New YouTube video. Links to all apps below.
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.
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.
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!
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
🎙 forScore for the Mac, featuring David MacDonald (Music Ed Tech Talk #31)
Robby and David talk about forScore for the Mac and its new syncing feature. But also, lots of music theory.
Also included:
Loop-based music theory
GoodNotes for the Mac
Transcribe Apps
Lots of music apps and utility apps
Tech podcasts we like
Music YouTubers we like
Our favorite music, tech tips, and albums of the week
Show Notes:
David’s other appearances on this show: #6 - Paperless iPad Workflows for Teaching Music | #16 - Master Your Virtual Teaching Tech | #30 - Apps for Research and Remembering
Robby’s Tweet Thread about teaching music theory to middle school students
John Gruber and Ben Thompson on what makes the iPad the iPad
Music Ed Tech Talk Episode 23 - Rogue Amoeba Audio Apps, with Paul Kafasis
App of the Week:
Robby - Soro for Sonos
David MacDonald - Diagrams
Album of the Week:
Robby - Lettuce - Elevate
David MacDonald - Darcy James Argue’s Secret Society - Brooklyn Babylon
Where to Find Us:
Robby - Twitter | Blog | Book
David MacDonald - Twitter | Website
Please don’t forget to rate the show and share it with others!
Subscribe to Music Ed Tech Talk:
Subscribe to the Podcast in… Apple Podcasts | Overcast | Castro | Spotify | RSS
🎙 METT Episode #28 - Rehearse Your Ensembles Remotely
Robby explains the software, hardware, and teaching strategies he uses to run engaging and effective music rehearsals in a remote or hybrid environment.
This information was presented earlier this month at the Maryland Music Educators Association conference. The notes and links below are from the session notes of that presentation.
Learn More From Me About Technology
Website - robbyburns.com
Blog - Music Ed Tech Talk (musicedtechtalk.com)
Subscribe to the Music Ed Tech Talk podcast Apple Podcasts | Spotify | RSS
Subscribe to my email newsletter here
Buy my book, Digital Organization Tips for Music Teachers, here
Buy my Scale Play Along Tracks here
Abstract
Learn the strategies and technologies to run engaging synchronous rehearsals. Engage students visually and speed up your flow using Open Broadcasting Software. Pump the sound video/music/play-along tracks directly through Zoom or Google Meet for a lag-free experience. Explore play along with resources, student reflection with Google Docs, effective camera/mic practices, and have students working collaboratively in synchronous chamber ensembles with Soundtrap! Software discussed includes: Keynote, Google Slides, Loopback, Soundsource, Farrago, AnyTune, Soundtrap, Smartmusic!
Links
Broadcasting Software
- Open Broadcaster Software
- Blog Post: Hyper-Charging Online Classes with OBS
- AirServer
- Stream Deck
- Teaching Tech: Live keyboard overlay in Zoom (This Page Left Intentionally Useless - David MacDonald's blog)
- Virtual Camera Plug-in
- Instructions for setting up AirServer as a scene in OBS
- Streamlabs OBS
- Tip! - In order to zoom in on your screen on a Mac while presenting, you can do the following: Go to System Preferences—>Accessibility—>Zoom and check on “Use scroll gesture with moifier keys to zoom.” I set up my modifier key as Control so that when I hold Control and scroll up, my screen zooms in.
Audio Routing
- Loopback
- Blog Post: Routing Audio From Your Apps Directly Into Your Zoom or Google Meet with Loopback
- Rogue Amoeba Audio Apps - Interview with CEO Paul Kafasis
- Black Hole
- Soundsource
- VB-Audio
- Presonus Revelator Mic (comes with Loopback-like software and Studio One recording software)
- Soundboard apps
Making Play Along Tracks
- Audio Hijack
- Pietzo
- Farrago
- AnyTune
- Amazing Slow Downer
- Transcribe!
- Smart Music
- Mainstage
- Apple Pro Apps Bundle - Educator Discount
Visual Presentation
Recommended Hardware
- Scarlet Solo (audio interface)
- Audio Technica AT2020 (microphone)
- External monitor
- Twelve South StayGo USB Hub
- Elago Stream Deck
- Stream Deck app - turns your mobile device in to a stream deck for a small subscription price
Subscribe to Music Ed Tech Talk:
Subscribe to the Podcast in...
Apple Podcasts | Overcast | Castro | Spotify | RSS
Automating Band Warmups, Teaching Auditory Skill, and Managing My Classroom… with Solfege Bingo
What is Solfege Bingo
Solfege Bingo is a game for young music students. You can play in class to help develop audiation, pitch recognition, and solfege.
The book comes with a series of bingo cards, each of which with three-note Solfege patterns in each square. “Do re mi, fa sol do, etc...” With the book comes a CD that has many different recorded examples of a singer singing these patterns, with space in between each pattern. Students match the three-note patterns they hear with the ones on their card until they get bingo.
The CD features a second set of recorded examples in which a clarinet plays the patterns so that the students must recognize the patterns by ear, not by syllable.
I first learned about this series as a student teacher, where the choir teacher would use them as warm-ups. She would use them as ear training examples to familiarize her ensembles with solfege. On the recorded examples, the space between each pattern is equal to the length of the patterns themselves, so you can use them as a call and response. The recording models the pattern, the choir sings it back.
Transposing the Tracks for Bands and Adding a Drone
A few years ago, I got the idea to transpose these recordings into band keys using GarageBand. I added a clarinet drone on the key center (using one of the software MIDI instruments) to help students hear the relationships of the pitches not only to each other but also to the tonic.
In band, I start the year by implementing these play-along tracks during warm-ups, starting in concert Bb. I first use the vocalist track and have students sing back. Then they play it back, with brass buzzing on mouthpieces. Then with brass on instruments. (The repetition of this has the side effect of reinforcing fingerings.) Eventually, once I feel like they have begun to internalize the pitches, I play them the clarinet version of the recording. The clarinet drone rings through my entire track, which takes the place of my usual Tonal Energy Tuner drone.
It sounds like this when it’s done…
Classroom Management (Making Two of Me)
I recall a year where I was struggling with engaging one of my band classes during the warm-ups. I needed a way to create some structure and reinforce expectations for the first 10 minutes of class, while making sure that the winds got the tone and ear development I wanted them to have. It is always easy to assume that students are against you when they are talking amongst themselves, wandering the back of the room, and slouching in their seats. I have come to find that, more often than not, my students aren’t against me, they just flat out didn’t understand my expectations for participation, posture, and technique and that they needed my support (even when it seems my expectations should be obvious).
My solution was to duplicate myself. I needed there to be one of me on the podium guiding the rehearsal sequence, and another of me walking the room to adjust students’ expectations of themselves.
I added the Solfege Bingo play-along tracks to slides in my daily agenda presentation, which is always on display at the front of the room through a projector. I make all of my slides in Apple’s Keynote. I found that I could embed an mp3 of one of my tracks into a slide and set the presentation to automatically skip to the next slide after a certain length of time had passed. So I created a sequence of these Solfege Bingo tracks, and a couple of other typical warm-ups I do, and embedded them all in Keynote slides so that the warm-up would happen automatically.
This allows me to work the room. While warm-ups were taking place, I can walk in the percussion section and remind them what instrument they play for warm-ups that day (it's on the chart in the back of the room 🤷♂️). I can give postural feedback to my trombones. I can high five the tuba player. I can fit someone for a concert shirt. I can do nearly anything. And this is all while reinforcing audiation, tone development, and proper intonation.
I recommend the Solfege Bingo book. It’s effortless to modulate tracks with software. You can use the pitch-flex feature in GarageBand, as I mentioned above. But you can also use apps like Transcribe!, The Amazing Slow Downer, or Anytune.
Adding a clarinet drone is easy. I added a software instrument track in GarageBand, set it to a clarinet, and played the tonic along to the recording. But you could also use Tonal Energy as a GarageBand instrument.
Conclusion
Given the time I am posting this, it is worth mentioning that I totally intend to use these warmup play-along tracks in my online band classes this fall, which will be taking place in Google Meet. I am using the Loopback app to route the audio of Keynote through to the call, and a soundboard app called Farrago to trigger them. I can run the tracks through Google Meet and everyone plays along while on mute. I am hoping to blog about Farrago soon.
I am also planning to blog about another version of this workflow I have tried in especially needy classrooms, where I go as far as to record myself giving instructions to the band in between transitions, and even program the tracks to rehearse concert music for me while the real ‘me’ works the room. I have run up to 40 minutes of a band rehearsal through pre-recorded instructions and play along tracks before!
Get a copy of Solfege Bingo here.
🎬 How to Make a Virtual Ensemble!
The school year is finally over, as is my first ever quarter of online teaching.
I wanted my students to end the year seeing themselves represented together, playing the same music, at the same time. So I sharpened my Final Cut skills and dove into the process of making a virtual ensemble.
The video in this post gives an overview of my process for making these videos, all the way from making a play along track, to advanced editing such as pitch and rhythm correction. The video includes a couple of my favorite Mac utilities for manipulating audio and video files. Scroll to the bottom to see all of the final videos of my students.
Apps Mentioned in the Video
If you want free alternatives to the apps in the video, try:
- VLC - for file conversion
- The Amazing Slow Downer - for slowing down audio tracks
To edit on iPadOS, try:
- Ferrite - for audio editing
- LumaFusion - for video editing
Subscribe Links:
Subscribe to the Music Ed Tech Talk Podcast: Apple Podcasts | Overcast | Castro | Spotify | RSS