Bandmasters Review - December 2019

Texas Bandmasters Association Bandmasters Review • December 2019 25 Ensemble Singing ( that means performing together ) More often than not, young musicians are hesitant to sing aloud in an ensemble setting. They “can’t” sing, they are unhappy with how they sound, or they don’t fully understand how singing can benefit their musicianship. Over the years, I have found that a simple way to build a students’ vocal confidence is to introduce a concept that is easier and lower risk than singing out loud - humming . The exercise that we use as a pathway to tonality is called “Hum - Sing - Play”. The focus is to transfer a low-risk, successful skill and immediately make it apply to playing their instrument. We utilize the TonalEnergy drones (any drone will do), a Bluetooth speaker, and a simple series of instructions to encourage students to think less about WHAT they are actually doing and focus on the process of performing the “Hum - Sing - Play” exercise. Use 3-single handed cues (I use gestures rather than words to promote students’ eyes being UP.) • Humming - Closed Hand • Singing - Open ‘C’ Hand • Playing - Flat Hand or Conducting Hand A simple procedure to get you off the ground is below. (Use a sustained drone on Concert F or Bb at first.) • Hum x 3 • Sing x 3 (“dah” or “doo”) • Play x 3 Give a few quick comments like “try humming louder this time” or “try finding the pitch faster this time and get right back at it!” Try changing pitches on the next rep or try two pitches (like a Perfect 5th). Once the process is established, you can easily transition the exercise to perform: • The last chord of a marching show • The first tone of an ensemble chorale and then continue into PERFORMING the chorale • Or change the exercise and continue singing or humming on the notes of a scale (changing the drone tones to give them a chance at success!) sudden dramatic tempo changes, joyful accelerandos, or emotional rallentandos? Yes, you may be able to execute the musical decisions on your own with your trusty baton, or by cleverly manipulating the dial on a box metronome, but how can you ensure that each student can practice the same expression on their own? I mean, we do want our students to practice on their own, right? Cue the ClickTrack (or Preset group) as an easy way to save tempos, modify tempos, and share tempos so that CONSISTENCY can be achieved across all musicians and you can spend more time of perfecting your performance. Recently, one of our bands performed an exciting arrangement of the “Black Panther” soundtrack. We conducted a student project where the kids were encouraged to listen to music on the publisher websites and then choose what they would want to perform. Through a class vote, we selected a piece. After a quick listen and quick glance at the sample score page, I purchased the music. WOW did this piece turn out to be a lot more “FUN” than initially planned! Many tempo changes and several triplet-based rhythms later, I knew we could learn the piece, but wanted to find a way for the students to REALLY get into it during their own individual practice time. So, I created a ClickTrack with all the tempo changes and measures of triplets that would help students with the appropriate subdivision when practicing on their own. After two days of work with the ClickTrack in class and after sharing the ClickTrack with the students, they went home to practice the music THEY were so excited to play. “Black Panther” was coming together...sans metronome! Yes, we still used the tool for practice, but the students had GAINED such a firm understanding of how the subtle and sudden tempo changes worked! We had SOO much more fun as an ensemble! Effecting Today’s Music Students...Generally, with Technology