'Tis the Season...Part III

Well, the dust has settled, or maybe I should say the puddles have dried, but here we are finally at Christmas Eve. With the tree trimmed, the pies in the oven, the presents wrapped, the dog bathed, and still some time to clean the bathroom tomorrow morning (TMI?) I have a moment to sit and reflect on the amazing concert my students put on last Tuesday night. Is it bragging? Maybe, but I can't help it. They blew me away.

The fifth grade band at Sierra Madre is comprised of seven flutes (one of which appeared at the concert in her soccer clothes telling me she had a tournament that night and wouldn't be staying for the show), a clarinet, a couple of alto saxes, a trumpet plus a couple of ringers from the middle school group playing percussion. We like to say they are a small-but-mighty group, and they really played well on Tuesday night.
They were followed by the fifth grade strings which is about 20 strong and includes a cello and a viola, as well as a third grader and a couple of fourth graders. The strings also sounded great. Together these two groups are the future of the middle school orchestra, and if Tuesday night is any indication, then we will have a strong middle school program for the next several years.

The evening was topped off by the middle school PAK Orchestra- (should I change the name, as we have talked about to the SiMa Philharmonic?) and all the detailed preparation we had done last week really paid off. They listened to each other, they watched me, they minded the pitfalls they had discovered and thought about, they waited for cutoffs, they even crescendo-ed! What a show! The principal was very complimentary, and I have gotten lots of positive feedback from parents. The kids themselves beamed when it was over, and the audience clapped and clapped.

The success of this concert has prompted me to do something that I have wanted to do for a long time. I think this orchestra will go to the Forum Music Festival this year, in May. We will play for an adjudication, and then spend the rest of the day at Magic Mountain. This group is up to the challenge, and deserves the fun such a trip would give them.

Now for a couple of weeks of rest. After the holidays we dive into preparation for the All-District Festival, which happens in February. But for now, pumpkin pie, family and lots of sleep!

Happy holidays, everyone!

'Tis the Season... Part II

It has been quite a week. It started with the "strolling" musicians of San Rafael Elementary, and ended with packing up a good chunk of the music room at Sierra Madre Middle School to move it to the elementary campus where the auditorium is.

The Monday morning stroll was fun for all. The classes we visited seemed to appreciate the music as much as the break in their routine. The musicians stepped right up to the challenge and did their best. The one surprise came from the kindergartens where several children in each room covered their ears upon hearing the first notes of the flutes. Now, the two boys playing flutes did a good job; the covered ears are no reflection on their skill or ability. Rather, I think it just had to do with the fact that most people these days are not accustomed to live music being performed in close proximity. This is another reason I love the strolling option for school performances.

The Middle Schoolers at Sierra Madre have been putting the finishing touches on their repertoire for next week's all-instrumental program. This is the first time in the 15 years I have worked at that school that the instrumental musicians will be featured on their own concert. I am really excited about this, and while the show is going to be short, it is going to be very sweet.

A couple kids in the orchestra asked me last week if we could do something we had done last year. I had forgotten about this activity, though last year when we did it, it had been a big hit. It is an activity that consists of several parts. First we play through one of their pieces. Then we play through it again and record it. Right after the recording the kids take a minute to reflect on their own performance and write (on a grid sheet I make for this purpose) something they did well and something they need to work on. Next, we listen to the recording, and afterwards they write about their section (flutes, first violins, etc) and also the group as a whole. When they are finished writing, a few kids can talk about their observations. Of course, I get to throw in a few as well.

I'm not sure why they love this activity so, but I'm really glad they do, and I will certainly do it again as we get close to their next concert. I guess it partly has to do with hearing themselves in the recording. They are both thrilled and horrified...if that makes any sense. They are amazed that it sounds as good as it does, and also shocked that is doesn't sound as good as they imagined. But the thing that's really amazing is how focused they get when it's time to write. They go right to work and are quiet in a way that they aren't at any other time except during tests. Their observations are usually astute and accurate. They are never cruel, and they understand their own part in the overall sound. If our experience from last year with this activity is any indicator, their performance at the concert on Tuesday will be amazing because of the focus on details in this stage of the preparation. But maybe the best part of this activity is the excitement it generates. When we ran out of time on Thursday, and couldn't listen to the recording they had just made of the Hallelujah Chorus, they let out a singular groan. Usually they are looking at their watches and telling me it's time to go. But they would have stayed late to hear that recording.

Another thing that has happened, coincidentally maybe, not sure... is that two of the kids who had till now been really not playing very well suddenly stepped up and were heard. One is my single trombone player. He has always been enthusiastic about playing, but this year as a newcomer in the Middle School group he had suddenly become shy and wouldn't play. Yesterday as we finished our last song, I realized I HAD been hearing the trombone, for the first time all year. And as I put the baton down I looked right at him and said "I LOVE hearing the trombone!" to which the entire class responded with a resounding cheer. Had they heard it too? Yes. Wow.

The other child, a sixth grade violinist who has been faking it since third grade, came in on Thursday excited that she had learned Canon (Pachelbel). "It's so easy", she told me. And as she sat in her chair warming up on her own, I could hear that she actually was playing the piece. And yesterday she came in saying she had practiced 60 minutes Thursday night, and had a practice slip to turn in as well. With this jump in skill level in both of these kids, I can say that we now have an orchestra with no "dead wood". This is a first for this group, for this school.

At Field Elementary the Beginning Band, all 40 of them, and the Advanced Strings took part in the Winter Assembly. It was barely-controlled chaos, as that school has only a cafeteria with a stage to service as an auditorium. It's not big enough to contain all the performers and audience, so traffic management is a big issue. Even so, it was a great show, and I was especially happy to see the giant group of beginners demonstrate their new skills. Putting the instrument together and blowing into it to make a sound is a huge accomplishment, and I was very proud of them and looking forward to their spring concert.

A few action-packed days to go, and then a nice break. How did we get HERE so fast?

And the Winners.....!

Last night was the second annual Pasadena Unified School District Band Fest. The four high schools presented their 2010 marching/pep band shows on the field at Pasadena High School. I love this event. Having never played in a marching band myself, I am always in awe of the kids out there playing their instruments while moving around the field into various formations.Last year's show was notable for happening at all, and it was a joy to see all the schools in one place. Last night's show exhibited bigger groups and better musicianship and is, I hope, a harbinger of years to come.

One of the reasons I like this show so much is that I get to see some of my "winners" from years past. For me, the endgame is to get a music student successfully plugged into a high school program. When this happens, I consider it a "mission accomplished" and feel high levels of satisfaction. At least four of the students in the PHS marching band are products of my programs. I love to see them in their cool uniforms, completely in control of their instruments, participating in what will be a memory-making event in their high school careers.



PHS Cirque du Soleil Field Show- Music arranged by David Miller!

 Last night one of my current eighth graders appeared in the stands with her dad. She's a clarinet player who has been a consistent, if somewhat lackadaisical, member of her school ensemble since the third grade. Her dad couldn't stay, and didn't want her there unsupervised, so she asked if she could sit with my husband and me. She's a busy kid: Tae-Kwon-Do, Japanese school and Art classes all compete for her free time. She never practices her clarinet, though keeps up with the demands of our orchestra music at school. I was happy to have a chance to hang with her. She really enjoyed seeing kids she knew from our orchestra in the band, and when the show was over, I asked her if she thought she would want to do that next year, to which she enthusiastically replied, "YES!" In my mind, I made a little check mark in

the Winners' column.

I reminded her that her attendance at the Band Fest was worth 100 minutes of logged practice time (toward a goal of 500 minutes for which she will receive a certificate worth $2.00 at our local music store) and that she can also earn those minutes by actually PRACTICING. This is a standing joke conversation between us: I say "why don't you take your clarinet home and play it?" and she always says, "I don't have time to play it".  I imagine she could actually go from being an adequate clarinetist to being a superstar, if she spent any time on it at home. This time she giggled when I made my usual pitch, and for the first time in two years replied that she WILL practice, once her art classes are over at the end of this month. Ka-chingggg!



More about winning and losing

Why is it that the ones who give music up are the ones I dwell on? There have been many who have gone on to play through high school and have become lifelong amateur musicians, and isn't this really the goal? I like to think so. I don't really care if my students end up in a major symphony orchestra or with a big record deal. What I really hope for each one of them is that they can find fun, solace, friendship, inspiration and community through music throughout their whole lives. And I recognize also, especially in light of recent research, that the act of studying a musical instrument engages the brain in a unique way, and is, thus, valuable no matter what the skill level achieved is.

This is why it was with a real mix of emotions that I heard the news from one sixth grade beginning violinist that he was going to have to drop Orchestra to take a Study Skills class. My first thought, if I am honest, was that things were going to get easier for me, and the orchestra would sound better. But following that thought, pretty closely on its heels, was a feeling of regret. This child had never picked up an instrument before this year. He had no musical training whatsoever, and he had plowed into a situation where he was surrounded by kids who had been studying with me in music classes since the third grade. He knew he was over his head, and we made arrangements to have small lessons after school a couple days a week. Each time we did this, his skill level jumped up a degree, and by the beginning of December, he was actually able to play along on some of the music, and not sound terrible. I knew he was struggling in his other classes, and he struggled in mine, but with the extra help, and support from his parents, it looked like music might be something he could really succeed at with time. I was also mindful of the fact that the work we did in his lessons was developing his brain in new, untapped ways.

I know that he really needs the study time to get his other subjects in hand, but I'm wondering if he might want to keep working on violin toward the day when he can rejoin the orchestra with new skills. I think I will see if he wants to do that. And thank you for reading my musings which help me to think through things!

Win some, lose some.

I have been thinking a lot lately about how kids come and go through my life. It seems that every year there is at least one student who, no matter how well I think I understand him or her, shows me I have a lot yet to learn.

On Wednesday I stopped into the office of my second elementary school of the day, and standing at the front desk with a first grader in tow was a young woman who greeted my back. "Hi Amy", she said. I am new at this school this year, so not many people know me at all, and certainly no parents know my first name, so it was with a puzzled look that I turned around to see who this was.

I recognized her right away as a former student who had played cello in my orchestra from 5th to 8th grade. She had been a pretty good cellist, though never really took it seriously. She had a twin sister who also played cello. They were like the opposite sides of the same coin. This sister, here with her own little boy, had been a congenial child, polite, who took naturally to the cello. Her sister, on the other hand, had had a foul temper, which could be turned into sweetness and light when she wanted something, and, though she might have actually been more passionate than her twin about playing cello, she struggled mightily with it, and never really understood what she was doing.

I had taken deep interest in these girls, as their home and family were dysfunctional at best, and borderline abusive at worst. I had had fantasies of them playing in their high school orchestra and using this skill as a way to open doors for themselves throughout their lives. That's not what happened, however.

The two girls occupied my psyche for several years, until in the middle of their 8th grade year, I had had enough. The more difficult of the two girls had come to take my kindness to them for granted and had developed an demeanor of entitlement. It's not that I expected to be thanked every minute for everything I did. I only really wanted the girls to have something positive and fun in their lives. And what I got in return was often very rude behavior, and "attitude". Finally, I stopped bending over backward to keep them in my program, and they both dropped out. I felt bad about this for a long time, and wondered how they were faring.

And here was the congenial sister, with her own child, now 6 years old. I did the math. After all I, her other teachers and counselors had tried to do, she had ended up being a teenage mother. We exchanged pleasantries. She introduced me to her son. We talked about how when he gets to 4th grade, he will play an instrument. She told me her twin sister also has two children. She seems like a good mother. She looks happy and healthy. Maybe that's all we can hope for. And I have to wonder how much of my own ego was wrapped up in "rescuing" these "poor" girls. As it is, at least one turned out all right, though not with the kind of life I would have chosen for her. I guess it's enough to know that as an adult, this young woman chooses to greet me and say hello.

'Tis the Season

The school year has an arc to it that I, like some creature with academic DNA, love and need. There is the first rush of the new school year, with all the meeting and greeting of new students, handing out instruments and finding those first sounds on them. Later in the year, we have our District Festival season, which has all its own excitement. Then there are spring programs, variety shows, graduations, the gathering back up of all the instruments, and the calm quiet of summer to regroup.

Right now, we are coming into the winter holiday season, a very busy time for all school music teachers. For those of us who travel each day to as many as three schools, fitting all the concerts in can be a real challenge. For some schools, the winter holiday program is a central part of the first semester of school. Much planning and rehearsing goes into the show, the date of the show is set in stone from the beginning of the school year and the instrumental music is surrounded by class performances of dancing, singing, reading and  play acting. At other schools, the holiday program is more of an afterthought, the planning of which happens on the fly, if at all, and instrumental music is low on the radar, since the teacher is not on campus everyday, and has almost no contact with the classroom teachers.

Often, my schedule flat out conflicts with the day and time of a show. When this happens, I have a couple choices. One, I can just blow off the holiday program all together. There is something to be said for this. Depending on the school, there may be only a handful of performers ready by December to play anything more than Hot Cross Buns. At such a school, I don't mention the program to the kids, and we slide on through the holiday season without much fuss. At other schools, there will be a critical mass of musicians eager to share their music with the school. More about this in a moment. At these schools, if my schedule does not permit full participation in the regular holiday program, we "stroll" from room to room, bringing a few moments of holiday cheer to the classes.

The musicians have a funny bi-polar attitude toward performing. When I ask them if they want to play the songs they have learned for the classes, they, without hesitation, enthusiastically say "YES!" But as we discuss the plan, and they start picturing themselves playing in front of, especially, their own classmates, they become more timid. They say things like "we're going to play in FRONT of them?! " or "Can we just go to the pre-K?" They are very nervous about playing in front of their peers. So we have more discussion about how hard they have worked, and they have actually accomplished a great deal, and that many of their classmates actually started playing when they did, but have since dropped, so what right do they have to criticize the musicians?

Almost without exception, after having this conversation, the kids are pumped and ready for the more intimate performance"strolling"affords. And then we go. We play the songs, we receive the applause, and then I get to have one of my favorite moments in the school year. As we leave the first classroom, and head to the second, there is an explosion of glee from the musicians. They fully brim over with the excitement of performing, and decide there on the spot that they want to do this every day all day. It's coming. Next week. I can't wait!

Thanksgiving

Oh, I so didn't want to go to work today. The day before a four-day weekend, not many children have music class on their minds as they leave home for the day. So they forget their instruments. Consequently, a day like this is guaranteed to have low music class attendance. At one of my schools, even on a good day I might have only 10 kids total for an hour of teaching. So my heels were dragging in the last few moments before I headed out to work. I kept thinking that if I cancelled the day, no one would really care, and some of the teachers might actually be grateful for one less disruption in an already irregular day. I even have lots of sick leave accrued. My shoulder and elbow have both been bothersome lately, and I thought I could actually give them a rest today, and NOT carry my 20 pounds of gear around. But, after dithering and complaining awhile, I went.

When I arrived at the first school, I found the room unlocked. This is a good thing. Sometimes I have to go find the custodian to have him open it, wasting precious setup time. It also means that the children would be able to leave their violins so that I could tune them before they come. This gives us a good half hour of instruction. As I cleaned the white board, and took care of a little paperwork, a small stream of 5th grade violinists wandered through and deposited their cases on the music room floor.

There were 12 students for class, out of a usual 19. Not bad. We worked diligently on a song for the upcoming holiday program. I felt I had given them something solid to work on over the next week, and also that they had a good enough grasp of it to practice on their own. I was starting to feel pretty good about coming to work.

On to the next school. As I had figured I would, I had a total of 5, only about half of the enrolled students. Several have dropped already this year, citing their failing math scores as the reason they have to quit. I'm not going to get into the reason so many kids seem to be having trouble with math at this school, but I will say that the students who now come to music have begun to show some real affinity for their instruments and music, and have become really fun to work with. The first two were violin players and it was only yesterday that one of them had put the bow on the string to play for the first time. She was so happy!  The other boy had been in my class last year, but hadn't really "gotten it" at that time. But this year, maybe only because he's a year older, he is doing really well. Today we cruised through the songs, using their bows, that they had been playing only pizzicato up till now. I accompanied them on the piano, and it was real music. The day was improving.

Then 3 of the 4 beginning wind players came in. Two clarinets and a trumpet. The trumpet boy had started half way through last year and has been champing to play harder music, since the other kids are all beginners. So today I had brought for him the three songs for the all-district festival coming in February. This is a concert featuring a giant band made of all the second year players in the district. I wasn't sure how we would schedule time to work on this music. But as the two first year clarinets (who, by the way, have named their clarinets) sailed through the songs on the pages I had assigned yesterday, I started to think maybe they could also handle the festival music. I brought out the part for the easiest of the three songs. They were amazed that the whole page was ONE song! We did a quick introduction to eighth notes and slurs (they have only just learned how to TONGUE and were thrilled to get to NOT tongue on the slurs!) and they were off. We got through the whole piece, noting the places where bits of tune were repeated. They were very eager to go off and practice.

This was my reward for getting my butt out the door this morning. And it's stuff like this that gets me going every day. I am very thankful for this wonderful work.

Harnessing the Fear

Last Sunday we had recital of my private students. Haven't done one of these in a while, because I was down to about 4 students, and that doesn't make much of a recital. But now I have 9 altogether, and 7 of them performed. The youngest was a third grader who has been taking piano lessons for about a year and a half and the eldest was a retired Art teacher who has been playing since August. The recital was held in the living room of one student's family, and was, by all accounts, a huge success.

Even though I spend my work day teaching music to children in school, and coming home to teach yet some more music seems like something I would not want to do, I enjoy my private students very much. Working with them one-on-one is satisfying in a different way than is working with the groups I see every day in my regular job. It gives me a chance to try things that I end up using in class, and establish really long-term, growing relationships with budding musicians.

One of my students, a cellist who is now a junior in High School, has studied with me since the third grade. He has always liked to play cello, though he is a ballet dancer in his soul of souls and will pursue that as his career. It has been extremely gratifying to watch him grow and change, and see the changes in his playing over the years. This recital was the first he had been in for many years, and I was so proud to show him off as his playing has a maturity and spirit now that just emerged after a summer studying ballet with ABT in Detroit.

The retired Art teacher was very nervous about playing in a recital. But she positively glowed with joy after playing her two songs. For all but the one cellist, this was the first recital ever, and each of them came away with new self-confidence and a new level of ability, gained from intensive practice stemming from, among other things, fear of failure.

I am taking acting classes myself right now-something I have always wanted to do. Last Saturday, the day before the recital, our acting class had a showcase of the scenes we had worked on with partners for the last six weeks. It was the first time I have ever been on stage as an actor and, though it was a short scene, I felt my own jitters about doing this new thing. I had learned my lines completely and my partner and I had gone through the scene dozens if not scores of times. But it wasn't till we were on the stage, in the lights, speaking to each other as our characters that the real emotions of the scene emerged. It was a rush, no two ways about it, and all week I have been thinking about the connections between that kind of performance and music performance, and about how my own students felt in their premiers compared to how I felt in mine.

I know I have just begun to scratch the surface of the self discovery that acting can uncover. And I also know that my own students have now had a taste of the joy of playing music you love for a live, listening audience. My acting teacher, Hal, talks about the wringing fear of screwing up that motivates people to study and prepare, and it is this that I count on when scheduling a recital and preparing my students for it. I know that the performers will put in extra time on their instruments that they wouldn't do if the spectre of live performance did not loom before them.

But as a teacher I have to be careful not to put the pressure on too hard, because as much as that fear can motivate, it can also paralyze. Controlling the fear, and putting it to use, as the classmate who played Clarise from "The Silence of the Lambs" in class did (who is NOT afraid of coming face to face with Hannibal Lecter?) can result in wonderful performances from both musicians and actors. It also assures thorough preparation. I'm not sure I know the mechanics of harnessing fear for good. I do know that I try to let my students know that the most important thing is to preserve the integrity of their performance by keeping going. "The audience will not know that you made a mistake if you just keep going" is the mantra that beginning musicians must meditate upon in the final practices. I suppose it's that way in acting too. The other thing is to remind them (and myself!) that when they do make a mistake, they must remember that the mistake is only one tiny part of the whole performance and NOT the whole performance. The performance is not the "notes" but the music.

After the recital, and after this acting showcase, each of us, musician and actor, comes back to the study from a new plane of skill and experience. We are all ready to take on a new challenge, we have new insights and have LIVED through this trial by fire. Tempered with new resiliance, we move forward.

You Mean You Can Even Play Saxophone?

So yesterday, in PAK Orchestra (which name I am thinking of changing to the SiMa Hot Box Orchestra...waddya think?) P- asked me if he could switch from bass drum to saxophone. He asked a few weeks ago if he could play tuba. I told him then, and told him again yesterday that if he can come up with an instrument, I will teach him how to play it. I don't HAVE any more instruments to hand out this year, but if he can find a sax, I'll let him play it. He's a pretty sharp kid, and understands music pretty well, so it would just be a matter of showing him how to blow the thing and where his fingers should go.

But here's the funny part: My comment started the whole room buzzing with this question- can you really play that? Meaning saxophone, meaning ME. Can Mrs. McLean play saxophone? I said, "Of course I can; I can play every instrument in this room". "Even trombone?" "Yes, even trombone".

Where have these kids been? I have been the only instrumental music teacher most of them have had at school since the third grade. Don't they remember? I found myself scratching my head over this all afternoon yesterday, and I'm still wondering about it now. Is it because I was Ms. Crocker then, and am Mrs. McLean now? Or is it like learning to walk, or talk?  We, none of us, remember that. So maybe their music learning has been so organic, they don't remember how they got where they are now. I'd like to think that is the case. Or maybe they were playing with me. They are not above doing that. And I am not above falling for it. But it felt like a genuine question. I am asked frequently by my students how many instruments I play when it occurs to them that the same person who just taught their violin class is about to teach the clarinet class. My standard answer is "I play a lot of instruments, none of them very well, but I can play 'Hot Cross Buns' on any instrument, except bagpipes".

Maybe I will need to refresh their memory. True, in this class I don't play any instrument much, except piano, and this year not even that very much. Occasionally I demonstrate something on a violin. Maybe I need to take my saxophone to school and play. Or maybe a tuba.

Symphony for Mouthpiece and Headjoint

Instruments finally all passed out, the new beginning band sits waiting for the next instruction from me. I ask them to set their cases on the floor in front of them, with the handle toward them. Then they are to open the case and take out ONLY the head joint (for flutes) or the mouthpiece (for the clarinets and trumpets). I show the clarinets how to put on a new reed. It always amazes me that they can get it so wrong if I don't show them close up and personal the right way. Then, cases closed, and stashed under chairs we're ready to go.

The first are the flutes. This is when I am going to see who will love playing flute and stick with it, and who is going to struggle getting this first sound, and maybe give up before they ever really get it. I've gotten better over the years at demonstrating and being able to say and do things that help coax that first sound from a budding flautist, but it still remains somewhat of a mystery, this shaping of the lips just so and the placing of the plate just so, and blowing just the right amount of air. Some kids get it right away. Some get it pretty soon, and some get it later. If they are patient and don't give up, and try it at home a million times, they WILL all get it.

In this group, in this year, we are having great success right off the bat. The flutes blow a head joint note with gusto, and hold it for 4 counts.

Next it's the clarinets' turn. With the reeds all correctly positioned on the mouthpieces, and the ligatures tightened and pulled down enough, teeth against the top of the mouthpiece and lower lip cushioning the reed, they blow their first squawking note. I make a joke about scaring away every goose in town, but they blow and hold for 4 counts.

Finally it's the trumpets' turn. I show them how to buzz their lips, getting a laugh. I guess it's funny seeing a grown up making such a rude noise, and I tell them they can practice that sound any time they want (which they immediately start doing) even if they don't have their trumpet or mouthpiece handy. Then they put their mouthpieces to their lips and get a buzz going. Hold for 4 counts.

So now we are ready for our grand finale of the day, the Symphony of Mouthpieces. Sitting up straight, feet flat on the floor, backs away from the chairs, mouthpieces in place- they will breathe on beat 4 of my count and blow for 4 counts, rest for 4 counts and blow again. We take turns, playing in different combinations,tutti and soli. Much giggling for the silly sounds we are making, but this is where it starts. And this is one of my favorite things to do.

What Fall?

November is supposed to be a time of leaden skies, biting winds and chilly leaf kicking followed by cozy soups and teas. At least that's how I remember it, but we  have temperatures licking the mercury just below the 100 mark today, and the heat is going to drive us all mad. 

The AC in my room-with-a view is powered by an inadequate cable that can not handle the extra draw on a day like this. I waited till the last minute to flip the switch to "cool".  The little mobile given to me by art students last year with cutout shapes of musical instruments and symbols that hangs from the ceiling began to twitch in the tepid air. But as the PAK orchestra came in from PE with red faces and soaked shirts, I knew we were in for it.

The AC WAS supposedly fixed a couple weeks ago, remember?

To cool off today we listened to excerpts from Brahms 1st Symphony, Mozart's Eine Kleine Nachtmusik and Tchaikowsky's Festival Overture to 1812. These pieces are all interwoven with Christmas tunes in a piece called "Santa at the Symphony" which we have, quite frankly, been having a gas learning. The piece is too clever for words, and finishes with a bombastic Common-time version of Silent Night overlaying the triumphant eighth-note fanfares of the 1812 Overture.

Once we had listened to these little snippets, we launched into the work on the piece. I keep wondering if anyone can hear us from anywhere else on the campus. We really are isolated, and there is usually a bulldozer churning around on the construction site during our class. But if they could have heard us today, they would have figured that our brains had finally gotten fried. I'm not sure they would have been wrong!

What fun we had waking the dead with the bass drum, blasting Silent Night like some violin carollers from hell. Saxophones took up the line French Horns would play if we had such beasts, and they did so admirably.The trumpets bravely found the high notes with safety in companionship. The flutes learned how to trill on a high D, and the strings learned how to play a tremolo on their low D. The bass drum found beat 1 and 3- finally- and with 3 minutes left to go in the class no one squawked when I said, "Okay, all the way from the beginning!"

Everyone was a little crazy today, me included. I hope the weather cools down. But something is happening to this group that might be partly BECAUSE OF the crazy heat, tight quarters and middle-aged, hot-flashing teacher. Focus, artistry, technique, and fun. It doesn't get any better. 76 degrees would be better than 86, but the music happens anyway.

A Song, and a Surprise.

My job offers me unexpected joys, along with the regular ones. Last week, as I was finishing preparations for the Sierra Madre Middle School class, an aid who works with one of the Special Education students, J-, stopped in to look at the music room. The aid explained that J- had been having a rough day, and asked if would it be okay for him to try out some of the percussion equipment.

I invited them in and watched as the aid put a bass drum beater into J-'s hand. J- had a big smile on his face as he beat on the bass drum a few times. Next, J- sat in a chair and played with the tamborine some, making up excited songs about teachers, classmates and some of his pet peeves as he went along. The aid told me he had never seen J- so happy. Finally, class was about to start, so they left with an invitation to come back any time.

The next day, J- and his aid showed up again, and reprised some of the songs from the day before. We had had the jingle bells, a set of sturdy, jingly ones, out the day before for Orchestra class, so I encouraged J- to look inside the white box where they are kept. I showed him how to hold them by the top handle and tap the top of the handle with his other hand. Then I started singing "Jingle Bells" as he tapped in time. Suddenly, J- burst into song and sang the entire song along with me, every word clear, and his tapping in time perfectly rhythmic. J- looked right into my eyes as we sang together, and we did the song several more times with the aid joining in too. J-'s eyes sparkled and he grinned from ear to ear as we all made music together. I'm not sure which of us was having the best time!

My original idea as a college student was to specialize in Music Therapy. I have some little training in the field, but for various reasons did not follow the training all the way through. This was partly because I came to wonder if any of it was real, or just a way for musicians who couldn't cut it as performers to make a living.

Over the years as an Instrumental Music Teacher, I have had many Special Ed. students in my classes. Just like the regular population of our schools, some of these students thrive and become excellent musicians, and some struggle with the effort. But lately, and especially after encounters like the ones I had with J- last week, I wish I could do more Music Therapy-type activities. Not focussing as much on technical achievement as in sharing music and sharing in the joy of creation. This is something I don't get to do enough of- playing with music- and I truly believe that there is benefit to be had and given beyond and beside the learning/teaching of the craft. Music can reach in to places that other therapies cannot.

I hope J- and his aid will come and visit often. I know I could use the therapy!

Fierce Trouble All Day

Not really. This was something I overheard one fifth grade boy violinist tell another after he'd been shown, by the other boy, how he'd been closing his violin case incorrectly. The second boy gave a little demonstration,and then the first redid his case muttering something about "fierce trouble all day". What a line!

Thing is, for me, it was a dandy day. The upside to having only fifth graders - at least this year- is that there are very few beginners. We are making music from day one, without the usual ritual of those first painful weeks of blowing in headjoints, trying to get a buzz going in a trumpet mouthpiece, learning how to hold a bow, or how to bite the reed just right to play a clarinet (which, don't get me wrong, I love because of the lights that come on in faces when they GET IT). Most of the kids this year had that instruction last year, so here we are, picking up where they left off last year, everyone that much more focussed and able.

Having said that, there are a few beginners strewn in, and here's a funny thing: even without the benefit of last year's instruction, most of them are jumping right in, playing along, making music, seeming to have skipped that first step entirely. This phenomenon deserves further attention.

A couple weeks ago, when I finished the fifth grade class, I realized that I still had a couple hours before I had to get to my middle school class, just up the street. So I approached the principal about adding a fourth grade Beginning Band to the schedule and she was thrilled. She escorted me to the two fourth grade rooms and introduced me to the teachers who were also thrilled. Last week I visited the classes and talked to the students, whose eyes lit up when I told them who I was.

We sent permission slips home and, no surprise, almost every single fourth grader returned a slip. Yesterday I met with them- well half of them. It's always something. One of the two classes was having an art lesson in clay that had had to be postponed due to a district-wide earthquake drill the day before. So those kids couldn't come to music. But those who did filed into the room quietly and sat down and waited for me to tell them my spiel.

My first meeting with students is always about two things: Putting a face to a name on a permission slip, and finding out if the child needs a school instrument or has some other source. At this point, too, I can converse with kids about their choices, talking them out of saxophone, for instance, since that is an instrument in short supply in our inventory, and in high demand among the kids.

Finally all my talking done, it was time to pass out instruments. This group of fourth graders sat patiently as  I called forth each child for his or her contract. I handed an instrument to each child along with the paper, and instructed each to sit and just hold the case, closed. Even with that, the excitement was in the air.

After all the passing out was done, I stood back and looked at them. And then came the question from a soon-to-be trumpet player: Are we a marching band? Not yet, I told him. But if you play all year, remember to bring your instrument on Friday, practice at home every day, and then keep playing next year, when you get to Middle School, there is a good chance you WILL be a marching band. Oh, the excitement then. But there's more, I told them. After Middle School is High School and then the fun really starts. You can play for football games, maybe even the Rose Parade. Sometimes High School Bands go to Disneyworld, or London. They were practically jumping out of their seats when they heard that. And then....when you are done with High School, you can go to College, and learn how to be a Musician for your job, and do music every day. 

This was a great moment yesterday. We have talked a bunch in our Pasadena District about showing students career pathways, and I have always said that you can't just decide in your Junior year to be a musician, if you have never played before. This particular career pathway has to start much earlier.

So here we go, kids. We are on the road, you can decide how far you want to follow it.

A Room With a View.

Since Sierra Madre School expanded to include grades 7 and 8 a few years ago, the middle school part of the school population has occupied the farthest east campus in the Pasadena Unified School District. Originally called Sierra Mesa School, it was, for many years home to Maranatha High School which leased the property from PUSD. The District reclaimed it to use it for the expanded Sierra Madre grades, and the Instrumental Music program found a home in one of the many aging portable "bungalows" on the site. For awhile the Music Theater class occupied the other half of this double long structure, and it became affectionately known as "The Palace".

The Palace roof leaked, the floors has spongy places that felt like they could fall through, and at least one window a year would be broken by a stray soccer ball, but over the five or so years we were in that room, the orchestra grew from a handful of kids to a rowdy, talented group numbering almost 30. We made music in that room. Little by little, note by note, squeak by squeak, the year would progress, and by spring we would sound pretty good. Kids who could barely read notes in 5th grade got it by the end of 6th, and then they were off and running.

Each year the orchestra has gotten bigger and better. To build the program, I took to accepting pretty much anyone into the class who had a mind to be there. This could be anyone, including kids who had never played anything but maybe a few weeks of violin somewhere back in third grade and wanted to learn drums, a number of obsessed guitar players, some kids who had never played any instrument ever, and some who had not played for several years.

To accomodate this rag-tag group I would do things like take band or orchestra arrangements and pull out a part for the guitars to play, or tell the budding drummers to make up a part. French Horn parts became alto sax parts, and String Bass parts sometimes were played on Electric Bass. Sometimes I just let those guitar players sit on the porch and jam while the rest of us worked on orchestra music. Some days I opened the room at lunch and let the rockers hang in there and play electric instruments and drum set. Anything to keep the music going, to keep the kids coming back, and to make them feel that the Palace, funky as it was, was theirs.

Then in 2008 a bond measure passed in Pasadena allowing for upgrades to all the schools in the district, and, miraculously, a complete new school on the Sierra Madre Middle School site. In the plans is a whole Music Suite, with ample space for both the Instrumental Music and the Choral/Theater programs. As exciting as this is, it was still with a bit of nostalgic sadness that I packed up the Palace last spring so that we could move to another, smaller, portable on the upper edge of the campus beyond the construction zone.

Jury Duty at the end of this summer prevented me from getting into the room much before school started, but when I finally set up chairs and stands I stood back and thought, if we get 25 we'll be fine. Any more and it will be tight. Well, thirty kids signed up for Instrumental Music, and for the first three weeks the Air Conditioning in the tiny room didn't work at all. Part of that time the temperatures were hitting triple digits in the afternoons, so the orchestra decamped for a few days to the 8th grade Science teacher's room where we played Rhythm Bingo and listened to orchestral music and learned some theory. Tuesday this week, I arrived to find the AC guy just finishing up, and the room COLD!

So here we are, in our new room. 31 Students now, as we have added a couple more violinists. Our windows (which overlook the construction site where the old Palace still sits awaiting removal or demolition)  will not be broken by soccer balls, because they are far from the PE field. The roof does not leak. There is barely room to bow, and the trumpet players were shy about playing out at first, because they were blowing directly into the back of the flute players' heads. But note by note, and squeak by squeak, we have started to make some music. This week we have been doing playing tests, with each student playing exerpts from the one piece we have focussed our attention on this month. This testing, which sends jitters and nervousness through the whole group, results in sudden leaps of improvement in the overall sound. Whether it's due to the extra practicing that goes on in the days before the test, or just the attention I am able to give each player when his or her turn comes to fix little problems, I don't know. But the shiver that stands my arm hairs on end when I hear this group, in October mind you, is not coming from the AC.

A day in the life.

Monday 7:00 a.m. I remember that the music books I want to use with a class today on one end of town, are in my classroom clear over on the other end of town. I could wing it. It's Monday, and I could pick the books up later in the day to use on Tuesday, but I had told myself and the kids last Tuesday that we would have these books today. Didn't EVEN think of it at close of school on Friday.

My "office", when not the trunk or front seat of my car, is at Sierra Madre Middle School, in the room where my 6-8 grade, 30 piece orchestra rehearses the last period of the day Tuesday through Friday. So I usually try to remember to pick up things I will need for the other schools when I'm there. But this time I forgot. So flying out of the house, I head to Sierra Madre and get there just before the families dropping off kids clog the street in front. I park the car, walk down the path to my room, and as I am walking I hear the unmistakable sound of cars colliding. I say, "hmmm, that wasn't a good sound" and keep walking. As I return up the path to my car after picking up the books, several kids pass me saying "Mrs. McLean, you'd better see your car..." I walk faster and discover that my car has been rear ended by a mom coming around the corner. She is still there, and in fact a third car is now in front of mine, and the impact has caused my car to rear end the third one. There are people standing around with pencils and insurance cards and I quickly assess that no one is hurt, I have rear damage, no front damage, the car in front seems miraculously unscathed, and the mom who turned that corner maybe just a little too fast is apologetic and ready to make good. But now I'm late.

So before leaving the scene I phone ahead to my first school, 10 miles across the city of Pasadena away, and tell them I will be late. I miss the first class, and pick up the next two classes at that school, and then head to the next school where I will use the books I so fatefully picked up.  In between, in the parking lot of school #2, I phone my insurance agent and start the tedious process of getting the car fixed.

Back on schedule, I meet the violin class for whom I fetched the books. While waiting in line to have his violin tuned, one student drops his violin, cracking the face and the lower bout. Eeeeeek! So frazzled am I by this point, I skip over the lesson I meant to do this day, and go to the next day's lesson, and then am puzzled by the kids' not being able to do it. Later when I reflect, I realize what I've done.

Finished at school #2 I head to school #3 where I will have two classes. This is back in Sierra Madre at the elementary school. During the first class, Band, several students from Beginning Band come in to turn in instrument rental contracts, as I had told them on Thursday they could do. So every couple minutes the rehearsal is interrupted by a child excited to take his instrument home. But somehow we make music anyway. After that is the Orchestra, and even though it meets after school on this day, a good 2/3 of the kids make it, and play their hearts out. They sound really great though we have only had a couple rehearsals this year, and finally I am back in my groove, remembering what's best about this job: kids making music together. It doesn't get any better than that.

What is this Blog about?

Did you ever hear of the book by Michael Connelly called "The Lincoln Lawyer"? The protagonist of this book is a defense attorney who has dispensed with an office, and does all his work from the back seat of a Lincoln Town Car. This year, 2010-11, I am now covering 6 school campuses, and spend almost as much time in my car as I do teaching music. Today I pulled a stuck mouthpiece from a trumpet and put a new G string on a violin, made several phone calls and updated some paperwork from my 2010 metallic blue Toyota Matrix. The title "The Matrix Music Teacher" popped into my head, and here we are. I hope to connect with fellow music teachers from where ever you are, and also to reach out to kids and families who are concerned about musc and arts programs' survival in their schools.

Good News Bad News

The good news first. We have instrumental music classes in the public schools in Pasadena California. Despite millions of dollars of cuts to everything statewide over the last two years, Pasadena Unified School District, for whom I work, has managed to hang on to what many consider to be a precious component of a child's school life. There was a time, before I started teaching here, when every student from third or 4th grade onward had the opportunity to have a group music lesson twice a week, with instruments provided by the District. The marching band at John Muir High School in 1995,  the year I started, was huge. Probably a hundred kids marched down the aisle of the Pasadena Civic Auditorium on the opening day of school that year to herald the thousands of teachers, support staff and administrators who gathered for what used to be an annual pep rally/state of the district event. That event has gone by the wayside, and John Muir's Marching Band is a shell of its former self, but it still exists. The bad news is that within a couple more years, even that may go the way of the opening-of-school gala.

Since 1995, several elementary schools have closed, due to decreasing enrollment. The cost of living in Pasadena is high. What used to be a suburb of Los Angeles, Pasadena was where people moved to avoid the high prices of living in a large metropolis. But now it is a trendy appendage of the city of angels, with 80 -year-old 2-bedroom, one-bath homes selling for a half million dollars. Many of the people who can afford to buy homes here have some idea that our public schools are rotten, and so send their offspring to the many fine private schools in the vicinity. Consequently, fewer children fill seats in the public schools, which means that federal and state dollars to those schools decrease, which causes this spiral of underfunded schools scaring off possible students because there aren't enough students to pull in the dollars.

Neverthless, through all these changes and all these years, PUSD put Arts in general and Music in particular as a priority in making budgeting decisions. Not a front-and-center kind of priority, but always funding was available for music teachers in numbers enough to cover all the remaining elementary schools, the middle schools and high schools. Music classes dropped to once a week, full-time teachers who had previously covered two schools now covered 5, and money for buying new music and equipment was precious. This is the environment I signed on to in 1995.