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David MacDonald unboxes the Odla music notation ...
David MacDonald unboxes the Odla music notation controller

"What Do We Keep? Integrating New Tech Into In-Person Teaching" Session Notes | NAMM | January 21, 2022 - 2pm

Thanks for coming to my session today! Below you will find links to everything mentioned in the session, and more!

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TAKE LEAVE TRANSFORM

TAKE: Software that empowers student creativity

LEAVE: Virtual performances

TRANSFORM:

  • Podcast episode about transforming the music classroom with tech, featuring Will Kuhn and Ethan Hein:

TAKE: Software that empowers efficiency and teacher creativity

  • Evernote - Cross platform service and app for managing all your notes, research, and resources
  • Spark Mail - Free Apple and Android app with supercharged email features
  • Drafts | Where Text Starts
  • Todoist - Cross-platform task management app
  • OmniFocus - My preferred task management app
  • About my task and time management workflow as a music teacher:

LEAVE: Software that gets in the way

  • LMS--> Find the point of diminishing return. Don't do more work than actually gets results!

TRANSFORM: Practice resources and play-alongs

TAKE: Digital communication

  • Use effective digital communication tools when they eliminate unnecessary logistics!

LEAVE: Lengthy and verbose documents

  • Short, sweet, detailed, and frequent communication is idea in the digital age.

TRANSFORM: New models for non-musical logistics and collaboration

TAKE: Microphones, audio interfaces

LEAVE: need to be tethered to a computer

TRANSFORM: take the best of both

  • Wenger modular stand
  • Being tethered to a computer means more resources at your finger tips!
  • Farrago soundboard app
  • Other Rogue Amoeba apps that are indispensable for making content and wrangling audio: Audio Hijack, Loopback, and Soundsource. Check out their education discount.
  • AirServer app which lets you share an iOS screen to a computer
  • Podcast episode featuring maker of Audio Hijack, Farrago, Soundsource, and Loopback

Dorico 4

Dorico 4 is out! I've been testing it for the past few months, and I'm not even sure I am scratching the surface of what it can do. It is, in my opinion, the most important and exciting update to Dorico since its release in 2016.

This past summer, Dorico released an iPad app, which has many of the design updates and features seen in Dorico 4. You can read my first impressions about the iPad version of Dorico, and hear my conversation with Product Marketing Manager Daniel Spreadbury, here.

Fortunately, the Scoring Notes blog posted a review, which you can read here.

Here are some quick things that I am excited about in Dorico 4

Licensing

Dorico 4 uses Steinberg's brand new Steinberg Licensing, replacing the Steinberg e-Licenser. The e-Licensor was one of the two or three most frustrating licensing processes on my Mac. The new Steinberg Licensing is one of the least frustrating processes for licensing software on my Mac.

Once Dorico 4 launched, I was presented with the option to move my existing Dorico 3.5 license over and log into my Steinberg account. Once completed, Dorico can run on up to three machines without connecting to the web. This is a super easy and generous way to handle licensing.

Key Editor

I covered this in my iPad First Impressions post, so I won't go into too much detail here. The bottom area, which previously only contained project properties, now includes new note input methods like a piano, fretboard, and drum pads. It also integrates a piano roll and mixer right into Write Mode.

I really enjoy writing with notation and a piano roll visible on the screen at once. Perhaps this is because I am comfortable with DAWs. But I think it also speaks to how easily I conceptualize and edit rhythmic duration on a piano roll. Ethan Hein summarizes this well:

You can also view a mixer in the bottom area while in Write Mode. Cool.

Jump Bar

"Command pallet," "command search," "quick open"... whatever it's called, this feature is becoming very popular in pro-software. If you have used Sibelius, you might be familiar with their Command Search feature. The feature is also quite popular in productivity software. I love using Command+O in OmniFocus to open projects and perspectives quickly. In my note app Obsidian, Command+O smartly searches my notes, and Command+P acts upon them.

The idea is that you have a keyboard shortcut that brings up a search, you start typing, and then the software smartly displays some options on the screen for places it thinks you want to go or things you want to do.

Dorico has added this feature with their new Jump Bar, and I couldn't be happier. Just press the letter J, and you can type "m30" to bounce to measure 30 or "dynamics" to bring up the dynamics popover.

Popovers are my favorite part of the Dorico workflow, but I sometimes forget which keyboard shortcuts belong to which menus. In my opinion, having one command that allows for natural-language searching is a workflow win. Even if it is technically more keystrokes to find things, there is way less mental overhead in just typing what you want plainly.

Improvements to Play Mode and the Interface

Play Mode moves a handful of track options to the left, making it more familiar to users who work inside DAWs. Working with inserts and effects feels less esoteric in this design. I like it.

Project Templates

You can now turn any project into a template. Templates appear in the File menu, under the New from Project Template selection.

Previously, I used a Siri Shortcut to manage project templates in Dorico. I wrote about that for Scoring Notes here. My shortcuts method handles some of the file management for you and is worth a look if you want to learn more about macOS and iOS automation.

Generally, I think it is a benefit to store templates inside of Dorico, and I will be taking some of my most frequently used templates in the Shortcuts app and moving them inside of Dorico.

Library

Dorico moves most options relating to customizing the app's behavior into a menu called Library. It drives me nuts when professional creative software stores its settings across numerous custom preference panes throughout the application. This adjustment makes customizing Dorico's various options more discoverable, regardless of the mode or context they relate to.

The new library features also include many new options for font styles, which I am sure will make David MacDonald very happy.

M1

Dorico 4 works with Apple Silicon. From Scoring Notes:

Dorico 4 is the first Dorico version, and the first of any of the major desktop applications, to support Apple silicon Macs, such as the M1 MacBook Pro, iMac, and Mac mini. If you have an Apple silicon Mac, Dorico will run as a native application by default. However, if you use VST plug-ins, Dorico can only load VST plug-ins that can run natively on Apple silicon as well, and these must be VST 3 (there is no support for VST 2 plug-ins on Apple silicon). It is possible to force Dorico 4 to run under Rosetta 2 on Apple Silicon, which will allow VST 2 and Intel-native plug-ins to be loaded, though at the expense of slower overall performance.

Overall, Dorico 4 is a huge step forward. I imagine a lot of the work on this update was done in preparation for the iPad release. Now that both versions exist, I expect that the shared development platform between desktop and mobile will mean that future updates are released in side-step and continue to be feature-rich.

,

Kanban Boards in Todoist

,

I am preparing two presentations for the Ohio Music Educators Association Professional Development Conference next month, and one of the sessions is on collaboration and communication apps for music teams.

As I prepare this session, I came across this blog post draft from a while back that I think could be helpful for those looking for a graphical way to think about their various teaching responsibilities...

You can now "visualize your workflow with Board view in Todoist" by testing the beta version on both iOS and the web. Read more here.

I am pretty committed to OmniFocus for personal project management. But I have always liked Todoist. Todoist is the service I recommend to most people for tasks. It is simple to use and has a free tier. And if you pay for the subscription, it is full of features almost all the features you could ask for from a to-do app. Its native apps are not as well-designed as Things or as powerful as OmniFocus, but they are good enough.

If you are the kind of visual thinker who prefers a board-style for project management, Todoist will now allow you to depict your projects and tasks in a drag-and-drop, card-style interface.

Scanner Pro Update

Earlier this fall, my favorite scanning app, Scanner Pro, came out with an update that can automatically categorize documents based on features it can identify across your various files.

One of the things that repels people from going paperless is that it often takes a lot of repetitive steps to manage files. Renaming, organizing in folders, tagging, etc...

Over the years, Scanner Pro has been aggressive about adding features to smartly take on some of this work through automation.

Scanner Pro can now automatically recognize your scans as sheet music, and label them as such.

One of my other favorite features is the ability to designate a specific folder inside of Google Drive or Dropbox to save scans into in one tap. This makes saving scans to a specific folder of sheet music in my Google Drive as easy as can be.

NAMM's "Believe in Music" Virtual and Free Gathering -- Register Now!

I’m excited to be presenting at NAMM’s Believe in Music gathering on January 20-21, in collaboration with TI:ME. It’s virtual and free!

My session is called “What Do We Keep? Integrating New Tech Into In-Person Teaching” and is largely based on this blog post/podcast episode.

You can register here and read more about my session here.

Always Start from the Beginning: Developing Tone Quality, Intonation, Concert Repertoire, and Classroom Management through Unison Playing in Performing Ensembles

This post first appeared on the NAfME Blog on December 7, 2021. You can read it there by clicking here.

Always Start from the Beginning

Every year I teach band, I start from the beginning. I find that if I rebuild the ensemble, focusing on fundamentals, it is impossible to fail.

This is especially true after many programs have lost over a year of in-person instruction. Even if students' skills have been sustained or improved, they are likely returning to the classroom with less handle on things that they can only learn in a group: intonation, balance, blend, and even basic rehearsal expectations.

They will have to relearn how to listen outside their comfortable bubble of one.

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Caption: A mixer at the front of the room allows me to pump my voice, computer, and phone through a stereo and mix them to taste.

I want to describe some of the teaching strategies that have been most helpful this fall (and long since before COVID) while also sharing some technological tips I have taken from virtual learning into this year. I will explain how I am implementing them in my beginning band class to ensure that they develop great ears, strong ensemble sound, musicianship, and all while preparing concert music.

Developing the Ear

All excellent music-making starts with the ear. In Musical Performance: Learning Theory and Pedagogy, Daniel Kohut claims that students need a “superior concept” of the sound they wish to make. I believe this is much easier to achieve while playing in unison. Young musicians often learn this way by nature of beginning method books focusing on familiar, unison melodies, which elementary school teachers teach in instrument-specific sectionals. But when students first join a large ensemble, they can lose their independent sense of tone, intonation, and balance if too many separate voices start happening in their concert literature too soon.

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Caption: The Tonal Energy Tuner app is only a few dollars, and it play justly in-tune polyphonic drones and a metronome simultaneously.

My Concert Band class has 50 6th and 7th-grade students. Many of these students are first-year players. This year, most of them had only experienced a half year of in-person band before walking into my classroom.

I decided to keep them playing in unison for as long as I could keep them interested. I wanted to emphasize tone quality, intonation, balance, and bend, while somehow managing the classroom and preparing them for a December concert. And I wanted to keep things fun. Was it possible to do all of this? Yes!

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Caption: Dorico’s popovers, like this one for dynamics, allow you to enter notation naturally and quickly. Adding solfege with the Lyrics popover was equally easy.

Transforming Concert Literature into Unison Melodies

I started by ensuring that I centered instruction around accessible melodic material from the method book rather than technical exercises and drills. Additionally, I took the pieces I was planning for our winter concert and wrote out every person's part for every instrument using Dorico. Dorico’s keyboard shortcuts and flow-based composing make it easy to design supplemental resources as quickly as you can think.

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Caption: Last school year, my team purchased some equipment to support hybrid teaching. This year, we have repurposed that gear to integrate audio technology into traditional rehearsals seamlessly.

The guides are organized by rehearsal marking. For example, Part 1 has everyone in the band playing the bass line of measures 1-8. By playing each part of the music sequentially, students get more practice sight-reading while learning who in the band plays which notes. By playing in unison, they leverage their strength in numbers to develop firmer and more stable tone quality while learning to hear what an ensemble blend should sound like for the first time.

CleanShot 2021-10-30 at 09.49.23.png

Caption: This is what an individual part looks like in Dorico once completed. Instead of isolating sections of the band during rehearsal, I can have everyone playing at all times. For example, if I want to work with the tuba part in measure one, I can tell the entire band to play “Part 1. Lower Voice” and keep everyone engaged.

I write solfege into these practice guides and alternate between the students singing and playing. In a year without any COVID concerns, I would also encourage the brass to buzz these melodies on mouthpieces to develop their inner ear and flexibility.

Play-Along Resources Help Model Tone, Intonation, and Tempo

There is always a drone prominently playing through our sound system using the Tonal Energy Tuner app. The polyphonic drones can model justly in-tune intervals. Students can subtly adjust their pitch by making the “beats” that result between two out-of-tune pitches slow down and eventually dissolve.

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Caption: One of the easiest and most engaging ways to encourage metronome practice is to play along to the Drummer Tracks in GarageBand. There are numerous styles, beats, and editing tools at your disposal. Beats are way more fun to play with and provide more musical feeling than a metronome.

I have created play-along tracks that combine trap beats with tuning drones. I like to pump them through the speakers during warm-ups and throughout rehearsal. You can make these too using the free GarageBand app on iOS.

Sometimes, I will have Tonal Energy coming through my phone and the beats coming through my Mac. This allows me to mix the drone and the metronome independently, as they are plugged into two separate channels of my mixer.

Speaking Calmly, Being Everywhere

A Shure wireless microphone goes into a third channel of the mixer, allowing me to speak in a comfortable room voice and be heard over the sound of loud drones, beats, and a full band of 50-65 students playing.

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Caption: This Shure wireless headset microphone has been a game-changer this year. I don’t ever have to raise my voice to be understood. I can speak comfortably and be heard over the sound of a pumping drone and 60 students playing.

This technique works wonders for classroom management. Flowing from one part of our daily agenda to the next is nearly seamless because of how easy it is to keep everyone playing most of the rehearsal. With these persistent play-alongs underlying most of the rehearsal, my role could be described less like a traditional director and more like a spin instructor.

This might sound ridiculous at first, but it is true. A spin instructor curates music, keeps the beat moving you forward and paces instruction, all while making you sweat. This is precisely how I want my role to feel in the band room. I like to think of myself as a “coach” who directs students towards the goal while they work for it, rather than a “director” who beats the music into them.

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Caption: My colleague, Ben Denne, teaches from our “command station” at the front of the room.

The wireless mic allows me to step off the podium and be heard from anywhere in the room. While the band is playing, I can be high-fiving students, sizing a student for concert attire, helping percussionists find their place, encouraging good trombone posture, or any other need. I can be everywhere and still keep the flow of rehearsal moving even when I’m off the podium.

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Caption: Farrago is a useful app for queuing play-along material in a soundboard-style audio launcher. I keep my scale tracks organized and color-coded by key and rhythmic patterns to find them more easily.

Taking the Slow Road Gets Maximum Results

Once it is time to hand out concert music, I'm delighted to hear students say things like, "wait, we know this!." By this point, they can sing every part, play every part, and can now split into three or four unique voices because they are more confident in their melody from having practiced it with the strength of 60 musicians in unison.

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Caption: AnyTune is another excellent app that can change the speed and pitch of a play-along track independently.

The results are clear. I have never had a more engaging, fun, and tightly managed beginning band experience. Students are developing fundamentals at a pace consistent, if not better, than a typical year, and we are stronger for it.

#48 - Holiday Special 2021, featuring Will Kuhn, Craig McClellan, David MacDonald, and Jon Tippens

Friends of the show join to answer burning questions about music, education, and technology in 2021 (and beyond).

Patreon subscribers get some extra discussion about Dune and Foundation.

Subscribe to the Blog…

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Support Music Ed Tech Talk

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Buy me a coffee

Show Notes:

Album of the Year - Nate Smith: Kinfolk 2 | Stevie Wonder: Talking Book | Magdalena Bay: Murcurial World | John Mayer: Sob Rock | Cory Wong and Dirty Loops: Turbo

App of the Year - Obsidian | Fin Timer | OP-Z App | Pixelmator Photo | Molskine Actions

Tech Tip of the Year - Focus Modes (some discussion about how I am using these on episode 44 of this show) | camelcamelcamel.com | Use OBS for everything | Feedbin | Press and hold the spacebar on iOS to move your cursor around

Please don’t forget to rate the show and share it with others!

Sponsor: Light the Music

Thanks to my sponsor this month, Light the Music:

Light the Music empowers educators to ignite student creativity and collaboration. Using a digital audio workstation, students learn about the fundamentals of music while creating their own music that is authentic, relevant, and meaningful to them.

Light the Music provides a curriculum aligned with the creating strand of the National Core Arts Standards. As students are introduced to the technology tools, they create an artist’s profile to guide their work throughout the curriculum. Students then learn about the elements that make up a piece of music; rhythm, chords, bass, and melody. They learn concepts by recreating and remixing, then use that knowledge to create something new. In each lesson, students share their work with classmates to give and receive feedback that is kind, specific, honest, and helpful.

The Light the Music curriculum comprises 8 units and 26 lessons, containing tutorial videos, templates, resources, and slides to make teaching easy. In each lesson, students learn, practice, and apply new skills. The curriculum offers a scaffolded structure for teachers to sequence lessons, yet contains enough flexibility for students to get support or dive deeper when desired. Students will work towards creating their own piece of music and a video to go along with it. At the conclusion of the 8 units, students share their work in a final showcase.

Light the Music is ideal for students in sixth through twelfth grade general **music, music technology, music appreciation, or any other music courses where student creativity is a goal. Additional stand-alone lesson plans for teachers looking for a one-time project are also available. If you’d like to learn more, check out www.lightthemusic.com.

NPR Playlist - 50 Best Albums of 2021, Ranked

For a while, I had a holiday tradition of taking "best albums of the year" posts on the web, and making Apple Music playlists out of them.

NPR has started doing this, which saves me some time, but I sort of miss the ritual.

Anyway, here are links to their streaming playlists. I always learn about some good new music listening through this list every year.

Some of my favorites I have already heard are, in no particular order...

  • An Evening with Silk Sonic, Silk Sonic
  • Mood Valiant, Hiatus Kaiyote
  • Floating Points, Pharoah Sanders & The London Symphony Orchestra

NPR Music's 50 Best Albums of 2021, Ranked : NPR

If the year presently coming to a close was a dance, it'd be a hesitant shuffle, tentative steps toward — or heyyyy, maybe away from? — an uncertain future. So maybe that's why, when we sat down together to discuss which albums we loved the most over the course of 2021, NPR Music's staff and contributors found ourselves drawn to albums by artists making breakthroughs, moving forward with clarity, without balking at the obstacles falling in their way. Our list of the year's 50 best is topped by an album that was unmatched in concept, songwriting or performance, but it had so much good company. Everywhere on this list you'll find the thrill of artistic revelation, musicians finding themselves, willing something new into reality. There's plenty of fun, but little escapism. Many of these albums are stacked with great songs, but these aren't snacks. Even when slight they are composed, with a sense of purpose. This is nourishment. Look around. You'll find something fortifying to build you up for the road ahead. (As a bonus, you can find our list of the 100 Best Songs of 2021 here.)

_Stream NPR Music's 50 Best Albums of 2021:Spotify _/_ Apple Music _/_ Tidal _/_ Amazon Music _/_ YouTube Music

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