The idea of teaching improvisation in the music classroom intimidates many music educators, and for good reason.
The Dallas Brass: Helping Students Switch to Tuba
Change happens. Students move, graduate, or are abducted by aliens. Whatever the reason, at some point you’re going to need some students to switch to tuba.
Building Community with Your Holiday Concert
We wanted to do something special for last year’s December concert. Among our goals was to increase attendance by attracting some new audience members.
The Dallas Brass: Projection Tips for Your Horns
The horn is a versatile instrument, capable of making beautiful, velvety tones, while also taking on the role of strong and exciting musical characters.
When Classroom Management Goes to the Dogs
Nobody lands in a career teaching music on accident. At least nobody I know. You don’t sign on to wrangle a squawking flock of beginner clarinetists without a deeply held desire to help them learn and grow.
A Short Guide to Successful String Instrument Rentals
[Editor’s Note: The following post is intended as a resource for parents of first year orchestra students. Feel free to link to this post in your communications with parents and students.]
Renting, rather than purchasing, a string instrument can be a wise decision.
Recruiting and Developing Violists in your School Orchestra
While teaching viola is slightly different than teaching the other string instruments, it’s not more difficult. Below are a few suggestions for helping the school orchestra teacher develop violists, including recruitment ideas, technical assistance, and ways to fully engage violists in rehearsals – and your program.
Music Performance Tips from a Dog: Stage Fright
If you’ve ever taught middle school students, you know what a truly unique challenge they can be. Opinionated, smelly, a little wild in the eyes .
Brass Tone Quality: No Instruments Required
What is the most revered individual musical quality? Overwhelmingly, the answer is sound, or tone quality. Just like our voice, our tone defines us.
Summertime Band Instrument Repair and Storage
School’s out and it’s time to look at which instruments need repair. Some of the key things that need to happen with instruments over the summer are:
Instrument cleaning (I recommend ultrasonic cleaning whenever possible) Cases vacuumed and cleaned Mouthpieces washed and inspected for damageToday I’d like to offer some tips, from my perspective at the repair bench, to help you both correctly store instruments over the summer and be ready for the back-to-school season which sneaks up on us so fast.