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Blog: Catalysts & Connections

Classical, Contemporary, 20th Century or "New" Music?

Reading Frank Oteri’s recent piece “No Longer New” Music and Judith Lang Zaimont’s “Living American Woman” on newmusicbox reminded me not only of the many conversations I have had with colleagues about the need to include music being composed by living and recently living composers in our programs, but of the difficulty in finding a word to call that music. While some might say it is purely semantics to decide whether or not to call it classical music, contemporary music,… Read More »Classical, Contemporary, 20th Century or "New" Music?

A musical signature….

Have you ever wondered what your musical signature is? What about the musical signatures of your students? Why not pose that question to some students and see what they come up with? After trying out Jason Freeman’s itunes signature maker software you can have discussions leading in many different directions. What do the different musical signatures of your students sound like compared to one another? Why do they sound so similar or different? Does the musical signature reflect the identity… Read More »A musical signature….

"To clap or not to clap….. "(the conversation continues)

Before my students perform their compositions in class we always have a conversation about clapping and how the etiquette for clapping is different depending on the musical and social situation. (We also have many conversations on audience etiquette in general including the importance of turning off cell phones when going to concerts — well at least in most situations other than this or more commonly this.) We talk about, for example, how a rock concert has a different set of… Read More »"To clap or not to clap….. "(the conversation continues)

Copyright in (and out) of the classroom……

The issue of copyright came up in class today as it does very often. While I was explaining to a 7th grade general music class how we could apply what we have been learning about pitch, tone color, harmony, melody and rhythm by creating music in FLstudio, a student who had already downloaded the demo version at his house told me he ” inserted the voice of the Southpark character Mr. Garrison into the music” he made at home. I… Read More »Copyright in (and out) of the classroom……

Catalysts & Connections – A Music Education Web Mixtape

Track 1: An interesting perspective to reference the next time you’re having a discussion about jazz and hip hop music in your classroom Track 2: A post on being able to download free performances of Bach by the BBC Track 3: The free open source recording and audio editing software, Audacity, was recently upgraded and has many new features! Track 4: A new blog will be monitoring the aftermath of the SONY DRM fiasco Track 5: The MENC open Band… Read More »Catalysts & Connections – A Music Education Web Mixtape