Teaching Techniques in 2020

The 2020-2021 school year is going to be one that every single teacher will remember for the rest of their career. COVID-19 is leaving a huge impact on our educational system across the nation and is challenging teachers to adapt quickly. Music teachers will have to figure out different ways we can still play music, teach pedagogy, and keep our students and ourselves safe. Here are a few techniques that I have found in the last few months that can help us both in person and distance learning.

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Bagged Instruments

The College Band Directors National Association recently released a preliminary study of aerosol spread with different types of instruments that are most common in the concert band. Even though this was a preliminary study, Miller and Srebric (2020) both recommend to cover all woodwind instruments with a special bag and brass instruments with a bell cover in order to reduce aerosol spreads.

The clarinet in this example has a special bag with holes for the musician's hands and fingers. In conjunction with a slit in the mask for the clarinet mouthpiece and the bag reduces condensation particle counts dramatically as compared to playing normally (Miller & Srebric, 2020). Using similar techniques with other instruments produced similar results.

Rehearsals in a Safe Classroom

Rehearsals are one of the most efficient ways to work on a piece because every single part in the band is present. Normally rehearsals with 50-60 musicians in the band room. However, the CBDNA (College Band Directors National Association) preliminary study gave us a quick glance on how we could possible rehearse safely. Two types of instrumental rehearsals can occur, an outdoor rehearsal and a short indoor rehearsal. Rehearsals outdoors with social distancing, masks, and instrument coverings is the safer environment compared to indoor rehearsals. The ability to spread out farther than 6 ft, breeze/constant air circulation, and disposal of spit valves into grass all contribute into reducing the risk of spreading condensation particles to other musicians (Miller & Srebric, 2020). Indoor rehearsals must also follow social distancing and covering recommendations as well as keep rehearsals to no more than 30 minutes. After 30 minutes everyone must leave the room and allow the HVAC system to circulate the air for at least 10 minutes (Miller & Srebric, 2020). Despite the large numbers of students that we can have at rehearsals, this preliminary study gives us a glimpse as to how some of rehearsals will look like in the future if we move to in person teaching.

Brass Instrument Waste Removal

Brass instruments all have a water key or more commonly known as a "spit" valve. These water keys expel all of the condensation that accumulates in the instrument. The CBDNA study recommends that either students empty their water keys onto a puppy pad, towel, or buckets (Miller & Srebric, 2020). No students should empty their condensation onto the floor.

Choral Classes in Person

ACDA (American Choral Directors Association) released a report on strategies for teaching in varying scenarios that school districts around the country may adopt. With all of the inherent risks that are present with in person singing, ACDA recommends a few strategies to help choir directors. One of the big recommendations is to social distance and wear masks during the rehearsals. In addition, if technology and space allows for it, students should rehearse in sectionals as much as possible to mitigate the amount of aerosols in a room (ACDA Committee, 2020). With the supervision of adults sectionals can happen in different rooms, main choir room, director's office, uniform room, amphitheater, auditorium, etc. Student leaders can lead sectionals with the recordings given to them by the choir director. Each student should have their own copy of music and should not share it under any circumstance, or students can load their music electronically on their phones. These strategies can help mitigate the risk of spreading COVID-19 in our choir rehearsals.

Choral Classes in Hybrid

Hybrid class models are popular in districts around where I teach. These models have an in person and online element. ACDA recommends all of the same strategies as in person instruction, but adds more emphasis on technology fo hybrid instruction. High quality recording devices, such as mic setups, DAWs, audio interfaces, etc. are recommended so that students have a high quality recording of their rehearsals for them to analyze on their online class days (ACDA Committee, 2020). Since the hybrid model allows for short in person rehearsals, choir directors can focus on the individual musician by having students analyze their sound on online days. Online singing is impossible to coordinate with the given technology right now; having students analyze their sound and compare it to professional recordings can be a great reflection to help build their musicianship skills moving forward.

Choral Classes all Online

Online classes at face value can be a hinderance to choral directors, but ACDA has given us some guidance to navigate this unusual and sometimes frustrating medium. ACDA focuses on the basics of setting up the online class such as: familiarizing and setting the video conference software, ensuring that the recorded videos are safe and encrypted, ensuring that the recording is accessible to all students, and plan for technical problems (ACDA Committee, 2020). These may seem trivial, however by planning and addressing these issues our video conferences can go much smoothly. A smooth conference will usually result in more students participating in the meeting. ACDA also recommends that choir directors to program easy homophonic music, allow for pauses for student questions, and focus on socio-emotional learning (ACDA Committee, 2020). Easy repertoire and pauses allow for students to feel accomplished because they can achieve the music at home. It is definitely much more difficult to work on harder repertoire from a zoom call than in person. The teacher cannot give immediate feedback and the student cannot sing with the piano or accompanist to learn the harder lines. Finally, choir directors should most importantly focus on the student's socio-emotional well being. Quarantine has hit teachers hard, but can hit students even harder. Developing a way to check-in with students and build trust with the whole ensemble from an online format can really brighten their day. It can be a break from the monotony of online learning for them, and give us a great mental break as well.

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In this section we will explore some techniques that will help teachers in a non COVID-19 world.

Rehearsal Techniques

Band directors are always looking to improve their rehearsal techniques. Dr. Stewart Ross (2009) gives us some great techniques to use in our rehearsals. Long winded lectures do not belong in the band rehearsal. Sometimes we can wrapped up in stories or take a long time to explain a concept to our students. This is the fastest way to lose their attention in our rehearsals. Comments and critique should be short, quick, and concise. Students should spend most of the time in rehearsal playing, not listening to us talk. Another huge technique that can open the conductor's ears is to move around the room. Band directors can get a different sound and perspective if they simply move around the room and let the band play by themselves. This forces the band to take responsibility of the pulse and the band director can actively listen to sections that he may not hear every single day. These two techniques that Dr. Ross outlined for us are great rehearsal techniques that can be implemented every single day.

Concept-Centered Lesson Plan

Concept-centered lesson plans as explained by Phillip L. Clements (2013) focuses on learning and applying concepts in a rehearsal. The rehearsal structure is mainly the same, a warm-up followed by rehearsing the concert pieces and ending with a reflection/warm-down. Clements however improves on this basic structure and introduces a concept right after the warm-up so he can focus the student's attention to the concept right away. After focusing on the concept in a few excerpts, they then bring it to the big picture by applying it to the whole piece. Finally, Clements asks students to verbalize the concept they learned and implemented. This is a great way to keep rehearsals on track and focus student's attention on a singular concept and allow for time to reflect at the end of the lesson. It is decently fast paced so that our advanced students do not get bored, but slow enough that our advanced students can give a hand to our younger and less seasoned musicians.

Intonation

Tuning our ensemble can either be a joy or a pain. Having great intonation is reliant on how well trained each musician's ear is. Fred J. Allen (2003) gives us some fundamental tips to improve our band's intonation. One thing that he advocates bands learn is how to tune to just intonation. This means that in major chords the 3rd is lowered and the 5th is raised or vice versa in minor chords. High school and advanced middle school players are able to hear and adjust their intonation to these rules easily if trained correctly. He stresses that just intonation is the difference between an excellent and a superior performance. Allen also touches on the fundamentals for the students. Band directors should always train students to practice with a drone, listen to the lowest sound, and check for posture and instrument care. Warming with a drone played by the tubas can be a great exercise to help train the ensemble's ear to listen down low. In addition, incorrect posture and poor instrument care affect intonation and tone massively. Directors should always ensure that students are playing with good posture and good reeds/mouthpieces/head joints.

Marching Percussion

For a lot of band directors, the realm of marching percussion can be confusing and daunting to get into. Philip L. Clements (2008) gives a quick rundown on tuning marching percussion instruments. He begins generally with maintenance for each drum. Band directors should always lube lug nuts with lithium grease and lubricate the bearing edge with cork grease. In addition, shells should always be cleaned during each head switch. Tuning each drum is subjective and is based on personal taste, but Clements gives us a quick starting point on how to tune each drum. Generally, quad and bass drums should be tuned either P4 or P5 apart from each drum. The quad drum tones should be tuned at least an octave higher than their respective bass drum. The snare drums are tuned differently. The bottom head is tuned to an A4 and the top head is tuned to D5. These tunings are important for on field performances. It allows our percussion section to be heard but not overpower our wind sections. This allows all of our sections to stand out and succeed on the marching band field.

Starting Double Reed Players

One of the smallest instrument population in the band are our double reed players. The double reed family includes oboes, bassoons, and English horns. These instruments are usually more difficult than single reed instruments like the clarinet and saxophone. Richard Bath (2004) gives us some tips to start our double reed players. Three big things that a potential double reed player must have is: self-sufficiency, good embouchure, and experience. Since these students are usually going to be the only person playing that instrument they need to be able to learn quickly and easily on their own. They won't have an older or more experienced musician to help them during rehearsals. In addition, these students must have the fundamentals down of a single reed instrument before starting a double reed instrument. The concepts and embouchure from single reed instruments are transferable to double reed instruments. Double reed instruments are crucial to rounding out the sound of a concert band. It is important that middle school directors develop double reed players to further the band's development and help excelling students with a rewarding instrument.

Low Brass Tone

A solid low brass section can lay a strong foundation for our ensembles. Even though these instruments may not get the most demanding or technical parts, their development is just as important as our clarinets and flutes. Dr. Mark Britt (2002) gives us some tips on how to develop low brass tone in our ensembles. Britt focuses on the buzz most importantly when developing tone. He checks the low brass embouchures to make sure that all of the buzzes are free from tension and are as natural as possible. Some inaccuracies he checks for are: lip shape, space in the mouth, lip buzz, and mouthpiece placement. Bad tone can be fixed easily and quickly by checking the buzz quality of our players. This is important because sometimes our students can create bad habits as they play throughout the years. In order to ensure that their development as low brass players keeps growing, we need to check their buzz quality. If our low brass players keep buzzing inaccurately their tone and intonation will suffer. At worst, our low brass players can begin to plateau if we do not check their buzz quality. Using these tips will help us develop our low brass players.

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References

ACDA. 2020. COVID-19 Response Committee Report. Retrieved from https://acda.org/wp- content/uploads/2020/06/ACDA-COVID-19-Committee-Report.pdf

Allen, F. 2003. Tuning for High School Bands. TBA Journal 5(1), 1.

Britt, M. 2002. Low Brass Tone Production. TBA Journal 5(1), 4.

Miller, S. & Srebric, J. 2020. Performing Arts Aerosol Study. Retrieved from https://www.nfhs.org/media/4029974/preliminary-testing-report-7-13-20.pdf

Clements, P. 2004. Tuning Tips for Marching Percussion. Bandmasters Review, 13.

Clements, P. 2013. If I Only Had One More Rehearsal! Bandmasters Review, 17.

Rath, R. 2004. Starting the Young Double Reed Player. Bandmasters Review, 27.

Ross, S. 2006. Improving Rehearsals. Bandmasters Review, 21.