementary reading for any college Instrumental Music Methods course and is likewise beneficial material for the veteran teacher. Fifteen chapters summarize essential music education topics for orchestra and band (small and large groups), including jazz band and marching band, as well as less traditional groups, such as mariachi and steel band. A number of research articles and books are referenced and compiled into concise, pragmatic chapters covering topics from beginning through advanced levels, including recruiting, retention, assessment, musicianship, and sample instrumental music assignments.
Particularly appreciated is Chad R. Nicholson’s advice on selecting repertoire that your ensemble can actually transition to advanced musicianship by performing music of a lesser difficulty with a higher degree of consistency, rather than vice versa (p. 109). Too often bands attempt to play music that is unreasonably difficult for them and players lose any musical benefit. William I. Bauer and Richard J. Dammers offer ideas for implementing technology with music learning. Not only can technology be an excellent resource for assessing students, but it also provides tools for organization, administration, and online professional conferencing.
The majority of the chapters are reinforcing the nuts and bolts of instrumental pedagogy and administration, but chapter 9, “Teaching Everybody Everything,” is one of my favorites. In Alden Snell’s words, “the foundation for my curriculum became extracting musical components from repertoire for all students to learn. I could now articulate and assess learning goals and objectives based on musical content that everyone learned” (p. 164, italics mine). To teach everybody everything, we understand that listening is the foundation for teaching music, but students must also engage in the vocabularies of dialogue, reading, and writing. This chapter provides an excellent framework for selecting repertoire to create a comprehensive curriculum and even provides an example rehearsal plan of Sousa’s “The Washington Post March” to teaching goals and objectives.
Another favorite read is chapter 11, “Engaging Students in Instrumental Music Assessment,” which offers excellent information for educators not only to make instrumental class grading more transparent but to improve the quality of data conveyed to students, parents, and administrators. Many state education departments are requiring further data to demonstrate student achievement over time. By involving students in self-assessment activities, they should appreciate that assessment is for improvement of skills versus competition. In addition, students will have a better understanding of what it is that teachers want them to learn. Students who have ownership in both formative and summative assessment can reduce disagreement regarding grades.
Although not every reference list can be exhaustive, it would be useful to add Wayne Markwork’s The Dynamic Marching Band (2008) to chapter 7, “The Modern Marching Band.” Reading the list of references and recommended resources alone in A Sourcebook for Instrumental Music provides the instrumental teacher with an arsenal of high-quality materials to sharpen his or her tools for teaching. Many journals and scholarly books are mentioned, as are first-rate music education publishers, such as GIA Music and Meredith Music Publications. Ideas and foundations presented throughout the sourcebook will help teachers to design a national curriculum dedicated to Creating, Performing, and Responding.
Professor of music,
Wright State University
School of Music,
Dayton, Ohio;
Teaching Music through Performance in Band, Vol. 10
compiled and edited by Richard Miles. Chicago: GIA, 2014; www.giamusic.com.
Teaching Music through Performance in Band, vol. 10, is the newest volume in the Teaching Music through Performance in Band series. This particular volume, just as the other nine, is composed of two major parts. Part 1 is divided into six chapters, each of which is written by a different author and includes topics covering goal setting, student leadership, musical skill development, and extensive examination of band as an academic ensemble for teaching comprehensive musicianship. Part 2 provides an in-depth analysis of a variety of pieces at levels ranging from grades 2 through 6. All resource guides are written by experts in the band/wind ensemble directing field.
Chapters 1 through 6 (pp. 1–177) offer substantial information about a number of concepts in wind band world. Larry R. Blocher compares the decisions and choices a band director has to watching and riding a roller coaster. Eugene Corporon discusses subjects ranging from advocacy and ownership to audience expectations and interpretation. These are but two of the authors and topics covered, all of which are interesting, but the final chapter, written by the editor, Richard Miles, really stood out for me. In this chapter, Miles examines band as an academic ensemble for developing complete musicianship. He offers ideas for long-range curriculum development and shares strategies for teaching music during rehearsals. Miles touches on almost every facet on what a band director should do.
Each resource guide is broken down into units on composer, composition, historical perspective, technical considerations, stylistic considerations, musical elements, form and structure, suggested listening, and additional references and resources. These segments form the structure of each resource guide, providing consistency for all the pieces examined. Even though the structure is the same, each piece is examined by a different director, allowing the unique voice of each author to speak concerning the compositions. Certain directors used sample portions of the pieces in explaining melodies, phrasing, and so on. A great example of this was used on pages 541 to 545 in the guide for “Divertimento for Wind Orchestra” by Jindrich Feld. This would have been a beneficial feature for each of the pieces, allowing greater ease in understanding the concepts presented.
The final two sections of each guide, suggested listening and additional references and resources, are extremely helpful in connecting the examined piece with other compositions and literature. These sections encourage directors to learn more about other pieces and composers related to the piece being studied. Both directors and students can benefit from this type of continued learning.
Given the information covered in this book, current and future band directors will find this resource helpful. It will significantly assist in score preparation and rehearsal planning. In addition to a detailed analysis of each piece, a complete compact disc set is included containing professional reference recordings. All components of this resource are accurate and make it a great addition to any band director’s library.
Instrumental music teacher,
Columbia Borough School District,
Lancaster, Pennsylvania;
The Instrumental Music Director’s Guide to Comprehensive Program Development
by Michael J. Pagliaro. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, published in partnership with NAfME, 2014; rowman.com.
With a title like The Instrumental Music Director’s Guide to Comprehensive Program Development, I was expecting a 500- or 600-page tome to arrive in my mailbox, as I would expect of any work that purports to cover any aspect of teaching music “comprehensively.” The Program Development portion of the title led me to expect a work that would focus primarily on recruiting and retention, with some ancillary treatment of issues such as community engagement, public relations, branding, and so on. What arrived was a thin (143-page) volume containing an eccentric and unorganized collection of twenty-two essays, of which eighteen dealt with instrument purchasing, repair, maintenance, and the like. These concerns, while important, are but one small facet of comprehensive program development.
Michael J. Pagliaro is the owner of a musical instrument service, and this focus is apparent in the book. The title of another of Pagliaro’s books is Everything You Should Know about Musical Instruments but Didn’t Have Time to Learn, and this book seems to reproduce much of the information found there. Much of the material presented in the essays is commonsense information that any person certified to teach music would already possess.
Some of the information in the book is outdated. In the chapter on the measuring process for beginning instrumentalists, Pagliaro discusses the bell-front “recording tuba” as one of the three basic designs of tubas in “popular use.” In reality, recording tubas have not been in “popular use” for several decades and are no longer made by any of the major instrument manufacturers.
In an effort, I assume, to be “comprehensive,” Pagliaro often goes into extreme detail about aspects of music education that are not likely to be encountered by a practicing professional. Again in the chapter on measuring students for their first instruments, Pagliaro lists the pocket trumpet, the mellophone, and the flugelhorn as appropriate beginner instruments. I have never encountered an instrumental educator who uses these instruments in his or her program. In the chapter “Testing for Musical Instrument Learners,” he proposes an IQ test as an appropriate part of a battery of tests used to screen beginners. I have, again, never encountered a practitioner who would use an IQ test for this purpose and would strongly advise young educators against doing so.
Overall, The Instrumental Music Director’s Guide to Comprehensive Program Development does not include much information that would warrant the time needed to read it in the life of a busy music educator.
Doctoral wind conducting associate,
Mason Gross School of the Arts,
Rutgers University,
New Brunswick, New Jersey;
Quality of Life Habits of a Successful Band Director: Balancing Life and Work for the Modern Music Professional
by Scott Rush and Jeremy Lane. Chicago: GIA, 2014; www.giamusic.com.
This book is a practical guide for music teachers, specifically band directors, who are struggling with long hours, stress, and difficulties balancing personal and work life. Music education is a calling: many band directors choose their professions early in life. For us, our jobs are a huge part of our identities. Work–life balance is not something generally discussed in music teacher training programs but is an area that should be, as burnout rates show. This book will be helpful for preservice music teachers as part of college course work (as a companion to Rush’s influential Habits of a Successful Band Director), for mentors of music teachers, or for teachers who need a fresh perspective.
The book weaves a narrative with practical suggestions. Four chapters detail the evolution of hypothetical band director “Tyler” from bright college musician to a young teacher facing a difficult teaching gig, to a workaholic who rarely sees his spouse and kids, and finally, to the veteran teacher who has struck the perfect balance among work, family, and spiritual life. Unfortunately, it encourages the norm of a male band director, but it is successful in outlining the central issues of the book. Interspersed between sections of this narrative are chapters that discuss these issues in more depth: (1) the challenges of being a band director, (2) several chapters on ways to better balance life and work, (3) advice from band masters Ray Cramer and Frank Battisti, (4) insight for band director mothers, and (5) a chapter specifically for preservice teachers. Like a good self-help book, this work includes exercises to help the director evaluate his or her current situation and suggestions for implementing change.
As a woman band director, I found chapter 8, “Strategies for Successful Motherhood and Band Directing,” to be especially relevant; the topic merits a separate book. Based on several interviews, it gives a picture of the challenges that women, in particular, face as music educators. Each woman’s story is unique. One mother quit teaching altogether to have children. Another describes how her demanding career led to divorce and life as a single-mother band director. A third band-director mother describes being married to a band director—and the many creative solutions (mainly organizational) that kept their large and very busy family afloat. In my own experience as a band-director mother, living near school and having a supportive spouse are key. Additional support is available through Women Band Directors International (womenbanddirectors.org).
It is possible, as this book shows, to be a successful conductor without sacrificing the important things in life—family, friends, and personal wellness. I recommend this book to all music educators to help them lead happier lives in and out of the rehearsal room.
Director of music,
Fortuna Union High School,
Fortuna California;
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