In the readings this week, Feldman and Contzius discussed the importance of rhythm and movement. They mentioned Dalcroze as being a strong proponent of learning the fundamentals of ear training and rhythm before learning a musical instrument. While I agree with Dalcroze in that students need to learn the rudiments of ear training and rhythm before they play a musical instrument, I don't think that focusing extensively on ear training and rhythmic exercises in the instrumental music classroom is very time effective or productive. I believe that ear training and rhythm cognition begins at birth and keeps developing throughout the course of one's life span. It should be taught in general music from the moment a child enters into preschool. Hopefully, children will take many years of general music before they ever begin a musical instrument. But this is obviously not always the case. I think children are exposed to rhythm and melody enough in their everyday lives. I don't think that the instrumental music teacher should do much with it in the classroom. It takes valuable time away that is already compromised with other student activities. And I'm not sure that students are getting a lot out of the activities anyway.
A perfect example of this occurred during our class session when Dr. Bauer played You Can Call Me Al. Although this activity was fun and exciting, I'm not sure I understood what the ultimate goal of it was. We all took turns improvising rhythmic patterns using various parts of our body as percussion instruments, while the rest of the class tried to copy the rhythmic patterns in a call and response sort of "game." It was fun and I think a lot of people enjoyed the activity. But how is an activity like this going to fit into my curriculum for high school band? There is scarcely enough time in the day to focus on intonation and playing together as a group. There is even less time to get through as much repertoire as teachers would like to get through. Although the exercise with rhythm is interesting, I'm not even sure that there is enough time in the activity for it to give any sort of lasting effect. To me, it takes unnecessary time away from more important issues like can we get from letter "A" to letter "B" without completely falling apart? Time is money, and unfortunately when I get into a real teaching situation I have a feeling time will be even less than I think it will be now.
This is not to say that I don't see the educational implications in doing exercises like the ones we did in class. I think over a period of time, students could learn a lot from these types of activities, and have a greater sense of rhythm, pulse, and meter. But what I take issue with is the time and place. Like I said before, something like this is fantastic for general music. It is fun, it makes the students think for themselves, it introduces elements of improvisation, and it is a nice distraction from the rest of the day. Students will be able to learn a lot from this process, and I hope general music teachers across the world are putting it into their overall curriculum. I just don't think we have time to do it in band. Besides, the kids want to play music. They want to get their instrument out and play. Anything preventing this from happening will just make them more frustrated and anxious.
The rhythm and tonal activities we did in class were not meant for a high school band. They are the types of things you MUST do in a beginning instrumental music program. While some students are exposed to rhythm and melody in their daily lives, many will not be in a way that provides them with the readiness to play an instrument. I think you have a bit of an "expert blind spot" in regards to this. If you are fortunate enough to teach in a school system that has a general music program that develops students rhythm and tonal ability prior to beginning instrumental study, then you may not have to do as many of these types of activities. But, you really can't afford NOT to develop students abilitiies to audiate tonal an rhythm patterns - it is essential to informed musicianship.
ReplyDeleteI think you also need to consider what the ultimate purpose of school music programs are. It is not about getting from A to B. It is about developing the musicianship of each student. All of the things we have talked (and will talk) about are possible to do while still achieving outstanding peformances. In fact, I would wager that doing these things will result in a long term yield of higher levels of performance than would otherwise be accomplished.