Mr. Holland's Opus: A Cautionary Tale

One of the great "school" movies of all times is Mr. Holland's Opus. Those who have seen it cannot  cannot forget the finale. Budget cuts were scheduled to eliminate the program this man had worked his whole career to build. A defeated Glenn Holland walked into an auditorium filled with supporters and a stage teaming with students from days gone by. All had come to pay tribute to a man and a program who had meant much to them.

Earlier in the movie, we see Mr. Holland as he provides hope to a struggling young clarinet player.



Fast forward years later to Mr. Holland's surprise retirement celebration. At one dramatic moment, the doors to the auditorium fling wide and in walks that same clarinet player. Only now, she is the governor. She takes the podium and begins a stirring tribute to her teacher:




I kept waiting for the moment the governor would announce that under no circumstances would funding for a program which had done so much for so many be cut. I waited...and waited...but that proclamation never came. After all was said and done, Glenn Holland began his retirement, and the music program became history.

What a poor ending! What were the writers thinking? What kind of message does it send when the governor praises the teacher and the program, yet does nothing to save it?

I was expecting the governor to make everything right. I was expecting the "good guys" to win. And I was expecting it all to happen while I sat comfortably in my chair and watched. Surely I would be walking out of the theater affirmed that as long as music programs offer quality and help children grow up whole, those music programs have nothing to fear. Someone will look out for them. 

Little by little, I began to realize that this movie ended correctly. The message was clear. As long as good people sit back and do nothing, quality programs will perish with little thought given as to the void which will be left. The challenge clearly issued to every one of us in that movie theater was the challenge to make sure that what happened on that screen would not repeat itself in our communities.

Richard Dreyfuss played the starring role of Glenn Holland. An Academy Award nominee for his performance, these are the remarks that he made at the 38th Anuual Grammy Awards:

This evening is a celebration of music, the artists who create it, and the phenomenon of creativity itself. Now, there are two realities in this movie (Mr. Holland's Opus). One is the life of a teacher, a reality of defeats and victories, like all of our lives, --but one that ends as a celebration. The other reality is the loss of music in the schools in the same America and that is hardly a celebration.

For some strange reason, when it comes to music and the arts, our world view has led us to believe they are easily expendable. Well, I believe that a nation that allows music to be expendable is in danger of becoming expendable itself.

Perhaps we've all misunderstood the reason we learn music, and all the arts, in the first place. It is not only so a student can learn the clarinet, or another student can take an acting lesson. It is that for hundreds of years it has been known that teaching the arts, along with history and math and biology, helps to create The Well Rounded Mind that western civilization, and America, have been grounded on. America's greatest achievements -- in science, in business, in popular culture, would simply not be attainable without an education that encourages achievement in all fields. It is from that creativity and imagination that the solutions to our political and social problems will come. We need that Well Rounded Mind, now. Without it, we simply make more difficult the problems we face.

There's a general feeling growing in this country lately that we simply spend too much money ... that we can't afford to give our children the education we grew up with. This is an insane anxiety that allows us to forget that we are, after all, the richest country on Earth, and that the real question is not what we can't pay for, but rather how can we efficiently pay for the kind of public education we all want and need.

Cutting these programs, then, is like tying our children's hands behind their backs, and I don't think anyone really wants to do that ... we hope for too much for our kids, and for our country. We are parents, most of us, and we are citizens, all of us. Don't let this happen, I urge you."

As "Music in Our Schools Month" draws to a close, the challenge before us is not only to sustain, but expand the kinds of programs which will allow our country and its citizens to thrive in the decades ahead. All around us are people who owe much of what they have accomplished to the creativity, discipline, imagination, appreciation of quality, and preference for quality they learned in a music program somewhere along the way. Whether or not those opportunities will be there in the years to come will be up to us.

If you enjoyed this post, share it with others. Click one of the social media buttons below to share om Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Google Plus, or email to a friend.

Making Musicians with iPads

In this last post, you read about my first experience playing a musical instrument, an unforgettable experience from 4th grade. You also read about my thoughts for how we can use available technology to give every student the kind of experience I had. In this guest post, you hear from Dr. Sara Womack who provides her suggestions for specific software.

The benefits of music education, and particularly keyboard studies, are well known. In addition to cognitive benefits, a strong link exists between piano playing and the development of skills needed to be successful in life, including patience, discipline, and coordination. Playing the piano can also reduce stress and anxiety prevalent in adults, as well as children.

Traditionally, to offer piano in a school setting, a piano lab outfitted with full size keyboards and instructional materials must be available for each student. Now, technology has opened additional avenues for piano instruction. Students can utilize classroom sets of iPads, available in many schools, as an instrument and as an instructional tool.

Utilizing the iPad as a piano does not come without drawbacks. The spacing of the piano keys on the iPad may not match the spacing on a traditional instrument. The 88 keys of a full size keyboard will not fit on the iPad screen without stacking the keyboards. Some people solve that issue by playing on two iPads, like this performer on YouTube. Additionally, the touch sensitivity on the iPad is not comparable to a traditional instrument, no matter how lightly or heavily the key is played. Nevertheless, with restricted funding and space, utilizing iPads for a piano lab is a viable option to expose students to the world of keyboard music.

In schools, keyboard classes could be structured, so that all students master concepts at the same pace or the class could be differentiated to meet individual student’s needs. Students could also be grouped together by ability level to help each other follow the sequence of concepts to be mastered. iPads offer a wealth of options to meet each school’s needs. An iPad piano concert is also a great way to showcase the talents of the students! How about this version of “Happy Birthday?”

Below, I have listed a brief selection of iPad apps that could be helpful in class keyboard instruction. Many of the apps offer in-app purchases to expand the song offerings or lesson content.

• Virtuoso Piano (Free) – This is a basic piano that students can play. Students have the option of labeling the note names on the keys. 

• Piano (Free) – Students will play the piano to 32 accompanied songs, while the notation scrolls across the top of the screen. The practice mode allows students to set their own tempo. Additionally, the keys highlight to show students which key should be played for each note. 

• PianoMan (Free) – This game allows students to play music from various classical composers on the accompanying touch piano. You can set the difficulty level to differentiate for each learner and students can have a Piano Battle with up to four players. 

• Learn Piano HD ($1.99) – Follow along with Peter Darling, an expert piano instructor, as he teaches private lessons that students can master at their own pace. Videos and instructional text are included in the app.

• Piano Dust Buster 2 (Free) – Students will help Granny dust off her piano by playing the correct notes of familiar tunes when germs touch the rhythm line to earn points and bonuses. This app can utilize the touch piano included in the app or can sync with a real piano. 

• 50in1 Piano ($1.99) – Lessons on how to play 200 songs on the piano are included in this app, as well as a piano keyboard with option note labels and 50 instruments, covering a variety of musical styles. Students can compose and record their own songs with 100 different drumbeats. 

• Nota ($2.99) – This app includes a four-octave piano that allows students to see where each note on the piano is located on the staff, in addition to a chord and scale browser and a reference library with over 100 symbols. The interactive quiz section of the app measures each student’s ability to recognize notes on the staff. 

• Piano Notes! ($0.99) – Test the students’ knowledge of reading notation in treble and bass clef with this app. Three game modes, Arcade, Count-down, and Endless, encourage students to associate notes with the correct piano keys. 

• Piano Genius (Free) – Students will learn how to play more than 400 songs including classical, traditional, and modern hits. While the notation scrolls at the top of the screen, students will follow the dots on the keyboard to play the song. Songs are available in easy, medium, and hard levels and points reward accurate playing. 

• If you have a small amount of additional funding, you can purchase the ION Piano Apprentice (Amazon, $49.95), a lighted 25-key touch-sensitive keyboard with built-in speakers. When connected to your iPad, iPod, or iPhone, the accompanying Piano Apprentice app shows students how to play and lights up the keyboard. 

Technology offers a multitude of ways to expose students to keyboard studies. With the equipment already available in most schools, a little organization and time will afford students with the invaluable benefits of music education. But it’s not just the equipment that is needed to provide these benefits, music teachers that inspire and engage students are essential. Steve Jobs said, “The most important things is a person. A person who incites your curiosity and feeds your curiosity; and machines cannot do that in the same way that people can.” The technology is only a tool utilized by those teachers that motivate students to realize their potential as musicians. Inspire your students’ musicianship with iPad pianos!

Dr. Sara Womack is the music teacher at Greystone Elementary School in Hoover, Alabama. Dr. Womack is Past-President of the Alabama Music Educators Association and President-Elect for the Southern Division of the National Association for Music Education. In additional to the doctorate in the field of music education, Dr. Womack also holds a Master's degree in school administration. 

You Can Teach Every Student to Play a Musical Instrument

Fourth grade was my favorite of all the elementary years. We had mastered the dreaded cursive writing as third graders and learned our multiplication tables "by heart." We felt more than equal to the task of long division which awaited us. Fourth grade was the year we had Mrs. Brown. She was young, and pretty, and fun, and nice.

Fourth grade was the year we embarked on our study of Alabama history. We learned all about the Indian tribes, DeSoto's journey, and the road to statehood. Our year culminated in a trip to the state capitol building and the First White House of the Confederacy. But the best part of all was that fourth grade was the year we learned the Tonette.

Not just the ones who expressed an interest.

Not just the ones who demonstrated the greatest aptitude.

All of us.

As third graders, we had been envious as we walked down the hall past the fourth-grade classes. The sounds of Mary's little lamb and the ever-popular "Twinkle-Twinkle Little Star" echoed through the hall. We couldn't wait until the day we, too, would be learn to play a real musical instrument.

In fourth grade, our music teacher was stretched thin. Education funding was tight then, too. So, Mrs. Brown and the other fourth-grade teachers had a plan. When the music teacher was in our room, so was Mrs. Brown. She listened as he taught. She learned right along with us. As a result, music was not something we had only when it our day for the music teacher to visit our classroom. Playing the Tonette was a natural part of every school day, because we had Mrs. Brown.

...it all becomes easier to understand when you can visualize the keyboard.

We could take the Tonette and music book home, and therefore, playing a musical instrument was something we could enjoy during leisure time. As I look back decades later at those parts of my formal education which made a difference and which did not, fourth grade and the Tonette shine.

How could that fourth-grade experience have been better? I suppose if we had piano labs for each fourth grade class, that experience would have been better. After all, when it comes to understanding music reading, knowledge of the piano keyboard is, without a doubt, the best foundation. Sharps and flats, intervals, chords, and scales: it all becomes easier to understand when you can visualize the keyboard.

The ideal situation would have been for each of us to have our own piano keyboard. Furthermore, if each of us had a piano keyboard at home, we could extend our learning and play a music instrument during our leisure time.

"Ideal, but impossible," you might say. Can you imagine the expense, not to mention the space required? Impossible then and impossible now. After all, today's reality is that music been eliminated from the curriculum altogether in many places.

Ironically, while we can't seem to offer what Mrs. Brown's fourth-graders had, what we can offer is even better, and it is something we could offer our students today with equipment we already have.

Technology makes it easily doable
Technology has assumed a major role in education, and providing the tools to make it effective has become a focal point across the curriculum. How does that point impact music in the regular classroom? It boils down to one simple question: Does your school have at least one classroom set of iPads or other touch-tablet devices? If the answer is "Yes," then the ideal of a piano keyboard for every student becomes not only possible, but easy.  

When we look at piano keyboard apps, the options, including free ones, are plentiful. If the tablets are available, the apps are but a download away. So, too, are teaching materials for beginning keyboard readily available.

The next step

To provide suggestions for what apps and teaching materials to download, I am going to call on an expert in the field. Dr. Sara Womack is the music teacher at Greystone Elementary School in Hoover, Alabama. Dr. Womack is Past-President of the Alabama Music Educators Association and President-Elect for the Southern Division of the National Association for Music Education. In additional to the doctorate in the field of music education, Dr. Womack also holds a Master's degree in school administration. I am proud to say that she is one of my former students, having played clarinet in my middle school band. In the next post, you will hear Dr. Womack's specific recommendations.

The challenges of time and money are not new. The best of us have always found ways to provide quality experiences for our students. Mrs. Brown was one of them. Whether the topic was DeSoto's travels, how to perform long division, or how to finger F# on the Tonette, Mrs. Brown knew how to teach fourth-graders what we needed to know. The good news is there are many like her in classrooms all across America and beyond.

If your school does not have a music teacher, your students can still have significant musical experiences. Learning the keyboard is great preparation for future participation on band, learning guitar, singing in the choir, or any other musical endeavor.

Check back to read Sara Womack's recommendations. Share what you learn with your principal and other teachers who believe music is an essential part of a complete education. Music for all students need not be a memory from a time gone by, nor a lofty goal for a time somewhere beyond. We have the resources. Our students can learn to play songs on the keyboard and gain a life-long understanding of the structure of music.

Not just the ones who express an interest.

Not just the ones who demonstrate the greatest aptitude.

All of them.

More Than Music: Tales from a Teacher's Heart

A friend of mine, Wayne Washam, often said, "There are some kids the band needs, and there are some kids who need the band." This video, which illustrates a true story from my teaching career, spotlights a young man who started as one and became the other.



March is "Music in Our School Month." It's an opportunity to focus on the part music plays in our schools if we are truly committed to educating children who grow up whole. I'll never forget the words of a former superintendent who said, "How many music questions are there on the (high-stakes) test?" I had to hold my tongue to keep from saying, "None...and it's a shame."

We are in a period where the pressure is on to teach to the test to the exclusion of all else. There needs to be a voice that says preparation for a rich life, not to mention a well-rounded childhood, includes far more than that which can be neatly included on a bubble test.

If you enjoyed this post, share it with others. Click one of the social media buttons below to share om Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Google Plus, or email to a friend.

March is "Music in Our School Month"

I look forward to an America which will reward achievement in the arts as we reward achievement in business or statecraft. I look forward to an America which will steadily raise the standards of artistic accomplishment and which will steadily enlarge cultural opportunities for all of our citizens. And I look forward to an America which commands respect throughout the world not only for its strength but for its civilization as well.

                                                  —John F. Kennedy


March is "Music in Our Schools Month." Now, more than ever, our schools are called upon to graduate students who can do much more than memorize facts which can be yielded by any Google search. We want students to think new thoughts, to create, and to innovate. Music is a vital part of this process. March is "Music in Our School Month" and provides the opportunity to spotlight this vital, yet often ignored part of growing up whole.

Enjoy this group of 5th graders from Staten Island, New York. They comprise the "PS22 Chorus."




If you enjoyed this post, share it with others. Click one of the social media buttons below to share om Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Google Plus, or email to a friend.

Save Time for What?

In a blog all about saving time and getting organized, one of the questions we must keep ever present is, "Save time for what?" The answers differ for each of us. For many of us, the answer is that we can save time on the mundane and direct it to the creative aspects of our lives.

By the way, in this performance, it's not a band with a choir behind them. It's the band that's also doing the singing.

A Cautionary Tale

One of the great "school" movies of all times is Mr. Holland's Opus. Those who have seen it cannot  cannot forget the finale. Budget cuts were scheduled to eliminate the program this man had worked his whole career to build. A defeated Glenn Holland walked into an auditorium filled with supporters and a stage teaming with students from days gone by. All had come to pay tribute to a man and a program who had meant much to them.

At one dramatic moment, the doors to the auditorium fling wide and in walks the governor, a figure we had seen much earlier in the movie as a struggling young clarinet player. She takes the podium and begins a stirring tribute to her teacher:






I kept waiting for the moment the governor would announce that under no circumstances would funding for a program which had done so much for so many be cut. I waited...and waited...but that proclamation never came. After all was said and done, Glenn Holland began his retirement, and the music program became history.

What a poor ending! What were the writers thinking? What kind of message does it send when the governor praises the teacher and the program, yet does nothing to save it?

I was expecting the governor to make everything right. I was expecting the "good guys" to win. And I was expecting it all to happen while I sat comfortably in my chair and watched. Surely I would be walking out of the theater affirmed that as long as music programs offer quality and help children grow up whole, those music programs have nothing to fear. Someone will look out for them. 

Little by little, I began to realize that this movie ended correctly. The message was clear. As long as good people sit back and do nothing, quality programs will perish with little thought given as to the void which will be left. The challenge clearly issued to every one of us in that movie theater was the challenge to make sure that what happened on that screen would not repeat itself in our communities.

Richard Dreyfuss played the starring role of Glenn Holland. An Academy Award nominee for his performance, these are the remarks that he made at the 38th Anuual Grammy Awards:

This evening is a celebration of music, the artists who create it, and the phenomenon of creativity itself. Now, there are two realities in this movie (Mr. Holland's Opus). One is the life of a teacher, a reality of defeats and victories, like all of our lives, --but one that ends as a celebration. The other reality is the loss of music in the schools in the same America and that is hardly a celebration.

For some strange reason, when it comes to music and the arts, our world view has led us to believe they are easily expendable. Well, I believe that a nation that allows music to be expendable is in danger of becoming expendable itself.

Perhaps we've all misunderstood the reason we learn music, and all the arts, in the first place. It is not only so a student can learn the clarinet, or another student can take an acting lesson. It is that for hundreds of years it has been known that teaching the arts, along with history and math and biology, helps to create The Well Rounded Mind that western civilization, and America, have been grounded on. America's greatest achievements -- in science, in business, in popular culture, would simply not be attainable without an education that encourages achievement in all fields. It is from that creativity and imagination that the solutions to our political and social problems will come. We need that Well Rounded Mind, now. Without it, we simply make more difficult the problems we face.

There's a general feeling growing in this country lately that we simply spend too much money ... that we can't afford to give our children the education we grew up with. This is an insane anxiety that allows us to forget that we are, after all, the richest country on Earth, and that the real question is not what we can't pay for, but rather how can we efficiently pay for the kind of public education we all want and need.

Cutting these programs, then, is like tying our children's hands behind their backs, and I don't think anyone really wants to do that ... we hope for too much for our kids, and for our country. We are parents, most of us, and we are citizens, all of us. Don't let this happen, I urge you."

As "Music in Our Schools Month" draws to a close, the challenge before us is not only to sustain, but expand the kinds of programs which will allow our country and its citizens to thrive in the decades ahead. All around us are people who owe much of what they have accomplished to the creativity, discipline, imagination, appreciation of quality, and preference for quality they learned in a music program somewhere along the way. Whether or not those opportunities will be there in the years to come will be up to us.

More Than Music

A friend of mine, Wayne Washam, often said, "There are some kids the band needs, and there are some kids who need the band." This video spotlights a young man who started as one and became the other. It is a true story from early in my teaching career. Thanks to Eye on Education for the technical assistance they provided in helping bring this story to you.



March is "Music in Our School Month." It's an opportunity to focus on the part music plays in our schools if we are truly committed to educating children who grow up whole. I'll never forget the words of a former superintendent who said, "How many music questions are there on the (high-stakes) test?" I had to hold my tongue to keep from saying, "None...and it's a shame."

We are in a period where the pressure is on to teach to the test to the exclusion of all else. There needs to be a voice that says preparation for a rich life, not to mention a well-rounded childhood, includes far more than that which can be neatly included on a bubble test.

Thoughts for "Music in Our Schools Month"

I look forward to an America which will reward achievement in the arts as we reward achievement in business or statecraft. I look forward to an America which will steadily raise the standards of artistic accomplishment and which will steadily enlarge cultural opportunities for all of our citizens. And I look forward to an America which commands respect throughout the world not only for its strength but for its civilization as well.

                                                  —John F. Kennedy


March is "Music in Our Schools Month." Now, more than ever, our schools are called upon to graduate students who can do much more than memorize facts which can be yielded by any Google search. We want students to think new thoughts, to create, and to innovate. Music is a vital part of this process. March is "Music in Our School Month" and provides the opportunity to spotlight this vital, yet often ignored part of growing up whole.

Enjoy this group of 5th graders from Staten Island, New York. They comprise the "PS22 Chorus."

More Than Music

A friend of mine, Wayne Washam, often said, "There are some kids the band needs, and there are some kids who need the band." This video, which illustrates a true story from my teaching career, spotlights a young man who started as one and became the other.



March is "Music in Our School Month." It's an opportunity to focus on the part music plays in our schools if we are truly committed to educating children who grow up whole. I'll never forget the words of a former superintendent who said, "How many music questions are there on the (high-stakes) test?" I had to hold my tongue to keep from saying, "None...and it's a shame."

We are in a period where the pressure is on to teach to the test to the exclusion of all else. There needs to be a voice that says preparation for a rich life, not to mention a well-rounded childhood, includes far more than that which can be neatly included on a bubble test.

Choir Creates Quite a "Storm"

With your eyes closed, you would think you hear rain followed by a real thunderstorm.



The group is Perpetuum Jazzile. Just a little something to brighten your day!

A Thought to Begin National "Music in Our School Month"

I look forward to an America which will reward achievement in the arts as we reward achievement in business or statecraft. I look forward to an America which will steadily raise the standards of artistic accomplishment and which will steadily enlarge cultural opportunities for all of our citizens. And I look forward to an America which commands respect throughout the world not only for its strength but for its civilization as well.
—John F. Kennedy

A Resolution from the Alabama State Board of Education proclaims March as "Arts Education Month." The Resolution can be read here.

"Auld Lang Syne"

Straight No Chaser



or a more traditional version...




What the New Year brings to you will depend a great deal on what you bring to the New Year.
-Vern McLellan

King's College Cambridge: Once in Royal David's City

A celebration of Christmas from the Chapel of King's College, Cambridge. The simple story of the Nativity is told in the familiar words of the King James Bible, and in poetry by Henry Vaughan, John Milton and T.S. Eliot.

Nativity Carol : Kings College Choir, Cambridge

Written in 1963, this was one of its composers
earliest pieces. It was published in 1967
with organ accompaniment, and later
scored for strings by the composer.

Nativity Carol

Born in a stable so bare,
Born so long ago;
Born neath light of star
He who loved us so.

Far away, silent He lay,
Born today, your homage pay,
Christ is born for aye,
Born on Christmas Day.

Cradled by mother so fair,
Tender her lullaby;
Over her son so dear
Angel hosts fill the sky.

Far away, silent He lay,
Born today, your homage pay,
Christ is born for aye,
Born on Christmas Day.

Wise men from distant far land,
Shepherds from starry hills
Worship this babe so rare,
Hearts with His warmth He fills.

Far away, silent He lay,
Born today, your homage pay,
Christ is born for aye,
Born on Christmas Day.

Love in that stable was born
Into our hearts to flow;
Innocent dreaming babe,
Make me Thy love to know.

Far away, silent he lay,
Born today, your homage pay,
Christ is born for aye,
Born on Christmas Day.

A Christmas Festival

A Grown Up Christmas List

Merry Christmas Darling

I have always been a Karen Carpenter fan. As a band director, I closed my first Christmas concert with "Merry Christmas Darling." Little did any of us know that Karen Carpenter would pass away shortly thereafter. Throughout my career as a band director, closing the Christmas concert with this beautiful selection became a tradition.



Update:
After posting this video and making mention of it on my Facebook page, I received this comment on that Facebook entry:

I love that song. Dawn and I were background singers on that recording, vocals on September 17, 1978 and video for the first Carpenter's Christmas Special on Sept. 24 (four days before Erin was born).

The comment was left by Dr. Brad Logan, a good friend from many years ago when he was choir director at the University of Montevallo. Brad has been the director of the Bemidji State University Choir since 1998. It's amazing how relationships intertwine. It is also amazing how much time you can spend face-to-face and then learn something new once you are separated by hundreds of miles.

Galway Christmas

Straight No Chaser 12 Days of Christmas

Straight No Chaser performs 'The 12 Days of Christmas' at their reunion show at Indiana University!