I just wanted to pick the DLO brain on some things that have settled deeply into my mind for the last month regarding music and teaching music. Sorry for the terribly long post.

I think there's a massive flaw in how we've been trained/train ourselves in music. Even if we haven't necessarily been taught in this way, I've seen it become something that innately settles into musician's minds, particularly less talented ones.

After reading this article I immediately began thinking about what happens to us while we practice. Typically, (again, especially for the less talented) we focus so heavily on flaws and errors that we rarely notice good things. Good things actually tend to be considered on par with expectations and don't get acknowledged, as though doing something good is too mediocre too receive praise.

In students I've had, I've noticed this probably the most. Several of my private students throughout my teaching life have seemed so bogged down with a lack of success. I have one student in mind that gets so heavily discouraged that he shakes after enough negative stimuli. These stimuli don't come from me by the way - at least not directly. I make quite a point to be positive and encouraging. I certainly point out errors and offer solutions (that's why they pay me) but its to help them improve, and I season what I'm going to say in a way that's encouraging. At least I try. I talked to a couple students in the band that I teach for this evening asking them what they do when they think about between repetitions when they practice. Basically everyone's answer was "I think about what was wrong." I think there's something wrong there.

Then there's myself as a student. As a college student studying music ed, I have quite a share of practicing to do, participating in several ensembles and actively practicing concert percussion and drum set. I find myself practicing in the same way fairly often. Like a mercenary killing errors. That's the only purpose of rehearsals too. Killing errors.

Then there's myself as a teacher and an observer of other teachers (primarily in marching music). The school I currently work at has an EXCELLENT colorguard. And I mean excellent, they are extremely talented. Several of them are extremely unhappy too, again especially the less talented. Notice by less talented, I don't mean those who don't try. I mean the one's who are less talented, as in less natural talent. I told one of them this evening they did a great job. I thought so at least. She said "No, everything was really bad." I asked why and she said "Because it wasn't perfect." After I asked her she had fun her response was "No, it's not fun if its not perfect." Isn't that sad? Basically that's what she's learned from her instructor, "it's only fun if it's perfect." I doubt the instructor has said that, but maybe that's what the rehearsal vibe has taught them. Even in watching the band directors I've had, I've seen a similar problem. They're bogged down with the pursuit of perfection - the improbable pursuit.

This leads me to the conclusion that there's something wrong with an activity where the only goal is to be perfect. The precision and competitiveness of music make it particularly prone to that type of approach.

What's interesting about that is that music didn't start off that way for most people. Most people thought it would be fun. And then the fun and magic get's sucked out with each error.

I'm not saying perfection shouldn't be a goal, but I think the first goal should be to have fun. We "play" music, we don't "work" music.

I think that's enough to inspire discussion. The results of this "research" will eventually go into an article for MusicMajorSource.net, my new collaborative website for music majors so I'm very much thankful for the discussion, thanks!

How do you feel the activity could change?

Some random thoughts from 3 decades of music. Tidbits and things I've heard and realized on my own.

I was in a MENC national convention in-service and a presenter quoted a study where they identified negative professions. Curiously enough education was one of the most negative, and within education, music educators were the most negative. Presenter asked why? Room full of music teachers in audience responded in near unison "we are always fixing whats wrong"

Ever notice that we will grudgingly accept a 70% in algebra and call it passing. But no one would tolerate a music concert where the performers only play 70% of the notes correctly.

In other parts of the world, musicians are not worried as much about making the students "feel good about themselves". They are paid to train successful musicians. (illustration) Years ago Symphony flutist and college professor was asked to judge middle school solo and ensemble. This guy was not from the United states and was trained in Europe. s & E event was meant as a preliminary evaluation for the district s & e. This event had 10 soloist and parents in same room. Soloist had to play for an audience. This guy assigned almost exclusively III's, IV"s, V's all day long to 6th, 7th, 8th graders. One child he stopped in the middle of her solo, stood up and told the audience that "this is an example of how not to play the flute!" I had the opportunity to talk to this man a few days later about this. He said in Europe they don't reward averageness with inflated scores. Needless to say he was never asked to judge again.

In my own experience I have encountered the reverse. I have been told by students and parents alike That I am not tough enough on them. I have had HS kids look me in the eye and say "We know you don't care about us because you don't yell at us and tell us that we're terrible. You don't kick our butts". (I didn't say it was rational)

Also creating music is a very personal intimate thing. We expect a high quality product out of ourselves. In our "mind's ear" we have an idea of what it "should" sound like. When we don't achieve that we feel inadequate. Add to that feeling the teacher telling you what you did wrong, so it is no wonder a musician can feel terrible.

So why do we as musicians do this to ourselves??? Because we all live for those moments of Musical "purity" in our product. We know it when we hear it. And once we achieve it, we are rarely satisfied until we do it again.

This year with my marching band I have done the opposite of what we all have been trained to do. For music I picked an all pop show (pep band music really). I backed off the difficultly level of the music. I told my drill writer to write drill as if none of the students had ever marched a step before. I actually reduced the amount of time we are rehearsing. End result, we are having the best year that we have had in 5 years. The kids feel really good about the product they have produced. We are playing with expression and clarity. Our marching has lot's of clarity (more than we have had in 5 years).

In music and the other arts we have a low tolerance for a less than perfect performance. So the musicians and the people who teach them are not willing to relax and recognize that not every single run through is going to be perfect every time. We don't want the people around us to think that we are not committed to excellence.

I know that my thoughts jumped around. But your posting is more profound than perhaps some musicians would want to admit. Thanks for stirring the pot.

My View from the cheap seats

Just to clarify, I don't mean marching music only, I mean music in general as we're taught in school from middle school onward out of college.

As far as changes I think should be made, I'm still very much in the thinking process of this. So far a couple points are coming to mind however:

eliminate the obsession with perfection
This is particularly with teachers. I think there are a lot of facts that teachers ignore in music. Using HS marching band for example:

There's aren't professional marching bands, there aren't professional drumlines, and there aren't professional colorguards. The miniscule few that do exist may very well not exist for long or may thin out drastically in the future (military bands, Jags DL etc.), and the other ones you have to pay to be a part of, professional in quality, hardly professional by definition (corps). Essentially what this means is the number of people we're preparing for something greater than what they're doing now is very few.

Probably the biggest point is the common denominator in everyone's reasoning for doing marching music is to have fun. It may be for the social aspect, it might be because they want to play music, it might be because they want to get into football games for free. The problem is none of those reasons are "because I want to do everything perfectly." So as opposed to our earlier conclusion, the number of people who do this activity do it because they want to have fun.

As the facilitators of the activity in whatever position we hold, its our job to serve our students. Teachers are servants, we serve our kids the best we can, giving them the best we can hopefully out of love for music and love for them!

They don't do this to be perfect, or to prepare for a future profession. A lot of them do it because the school life needs a supplement of fun! For most people, the majority of school subjects aren't fun. Occasionally there's the kid that absolutely loves math and needs nothing but math, but the average kid needs some extra-curricular joy. For a lot of kids that's marching band. Our job is to insure that the kids have fun, not to insure that they're perfect little musical marching machines.

change the definition of perfection
I think an important part of what I'm getting at is to still strive for exceptional performance and effort. I'm not suggesting we go from high expectations to playing at a low level or accepting whatever we get. I'm saying perfection in performance can't be the primary goal.

One of the things I've been thinking about lately is changing the definition of perfection in teaching music. In recognition that students don't do music to be perfect, but for the fun and joy, I think the definition should be based around the effort that someone puts forth, versus the result. I think if you gave it 100% of your focus and effort, that rep was absolutely perfect. Evaluate things that need improving and aim for the improvements next time around, but if you gave it 100% it was perfect and be happy about it. In fact I would say this approach would exponentially improve the result due to the absence of the bogging down effect that obsession over flaw causes.

fun comes from within
The last change I'm thinking is necessary is for us to cause students to realize that fun doesn't come from teachers, instructors, leaders or peers. They certainly have a massive influence, but the choice to enjoy things comes from within. It can't come from us because our job is to find things that are wrong and assist our students in fixing them (among other things, of course). That's not to say we can't be fun, it'll certainly make their choice to find joy easier if we're enjoyable to around and to learn from.

I think what I'm saying is the gratification of music comes from meeting your own standard, not someone else's. So we need to insure that we're teaching the standard to be met as your best effort at that time. If we teach that, hopefully they'll learn it.

Bringing it all together, I think if we as teachers:

1. get over our obsession with flawlessness in a group of students who didn't do this to be flawless, and start doing what we can to make the activity fun,

2. make our main focus of evaluation effort, and not perfection

3. teach our students to know perfection as 100% effort 100% of the time,

We'll vastly improve the activity. I don't quite know how those apply to individual practice or other musical contexts but this is the direction my mind has gone. Is this crazy? Thoughts?

I rarely speak out on here, but here's what I think:


This activity is ABOUT excellence.

Nothing more.

That's what makes it so special... really, because at the end of the day, the proof is in the pudding...in front of a football stadium full of folks who understand what excellence is.

If we get bogged down in the whole "feel good about what you're doing", "it's about effort, but not achievement" movement... this activity dies as we know it.

That's why I fell in love with the activity. that's why the folks I know did too. maybe it's just a few of us.

But, really:

Just think of the first "piss clean" drumline you ever saw. What went through your mind? For me, it was:

How on earth does THAT happen?????

I'll tell you what, it doesn't happen through public education "feel good about yourself" bs. it comes through working hard and achieving your goals.

Marching music isn't about that for everybody, in fact for HS school students, it's very rarely for that. I even bet for some people doing corps it's not all about that. I understand that it's about that for someone who's marched and taught the Bushwackers drumline. I'd be shocked if it wasn't. But the fact still remains that it's not about that for everbody.



I never said achievement wasn't important, in fact hopefully it came across that I was saying quite the opposite. Achievement is an integral part of the activity, but it's not the only part of the activity. By the way, neither is having fun the only part of the activity, but for a lot of people it's the reason they do it. And I think as a teacher, making an effort to insure the activity is enjoyable for the kids we're teaching is something we can afford.

Agreed! And there are plenty of approaches to working hard and achieving you goals. There's the one you see far to often, where the director, staff and section leaders are grasping people by the neck, yelling and screaming where no one's happy. They'll put on a pretty good show, but they'll dread the next rehearsal 'cause they know how it's gonna be. Then there's the approach where kids want to work because working is fun, the working environment is fun, the staff is approachable and there isn't fear, just wanting to put for the greatest effort to do well.

I've seen both produce the same end-result. Just one method is more fun for everyone involved. drumteacherdude seems to have seen this work in his own program.

I don't have a problem with the hard-core do everything right mentality. It's great and it's amazing what a drumline unified around that attitude can do. But every band isn't a BOA band, and HS band isn't drum corps. People join BOA bands and corps because they have that mentality. Your average HS student want to enjoy music, we owe them that as educators.

Wow! All but one person is missing the point!

Paul hit the baby seal on the head with the statement " We serve the child ", not ourselves. Yeah, hard work and practice get the job done, but " a love " is what makes a great musican! It's the kids talent, not yours!

Too much bickering over they are not having fun and not enough on setting the stage for fun. How much time have you spent trying to inspire the student?

"Don't aspire for greatness, inspire greatness" !

I hear everyone hollering " They're not having fun! " . How about asking the student what inspires them. Hey, ask them what would make it fun!

Just an example, but you take any kid at any age, and let's say he's a horn player. Now stand that kid in front of a horn line like Santa Clara Vanguard when they play " Send in the Clowns ". I bet after that the kid is inspired! I don't mean only a corp horn line, if the kid is into jazz or concert, same concept.

Inspiration and the love of music, plus good practice habits make a great musician. If you take all that away and there is no fun then all you have is a cold, gray, check pattern.

isnt it normal for everyone to strive for success in order to get praise? Why not work on something small and create a reward. Create the task slightly larger and Create a bigger reward. It keeps the praise level up without making the student feel "lost" for not seeing as much praise. I used this technique along with creating a weekly prize that's handed down from the student to a student who believe they are working hard. Its handed off in a weekly fashion and creates a tradition.

I understand what you're saying by not only this portion of your post, but all of your posts in general, but I'd like to throw this out there. I think the level of success of a performance is determined not by how fun or how strict an instructional staff is. I think it needs a balance of that. Just like everyone pays money to be in drum corps, where the concept of strictness tends outweigh the concept of fun, people do still pay to be a member of a high school marching band as well. When you throw high school members out on the field and say, "Okay, we're going to be as positively supportive as possible; we just want you guys to come out here, have fun, then go home at the end of rehearsal."
I don't think you're going to get a lot done. I know you're not suggesting that as the other alternative, I'm just merely pointing out the purpose behind being strict in a rehearsal setting. You need some sense of drive to get people going, especially when the personal drive isn't just musical excellence.You're right, especially at the high school level, members of a band will have hundreds of different reasons besides "because I want to make perfect music." However, those members to all have a similar goal, which is to take a musical show, complex drill, and lots of time after school to make it as perfect as can be. That's what sets marching band apart from anything else, it's about getting as close to perfect as possible, then indulging in your output at the end of the season, whether you do that in competitions, public shows, or at your organizations' (WGI, DCI, DCA, SAPA, I&E etc.) version of finals. In these atmospheres, it is strictly about musical performance and the level of excellence that you, as a performer or a group, can put out.

With all of this being said, I do agree with a lot of what you have posted. It takes more than just a military mentality to make a successful group. When you make people miserable with the level of strictness, your program is going to fail because there is no enjoyment in the process. On the other side of the spectrum, an organization with NO level of management and superiority will leave that group headed to a dismal path to nowhere, because it's a group with no sense of direction.

I've personally found that groups with a nice mixture of both of these aspects tend to be the most successful. Look at drum corps, for example. The activity is easily one of the most successful musical atmospheres, and it's obviously one of the most strict collaborations, as well. While there are plenty of other factors to include in this, for example, the level of performers' abilities, the staffs, the sheer amount of funding that is available to help ensure musical excellence, etc. there is still something very vital to take into consideration, here. Drum corps is probably the most strict that the marching band world gets (I understand you're using music as a whole, but I think comparing DCI to orchestral performances is like comparing apples to oranges, and isn't very beneficial to do here), however, if you speak to members after the season is over, ask them one question, and one question only, "Did you have fun?" I can tell you that well over 90% of the members would say that they had an absolute blast, despite the strictness, and despite the hard work that went into musical perfection. Is that just because the music was perfect - or as close to perfect as obtainable? Of course not. There are way to many other aspects of corps such as fellowship, touring the country, thousands of fans, etc. that make it all worth it.

I'm now going to play devil's advocate to my own post. These organizations are typically already on the successful side of the musical spectrum. They have talented players, and they have a staff to make things great. What if you're at a high school group that is about 50 strong, and is over 50% high school freshmen that came from a feeder middle school with a terrible band program? When you're in this sort of situation, I think it IS best to turn away from a high level of strictness, and turn more toward making the activity more fun. In a situation like this, there are too many other things to overcome to make a performance "perfect," it's still vital to hold goals and other expectations for the performers to help insure a sense of satisfaction when it's all over with, but I do understand where turning straight to strict instruction to progress can cause a non-desired effect, and would eventually cause the program to somewhat fold.

Anywho, sorry for the ridiculous post, I was trying to cover all aspects that I could possibly think of at once. Just my $0.02.

B

That's a point that we haven't brought up yet. Determining the balance. How?

I especially appreciate what you mentioned at the bottom of your post about teaching to the group. Acknowledging that one shoe doesn't fit every foot is something that needs mentioning.

So what have you done in your teaching career to gauge to the groups needs? How have you measured it and what changes have you made to bridge the gap?

Thanks for posting bcaviness, what a contribution to the discussion!