In the beginning...The Foundation for Success in the First Two Years of Band (with Dr. Steven Tyndall)

This is a summarized version of a clinic that myself and Dr. Steven Tyndall gave at the 2009 Midwest Clinic in Chicago, Illinois. 

Click this link if you are interested in the full handout from the clinic, http://nebula.wsimg.com/14ee473521229f7b2d28c4c0bd7f485c?AccessKeyId=8A07B23F9D49DAA23B98&disposition=0&alloworigin=1

Building Block 1-On your mark! Get set...

 Go slowly and be thorough in the beginning. It is important to spend some time on basic reading/notation. You can give students written material to review while you are working with different sections. Be extra careful when setting the embouchure-make graduating to the instrument an accomplishment. You must cover proper instrument maintenance from the beginning. I insist that that they be able to show me how to: properly assemble, swab, oil valves, care for a slide etc...Be insistent on proper hand positions and posture. Have you ever tried to fix bad right-hand positions on clarinetists? Remember, practice makes permanent-not perfect! I use the house building analogy: watching a house get built goes slowly at first, and rarely looks like a house for a long time, then once the foundation is laid, the house goes up rapidly. A slow first nine-weeks means a rapid remainder of the year.

Building Block 2: Divide and Conquer

One of the biggest problems with beginners is when they play en mass and you are not able to monitor all of them. The key is to not let them all play at once. You need to divide the class and give them specific concepts to work on while only one group plays. For example-Flutes/Oboes clap the rhythm, Clarinets finger the notes, Saxes play. It is also important to hear individuals as much as possible. I will ask for volunteers to play a line and I pick one or two per instrument. I do not let them volunteer more than once per class. Students are always doing wind-horn (air and fingers) when not playing with the group. If you have a large group, pick a couple of sections per day and make sure that you get to each section over the course of the week.

Building Block 3: Break it Down! 

 Why does band make you smarter?  It uses the whole brain. But for beginners, or inexperienced students, the complexity of what we ask is often overwhelming. This sense of being overwhelmed is a key factor in students quitting band. So, how do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. Findings suggest that multi-tasking is a myth. We must automate some tasks so that the brain can focus on the most important task at hand.

•  Example
• A new line in a method book
• Step 1=Clap or blow the air pattern for the line (Reinforces artic. and rhythm)
• Step 2 =Say the note names (I will sometimes do this in key groupings, i.e., all C instr. Then Bb instr, then Eb,
• Step 3=Everyone fingers the notes while saying the rhythm.
• Step 4=One section at a time plays with me, everyone else continues to finger along
• Step 5=ask for volunteers
• Step 6=Everyone plays together once

Whenever a student struggles on a line or a piece of music, I ask, “I need for you to think about what is most difficult for you?” Is it: Rhythm? Note Names? Fingerings? Embouchure? Once we determine what the problem most likely is, we focus our practice on that issue for each student.

Building Block 4: Bring the technique to the music

This one simple concept is how you avoid being stuck in the "Grade 2 Vortex!", which is being stuck playing only grade 2 music with your students. The primary goal for practicing--in school and at home--is to develop more technique than the music requires. You cannot wait until you need a skill, scale, or technique in a piece of music, then it is too late. In practical terms, this means…We must plan ahead and prepare our students. This means that you must: learn scales and keys that you are not playing in your music, develop range before you have to play those notes, i.e., clarinets over 2^nd break, work on much harder rhythmic material than the music currently requires and learn to multiple tongue before the students see it in a piece of music. You can download the complete handout for a copy of some of our supplemental technique building exercises.  We work  from those materials, almost, daily.  

Building Block 5: Can you feel the beat?

e    We use a down-up system first when introducing counting and rhythmic understanding. We will use this system for about 4-5 months or until the students show a strong mastery of this system and a consistent ability to feel and maintain the pulse we move to the more conventional: 1-and 2-and 3-e-and-a 4. Once we have introduced the number system and developed a strong understanding of this system, we graduate to:  Tap our foot-Verbally subdividing all beats-Clapping the rhythm. The book we use in year one is: Winning Rhythms book by Edward Ayola. We use 101 Rhythmic Rest Patterns and 150 Original Exercises by Yaus. We build these rhythmic skills in layers. The down-up system helps to reinforce pulse awareness and dividing and adding beats and is less abstract for young students. Once mastered, we graduate to the more conventional systems.       

The Down-Up System Sample

Building Block 6: You can't teach empty chairs!

Recruiting new students and instrument placement are probably the two most important things we do as middle music educators. To quote Alfred Watkins,  "You can’t teach empty chairs!”  Recruiting is not a seasonal or once-a- year responsibility. Remember, you recruit/retain on a personal level. If the students feel like they belong to something bigger than themselves, the students will flock to your program. Make a point of talking with every student in your feeder schools more than once, if at all possible. Also,  I never let a student quit without a personal 1-on-1 meeting with me and several conversations with their parent. To recruit beginners, it is about raising the profile of the group and then personalizing the contact you have with potential students. We do our recruiting/placements w/ beginners in May for the next school year, BUT it is a labor intensive process, throughout the year. Just remember-the greater the investment, the greater the potential return.

Building Block 7: We, not me! 

What is the single most important ensemble skill to develop in your young players? LISTENING! Hearing is passive, listening requires concentration and awareness. The essence of ensemble is becoming a part of a larger group, not an individual.  In band, everything that effects the ensemble is derived from listening. 

Listening Priorities

• Balance (Can you hear what you need to hear?) 
• Blend (Does your sound match your neighbor's?) 
• Matching articulation (Am I playing with the same note length as my neighbors?) 
• Intonation (Are there waves in my sound?
• Watching the conductor is also a part of the process, but much less than listening. 
• You can get your students to watch by:
• Varying tempi
• Memorizing your scores
• Practicing dynamic changes in your conducting and ask the students to match you.

As a general rule, our students do a lot of hearing of music, but not a lot of listening before we get them. We direct our students to listen throughout a rehearsal from the 1^st note by asking a lot of questions, such as: 

• "Can you hear your neighbor as much as yourself?"
•  "Can you hear the bass voices and clarinets?" 
• "Can you hear the melody?" 
• "Do you hear the waves in the sound?" "
• "Do the trumpets sound like one big trumpet or 9 individuals?"

Building Block 8: Earning your stripes

In order to maintain persistence and perseverance to a task…we must see progress. If you are running a race, and you cannot see the finish line or where you are running to, it is hard to continue to run at your top speed. Young musicians must see progress in order to continue to work. If not, the wheels of progress almost certainly stop. I believe in the "Fun Cycle", which goes: 1) learn something new, 2) practice correctly and consistently, 3) see progress and 4) have fun. When we stop working, we stop having "fun." A system that provides the students with structure and a sense of progress is essential in these early years. I, personally, do not believe in practice charts for a variety of reasons. Rather, I prefer to focus on Progress Charts. How much you practice is completely irrelevant to how much you progress.  Many people use a pass-off system to this end and  some people use SmartMusic. We use a system called Earning your stripes (Refer to Supplement 8 in the complete handout). 

I hope you find this information helpful to you and your teaching. Please feel free to contact me at info@andrewpoormusic.com if you have additional questions. Best of luck! I would like to acknowledge my friend and former colleague, Dr. Steven Tyndall, Director of Instrumental Music at Truett-McConnell College, for his inspiration and collaboration on this project in 2009. His middle school bands embodied musical excellence and were an inspiration for music educators across the country.

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