Music Education and Performance

This post is in response to Jason Heath's recent "You can't teach professionally and perform professionally" article.

The article expresses Jason's dismay at being told by a professor of music education that students should choose between an education major and a performance major, rather than pursue a double major.

A few things immediately struck me about this article. The first is the context of the statement: Jason described it as a "certification course", which I can only take to mean an education-specific course offered as part of a degree in education. The state of Illinois may or may not have the same requirements I'm familiar with: here in New York, and in Rhode Island (where I did my initial coursework in music education), certified teachers are required to have a bachelor's degree, a minimum amount of undergraduate coursework in education (usually including observational work), and accepted student teaching experience. For full certification after the first few years of teaching, the candidate is required to obtain a masters degree within a set time frame. There are other states with looser requirements, but the trend nationally is to require at least this much of the incoming teacher. Please correct me if you're a teacher in another state who knows more about this.

Just to continue with the context of the statement: if you're talking about becoming a "certified" teacher, and you're not talking about getting a doctorate, then I can only assume you're talking about becoming a "schoolteacher", k-12, full time, hand in your planbook and do what you're told within union regulations kind of teacher. The kind who doesn't get to choose which kids or families to work with, or not work with. The kind who has to become an early riser whether they want to or not (that seems to be more of a problem for me than for Jason, who wakes up at 4:45 to blog. Wow.) This is in stark contrast to "studio teaching" or "college music department teaching", which are both entirely different animals.

Within certain limits, I think the professor in question was right, though he (it sonds like it was a "he", anyway) probably said it in a way which was bound to get a mature and accomplished player like Jason a little worked up.

Let's look at it this way: Everyone with any experience in "the business" knows how much of a commitment it takes to scrape by as a musician. Jason himself has documented this better than anyone in his "Road Warrior" series of articles. It doesn't matter if you're an opera singer, orchestral bassist, rock guitarist, or itinerant shofahar-blower: if you're going to make a living, you've got to spend some serious time traveling to keep the gigs rolling in. You have to be available, and you simply won't be as available when you're working a teacher's schedule.

You can, and should, continue to play at a professional level. Some of the most horribly ineffective and unhappy teachers I've met are "music teachers who don't play music". This is a fate worse than death, and should be avoided at all costs.

However, you simply won't be able to keep building that complicated jigsaw puzzle a freelance player needs to be building in order to maintain their status as a "professional musician". You can try it for a while, but I've yet to see it work. This is one of the things which kept me out of the teaching profession for so long. When I was younger, I was just dead set on keeping my playing schedule up. Less than five nights working per week was unacceptable, and I wasn't ready to try to give that up until other things happened in my life to push me away from trying to be a full-time player.

This tradeoff isn't all bad, though: it is very common for teachers to play on a professional level in regional orchestras, jazz groups, as singer-songwriters, whatever floats your boat: and they don't have to desperately scramble for money while doing it. I no longer have to take the cut-rate theater gigs I always hated doing, nor do I have to fill up my schedule with "music store teaching" or any of the other "musician jobs" I used to have to deal with on a regular basis if I wanted to pay rent. I can "work cheap" on projects that are of genuine interest to me, as time allows, and that's a good thing. When you have a salaried teaching job and the per-session orchestra with the psychopathic section member two states away calls you, you're allowed to say "gee, I'm sorry, I can't do it". Even better, you don't have to worry whether that contractor will ever call you again.

I have to assume that the prof in question was working at a "teacher's college". Generally speaking, the young musicians who attend these colleges do not have a whole lot of real-world playing experience, so they may have no idea what it takes to survive as a musician. I also have to assume that if someone's got a good, solid playing job as a studio musician (do they still make those?) or a full-time orchestra player, that they will not be going to the teacher's college to get certification to teach in the public schools. In my humble opinion, the prof was right on this one, and doing a service to the younger students in the class, who may need to get their priorities in order before they can prepare to go into the classroom or onto the audition circuit. Either one of these things will be an all-consuming task.

I don't think he was really telling you you can't play as a professional, Jason. I think he was telling a young cohort of students: "It's time to get serious."

There is no question in my mind about this: no one should enter a career in education lightly. It is a profession which requires a lot of serious preparation. There are many different children from many different families who have many different needs, and they don't care about the trip you will have to take to Seattle, or Albany, or Houston, or wherever you need to haul your bass to play excerpts for a committee. They will care if they have a professional teacher who is equipped to deal with their child's educational issues. Or, to give you another tired cliche, you are not just teaching music, you are teaching children.

We need teachers who are willing to commit to this obligation. There are more than enough people trying to "dabble" in the field, then walking out in their first years, only to find out it's too challenging for them.

Thought I'd pass this on - Kozol's online resources

I just finished reading Jonathan Kozol's latest release, "Letters to a Young Teacher". I have to say, any criticisms I've had of his views in the past have all been addressed in this book. He's at his best here, giving real advice to real teachers "on the front lines" rather than addressing large, intractable systematic and societal problems. This seems a stark contrast to his previous works, which have always given me the impression that he's a great critical writer who is very good at seeing existing problems, but not as effective at offering workable solutions.

I was wrong. Read the book.

At the end, there is a series of afterwards. One of them has some contact information for his educational reform movement, Education Action!

After sending an email to the address listed there, I received a very prompt reply giving me links to some recently established resources. Here they are, go check them out if you are interested in Educational reform in the U.S.:

(quoted from ed-action email)
Our website is up and running (www.ed-action.org), and I want to encourage you to visit it so you can see the many things we have to offer. Some important features include:

Discussion Board
http://www.edaction.com/discussion/list.php?2

Jonathan's Suggested Revisions for NCLB
http://ed-action.org/states.php?section=NCLB
(we encourage all of our network members to "weigh in" on NCLB, whether it be writing to or phoning their Congressional representatives, or some other way of voicing their opinion)

Join Our Network
http://ed-action.org/join.php

Find Education & Social Justice Oriented Organizations
http://ed-action.org/resources.php?section=search

In case anyone else is interested, here is the email address to Mr. Kozol's Ed Action! organization: educationactioninfo@gmail.com

Links to Resources for Suzuki Bassists

These resources are being published as part of an informational series about the Suzuki Bass Program.

If you have any other links you'd like included here, please comment to this post by clicking the word "comment" below, or email me.

www.suzukiassociation.org
www.isbworldoffice.com
www.coloradosuzuki.org
www.uwsp.edu/cofac/suzuki
books, CDs, and accompaniment parts for Suzuki bass teachers and students
Shinichi Suzuki's Nurtured by Love
Article: Suzuki Violin vs. Traditional Violin
Great article about S. Suzuki. Includes 25 hours of video footage of his teaching!


For more about the Suzuki Bass Program and Virginia Dixon, follow these links:

About Virginia Dixon
Interview with Virginia Dixon
How I became involved with the Suzuki Bass Program
How to Become a Suzuki Bass Instructor
Materials for Beginning Suzuki Bass Students and Teachers

Interview with Virginia Dixon

This interview with bassist/Suzuki teacher/teacher trainer Virginia Dixon is being published as part of a series of informational articles about the Suzuki Bass School.

Please refer to the bottom of the page for links to related articles

Q: What could you tell us about your own early training?

VA: I have two performance degrees from Indiana University. But things really came together for me when I was a Fellow with the Bach Aria Festival and followed that with doctoral work with Julius Levine at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. The wholeness of his approach, his deep understanding of expressive playing, and his incredible personal kindness became the basis for my teaching today.

Q: How did you initially get involved with the program?

VA: I wanted my own three children to have an early start. There was a parallel with the way my own parents raised me to be around water and to swim. Though I am not a professional swimmer, I do it with great ease, and it has greatly enriched my whole life. Though only one of my kids has become a professional musician, it has worked the same for them. Their lives are much richer for it.

I still remember the first time I attended their violin repertoire class. A group of extremely young children sweetly playing "Twinkle" together was so startlingly beautiful that I wept. I was hooked!

Q: How old was the youngest student you ever taught?

VA: I have taught a series of three-year-olds. One still had the corner of a diaper appearing out below his shirt, and today as a high school student he is a very successful jazz player.

Q: How do you approach positioning the instrument, or teaching a beginner
how to position it?

VA: We move. Through the exploration of movement the child learns not to be intimidated by the size of the instrument and to use his/her body naturally for deep, rich sound.

Q: Could you describe how bow control is developed in the early stages?

VA: The Suzuki Method starts with controlling little pieces of bow and then increases the amount used. The muscle training that comes from this is what is responsible for the big, free sound.

Q: How do you encourage intonation to improve?

VA: Most problems are solved through physical balance and ease and through ear training with the use of open strings and sympathetic vibration.

Q: Is it possible for adults to relearn how to play using techniques designed to
teach young beginners?

VA: Definitely! I did.

Q: One of Dr. Suzuki's basic tenets was that we are not only training children to be good musicians, but good people. How do you feel about that?

VA: Music can be a very noble art. It can inspire many things including collaboration, inner discipline, a feeling of fulfillment, and deep peace. We have too precious little of these things in this warring world of ours.

Q: Do you think that involvement with "Suzuki" can increase a teacher's
marketability or earnings?

VA: Definitely! The system of registering book courses that the Suzuki Association of the Americas as it is set up is very resume -building, both for the classroom and studio teacher. In addition, the people who go through my training courses take a good look at their own playing and teaching thus becoming better performers and better teachers.

Q: The books are designed as a progressive method, where each playing skill is
built up individually through the study of a piece focusing on that skill. Could
you talk a little about how you are determining which pieces belong in the
book, and in which order?

VA: Much of it is through experimentation with the children. Shinichi Suzuki spent several decades figuring out which pieces and in what order. As we create new instrument areas we have done the same, though by following his original example we have taken less time. Even more fortunate are the new methods of publishing that allow changes with every printing of the volumes. It is an evolving method, and that is what Suzuki envisioned.

Q: What do you think about other published methods (Vance, Simandl,
Rabbath, or others) and are they compatible with a Suzuki curriculum?

VA: Each teacher must teach in his/her own way to fit the needs of the individual student. These works can be extremely helpful in supplementing what we have in the method already. The most important reasons for having a nice sequential series like the Suzuki Method are:

1) The children can play their common literature together even when they come from different parts of the world

2) It makes teaching so much more effortless and efficient.

Q: Many players criticize Suzuki methodology because it doesn't teach reading
skills, making it hard to learn reading later. Could you address that?

VA: When the Suzuki Method first came to America I think that the early teachers were so impressed and excited that a small child could play difficult works with such ease that we forgot to teach reading until it was too late. This has now been remedied. Good Suzuki teachers now teach children to read when they are ready, generally about the time that they begin to read at school. We still like the children to learn their core repertoire by ear to develop their musical skills in the same way they develop verbal skills.

Q: Could you describe how you use games to teach skills in the early stages?

VA: When did the English language acquire two meanings for the word "play"? Play is a child's work. Humor and games are a big part of this. I work to make each conscious skill they learn a game, or at least playful.

Q: What are some of your favorite "bass games".

VA: My very favorite is "Bow Game" where you use the bow without the bass to do all manner of pointing and carrying light objects. The reason for this is to build strength and dexterity that brings the kind of control to the bow as if it were an extension to our whole arm. If we did it with the spoon in the high chair to put food into our mouth as a baby we can now do it with our bow to urge sound from the string.

Q: Could you talk about how older players can learn to break bad playing
habits?

VA: People tend to overplay. The process of finding just the right amount of energy for a task is like peeling away the layers of an onion, one layer of tension at a time. I am still working on the tension in my playing.

Q: When you worked with Gary Karr to record the performances on the Suzuki
Bass CDs, how did you prepare? Was there any communication beforehand?

VA: Our Bass Committee Chair, Dan Swaim, went to British Columbia and worked with Gary in his home studio. I was not a part of that.

Q: What are some things that you'd like to see taking place in Suzuki bass in
the future?

VA: When the Suzuki Method came to America the level of violin, viola, and cello playing increased by leaps and bounds. Today our rosters of soloists, our chamber ensembles, and our symphony orchestras at all levels are filled with people who got their start with Suzuki. Though it is a byproduct and not the main goal of what we do, a young Suzuki musician can easily mainstream into the conservatories and become a professional. The early start does give him/her a definite edge. I hope that we can do this with bass as well. It is high time!


For more about the Suzuki Bass Program and Virginia Dixon, follow these links:

About Virginia Dixon
How I became involved with the Suzuki Bass Program
Resources for Suzuki Bass Teachers and Students
How to Become a Suzuki Bass Instructor
Materials for Beginning Suzuki Bass Students and Teachers

About Virginia Dixon

As part of an ongoing series of articles related to the Suzuki Bass Program, an interview with Virginia Dixon (Suzuki bass teacher and teacher trainer) is about to be published. For those who have never heard of her, here's some background information:

Virginia Dixon teaches double bass at Wheaton and Elmhurst Colleges and the Suzuki School of Elgin as well as in her home studio. Summers find her teaching at Suzuki institutes which this year included Beaver Creek, CO, New Orleans, and Stevens Point, WI. A former Board Member of the International Society of Bassists, she still edits their journal's Child's Play Column. In 2005, she received the ISB Special Achievement Award as their Young Bassist Ambassador. As a member of the Suzuki Bass Committee she is collaborating on creating materials for the Suzuki Bass Method and is one of two Teacher Trainers for the Suzuki Association of the Americas actively training teachers from the United States and abroad. She holds two performance degrees from Indiana University and has studied with Julius Levine, Murray Grodner, and Georg Hortnagel. Her performances have taken her throughout the United States as well as Europe and Japan.

In her spare time she loves to travel the world with her husband Mark Harbold and is a student of Japanese and Hindi. She is also an avid camper and hiker.




For more about the Suzuki Bass Program and Virginia Dixon, follow these links:

Interview with Virginia Dixon
How I became involved with the Suzuki Bass Program
Resources for Suzuki Bass Teachers and Students
How to Become a Suzuki Bass Instructor
Materials for Beginning Suzuki Bass Students and Teachers

Early Book (1-3) Suzuki Bass Materials

Each of the first three volumes of the Suzuki Bass program consist of a bass part (containing the written solos), a CD (with all songs performed by Gary Karr and Harmon Lewis), and a piano accompaniment part (a must for studio teachers and recital performances).

All the materials listed here are the newest revised edition as of 2007, sold through Sheet Music Plus, which is where I bought them myself.

Book one materials are all available here:


Suzuki Bass School Bass Part, Volume 1 For String Bass. String - Bass (Suzuki). The Suzuki Method Core Materials. 0. Book. 24 pages. Published by Alfred Publishing. (0370S)
See more info...


Suzuki Bass School CD, Volume 1 Gary Karr. For String Bass. String - Bass (Suzuki). The Suzuki Method Core Materials. 0. CD. 1 pages. Published by Alfred Publishing. (0369)
See more info...



Suzuki Bass School Piano Acc., Volume 1 For String Bass. String - Bass (Suzuki). The Suzuki Method Core Materials. 0. Book. 24 pages. Published by Alfred Publishing. (0372S)
See more info...


Book 2 materials are available here:




Suzuki Bass School Bass Part, Volume 2 For String Bass. String - Bass (Suzuki). The Suzuki Method Core Materials. 0. Book. 20 pages. Published by Alfred Publishing. (0371S)
See more info...
Suzuki Bass School CD, Volume 2 Gary Karr. For String Bass. String - Bass (Suzuki). The Suzuki Method Core Materials. 0. CD. 1 pages. Published by Alfred Publishing. (0379)
See more info...



Suzuki Bass School Piano Acc., Volume 2 For String Bass. String - Bass (Suzuki). The Suzuki Method Core Materials. 0. Book. 20 pages. Published by Alfred Publishing. (0374S)
See more info...
Book 3 materials are here:

Suzuki Bass School Bass Part, Volume 3 For String Bass. String - Bass (Suzuki). The Suzuki Method Core Materials. 0. Book. 24 pages. Published by Alfred Publishing. (0376S)
See more info...
Suzuki Bass School CD, Volume 3 Gary Karr. For String Bass. String - Bass (Suzuki). The Suzuki Method Core Materials. 0. CD. 1 pages. Published by Alfred Publishing. (0380)
See more info...

Suzuki Bass School Piano Acc., Volume 3 For String Bass. String - Bass (Suzuki). The Suzuki Method Core Materials. 0. Book. Published by Alfred Publishing. (0377S)
See more info...


About Virginia Dixon
Interview with Virginia Dixon
How I became involved with the Suzuki Bass Program
Resources for Suzuki Bass Teachers and Students
How to Become a Suzuki Bass Instructor