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Choosing Repertoire that Inspires and Provides Great Teaching Opportunities: A Rewarding Challenge - Part 3

23/2/2014

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In my last installment on Repertoire Choice I mentioned the importance of developing a personal repertoire grading system, as it can serve as great ally providing specific reference points when making those difficult repertoire selections for your ensemble programme.

No this 3 part article blog does not contain a selected repertoire list.  There are many books and resources to which you can refer.  Rather, I would like to see you develop your own criteria.  

A well-defined personal grading system enables us to consistently choose appropriate repertoire, which will in turn serve to address both the musical and technical needs and abilities of our students. 

A.   The key to understanding how a specific work fits into a particular grade relates directly to our understanding of the following points:

1.     Individual attention spans, along physical endurance  
  • How long is the work?
  • What are instrument ranges and embouchure endurance factors?  
  • What are the tempi implications? How much of the work is slow as opposed to fast?
  • How much sustained playing is required, and at what range?
  • How high do the 1st parts extend? How low for the bass line?
  • What are the special instrument intonation demands?
  • What is the dynamic range?

2.      Technical demands, such as:
  • Fingering, bowing, articulation, sticking and slide shift demands
  • Rhythmic complexity considerations, such as syncopation and sub division issues.
  • What are the expressive demands: Phrase length and articulations?
  • How active and varied are the percussion parts?  Are there Key mallet and Tympani parts?

3.       What are the instrumentation requirements?
  • What are the minimum percussion instruments needed to faithfully meet the composer’s requirements? 
  • Do I have access to the necessary percussion instruments?
  • Do the members of the ensemble collectively have the technical skills to meet the musical demands of the work?
  • What are the ‘solo’ requirements within the work, and does the ensemble possess players capable of playing them with sufficient skill and expression?

4.     Musical and educational considerations
  • Does the work provide adequate opportunities to introduce, develop and support the skills of our ensemble performance student learning objectives?
  • Is the work worthy our and our ensemble’s time and investment?   

B.  Coupled with an effective and definable repertoire selection process is the need to develop both a personal, as well as a group profile for both our students and ensembles. Maintaining an 'up to date' profile is essential for achieving effective educative planning.
         
  1. Start with a three sentence descriptive statement regarding strengths, weaknesses and areas for      improvement.  
  2. Include learning styles, along with past learning and performance experiences.
  3. What would they like to accomplish? What is their dream?
  4. Why are they studying with you? Why are they in your ensemble?
  5. Now expand the exercise to include a three-sentence description for your ensemble.

C.     Critical to repertoire selection is the necessity of selecting a 'balanced diet' of works, which include:
  1. Original, serious 20th/21st century compositions
  2. Faithful transcriptions of orchestral works, retaining the composer's   original intent
  3. Well-crafted works from the popular/contemporary idiom.

D.    Thoughts and reflections on a ‘great music’ definition: What will ultimately guide our repertoire choices?

Great music is capable of reflecting and engendering the widest of human emotion. It also represents an artistic creation of human kind within the context of an identifiable, stylistic period and culture. It too, reflects the ebb and flow of human experience, often expressing some of the most deeply felt of human emotions. 

Good music holds our attention and is remembered through the interaction of the creative use of rhythm, melody, harmonic motion, timbre and texture.  It can, at its best take us to places deep within our heart, and stir up long forgotten memories. 

Personal choice/taste, musical understanding and musical depth are often directly related to our own personal experiences, encountering both great visual and performing art and great artists.  To what degree and frequency do we experience exposure to great art in our personal lives?  How good are we nourishing our musical souls?   Surely being an artist is a way of life, a way of understanding the world of beauty and ugliness around us, experiencing triumph and tragedy, peace and restlessness. 

Every piece of music that we choose to share with our students should be subjected to this criterion.  However, an aesthetic choice must take in the context of musical depth that great performing artists bring to the art form. This is why we need the inspiration through regularly being exposed to the finest of musical performances.

There are several texts available that will assist us in determining the complex issue of ensemble grading and ensemble assessment.  However, in the final analysis, repertoire choice remains a highly subjective topic and it is imperative that we have a clear knowledge and deep understanding of our ensemble’s strengths and weaknesses.

I would like to conclude this final installment on repertoire choice with a quote from Professor Craig Kirchhoff, Director of Bands, University of Minnesota

“Selecting repertoire is much more than picking pieces for the next concert. Selecting the appropriate repertoire is the most important thing that we do as music educators.  We enjoy a very special freedom and a very special privilege because we are empowered as music educators to create a meaningful curriculum for our students.  With that freedom and privilege comes an enormous responsibility.”

Best wishes for a fine year of music making!

Monte

 

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Choosing Repertoire that Inspires and Provides Great Teaching Opportunities: A Rewarding Challenge - Part 2

15/2/2014

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A.  When considering what constitutes appropriate repertoire selection it is important that we should consider works that:
  1. Provide opportunities for encouraging the love and appreciation of music: works that will aid in the nurturing and encouragement of musical creativity, comprehension, expression, inspiration and joy.
  2. Introduce and reinforce theoretical music concepts and historical context.
  3. Reinforce interpretive music concepts and expressive performance skills, which are introduced or addressed in the warm-up, technical development and chorale portions of rehearsals.
  4. Provide opportunities to reinforce technical development, such as manual dexterity, rhythmic vocabulary acquisition, the use of articulations as well as expressive and stylistic considerations.
  5. Present opportunities for exploring a wide range of human emotion: Works should include passages that present significant opportunities to experiment with expressive note grouping, phrase shape, rhythmic inflection, tempi variations and dynamic contrast. 

B.  Examining various evaluation criteria for the purpose of developing a more effective and academically accountable repertoire selection process:  We can begin by exploring the individual work’s compositional elements and related craftsmanship relating to how the works are put together.
  1. Does the work exhibit the craftsmanship of a skilled composer/arranger?
  2. Are the melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic elements integrated, transformed, and developed in a skilled way? 
  3. Is the form logically conceived? 
  • is it expertly scored?
  • Does the form shape the various elements of the work in a convincing way?
  • Does the work reflect a historical context in relation to both ‘creative and stylistic’ expression of a specific era?   
   4.  Does the work provide opportunities to employ the use of aural, dexterous and transitive skills?
   5.  Does the work contain the potential for developing musical skills in a sequential way?
   6.  Does the work contain interest for the players, audience etc.?
   7.  Does the work interest you —do you ‘believe’ in the work and, do you really want to conduct it? Why?

C.  Repertoire Choice: Assessing the educational and artistic suitability 
  1. Does the work lead towards achieving both technical and expressive educational goals?
  2. Select music that inspires, and includes all students in various combinations
  3. Coordinate your repertoire with your curriculum
  4. Does the work provide for:
  • Establishing and maintaining internalised pulse?
  • Exploring the beginning and ending keys or pitch centres?
  • Expressive musical interpretation in context: including dynamic contrast, articulations, note-grouping, phrase shape, form and the use of structure, rhythmic inflection)
  • Opportunities for the stylistic entering and exiting of silence in expressive context
  • Does the work fall within a standard grading system? i.e. 1 beginning to 6 Advanced? (consider developing your own*) 
  • The repertoire’s instrumentation requirements? Do you have the required instrumentation as listed in the score? Can instrument substitution be facilitated without comprising the composer’s original intent? 
  • Are the parts interesting, including the bass line and percussion section parts? Do you have sufficient forces to give a faithful performance of the work? 
  • Are the technical/musical demands of the work compatible with the overall skill level of the ensemble?
  • What is the general overall character of the music? 

I do hope that you will find these questions leading you to more investigative reflection...

We possess both the privilidge and the responsibility for choosing the foundatioal material for our performance ensembles.   Therefore choosing significant repertoire must form a vital component in a student’s musical education.  It is the interaction, and engagement between the human spirit and music that often initiates the spark of creativity and appreciation of beauty.

We need to the remember the importance of remaining discerning and able to articulate our rationale and defense of the repertoire we use as a critical component of our curriculum.

I do hope that you will find these questions leading you to  more investigative reflection...

In my next installment I plan to continue the discussion of repertoire selection through examining various grading systems and how we can best use them in assisting our repertoire choices.  

Please stay tuned in for my next installment on the importance repertoire choice!



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February 06th, 2014

6/2/2014

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Choosing Repertoire that Inspires and Teaches: A Rewarding Challenge

Some general thoughts and considerations on the imporance of choosing appropriate repertoire for long term investment

Every year we are faced with the perplexing issue of repertoire choice.  What concerns/needs/pre-conceived notions will drive our choices?  Do the following questions sound familiar?

  • Will my students like the works I choose? Why?
  • Will the works I choose have relevance? 
  • Do the students know the works, and does this matter?
  • Do I like the works I choose? Why?
  • Is teaching music through my repertoire choices an important consideration? Why, and how will I plan for this?     
  • Will the school, family and community approve of my choices? Is this important?
  • What is the overall technical strength of my ensemble? Is this important?
  • How long will it take me to teach my repertoire choices?  Is this important?
  • What are this year’s priorities and commitments?
  • Where do I see my ensemble’s position at the end of the term?  At the end of the year?

The importance of repertoire choice forms a vital link to achieving our overall educational philosophy and goals.  It is essential therefore that we choose works from a broad base of significant, rewarding repertoire as a part of our teaching matrix, as this selection provides the necessary material for applying the skills and practical knowledge we are attempting to share through our rehearsal process. 

If the purpose of music education is to stimulate, nurture and enhance the creativity, the imagination and the expressive abilities of our students, then the use of significant repertoire is an absolute necessity toward assisting us in achieving these lofty goals.

If we are to nurture a life-long love affair with music and the attendant creative process necessary for significant performance, we will need to search out and acquire repertoire, which by it's very nature intrinsically  motivates through providing inspirational opportunities for exercising both technical and expressive skills.  

To achieve this goal we will need to embrace four foundational beliefs, which in turn inform our music performance curriculum.

  1. The process of nurturing students through making and sharing music is more important than preparing for concerts, festivals, tours or contests.
  2. The long-term value of music education is greater than the entertainment value, which is often a high priority for families or school administrators.
  3. The long-term benefits of music education for our students is much more important than the short-term rewards of a concert, tour or festival participation. 
  4. And lastly, the quality of the student’s music education is directly related to the quality of the repertoire (and applied learning processes), which they will regularly study and perform!

It is essential that we consider the importance of making appropriate and informed choices in repertoire selection, for every decision or choice we make as educators, whether it is musical or ‘extra-musical’ is a direct reflection of our values.  In the case of repertoire selection the critical balance between aesthetic criteria and personal taste is a direct reflection of that value system.  While aesthetic values may be more easily agreed upon, the issue of personal taste is more difficult to define.  However, 'personal taste' may constitute the most important issue in the overall equation.

We must possess a basic understanding of how our chosen repertoire serves both our musical and non-musical educational agenda. In other words, we ought to look at our repertoire as a 'vehicle' that will transport our ensemble to its next musical and educational destination.

Please stay tuned in for my next installment on the importance of repertoire selection.
In my next post we will explore some specific criteria to keep in mind while making informed choices.


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    Author

    Mr. Mumford holds an international reputation as a conductor, adjudicator and clinician, contributing regularly to the field of music education and performance studies through conference presentations, publications, professional development offerings, and master classes. He is highly regarded for his musical experience, expertise, passion and effective teaching style. He is in demand as a guest conductor, music education consultant, and adjudicator, providing performance strategies and professional development for music educators, administrators and students alike. From 2015 -2017 Mr. Mumford was engaged as Advisor and Lead Educator for the Melbourne Youth Orchestra Teacher Professional Development Programme. ​  

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