Tips for New and Aspiring Ensemble Conductors

When one first learns to conduct an ensemble, there is so very much to learn.  It’s much more than just waving a stick around.  Here are seven tips for new conductors:

1.     Know your technique cold.

Learn to cue, how and why.  Learn how to effectively and efficiently conduct fermatas, with and without caesura.  Learn how to conduct all meters, not just the simple ones.

2.     Score Study. A lot.

When you first approach a score, listen to a few recordings.  Then, put the recordings away and start making your own choices.  If you have the skill, play through the parts on a keyboard.  Figure out what will be difficult for you to conduct, and what will be difficult for the musicians.  Where will they want cues?  Where will they want help?  Are there errors in the part?  Do you understand the harmonic progressions?  What decisions will you make about tempo and style?

3.     Keep your scores in your head, not your head in the scores.

The number one thing you can do is to learn your scores.  Your eyes should be on your ensemble 90% of the time while conducting.  Too many conductors—especially new ones—use the score as a crutch.  Conduct without it a few times to ensure you are comfortable knowing the piece.  Your focus should be on what is happening in the ensemble and what you want to do musically while you are conducting, not on reading and trying to figure out what’s next.  To do this you need eye contact with the ensemble constantly while they are playing.

4.     Practice piano for 15 minutes every day for the rest of your life.

This advice was given to me by one of my professors during my undergrad and I wish I had started this practice then.  The skill to play reductions of scores from piano or to accompany and understand harmony using a keyboard is invaluable.  Transposition is another often-underdeveloped score in new conductors that keyboard work can help with.  Develop these skills early and hone it every day.

5.     Learn other instruments- at least the basics.

You don’t need to be able to perform each instrument with mastery, but try to get a sense of how each instrument operates.  What fingering issues do wind players have?  How might suggesting alternate fingerings help them overcome challenging passages?  Which notes are harder to tune on which instruments?  Will this passage require difficult shifting in your strings?  Learning the basics of each instrument will help you to help your ensemble.

6.     Listen to as many different types of music as possible.

Don’t stick to your genre.  There is a lot of music out there, and each style will give you more understanding of how music works and perhaps give you ideas of how to interpret music in your main genre(s).  In your principle genre, learn the repertory.  If you are a wind band director, know all the big wind band pieces.  Discover new pieces daily.  Attend concerts.

7.     Watch those who are great.

Some of the best things I have learned as a conductor came not from the classroom, but from watching how professional skilled conductors treated various passages.  Everyone has an individual style and approach to conducting.  Watch those who are great and who get great results.  Try to figure out why they use the type of gestures they do, and whether or not their approaches would be helpful or detrimental to your own conducting.

That’s just the tip of the iceberg- but it’s a good start.  Master these seven tips and you’ll be well on your way to leading with artistry as an ensemble conductor.  One final tip:  Never stop learning or honing your craft.

The Benefits of Community Bands to Adult Musicians

            There is little dispute that music is an important part of education for children.  However, music is just as important for adults.  One of the best ways an adult can be involved in music is to play with a local community band.  There are community band of all shapes, sizes, missions and values throughout the United States.  Why is playing in a community band so important for adults?  Here are just a few of the reasons:

            Music keeps your mind sharp.  It encourages active problem-solving and critical thinking skills.  Music reading works a lot like math, but in a more abstract way.  Performing music in an ensemble helps increase concentration improves reaction time to various stimuli- from the conductor’s baton, from printed music and from aural cues.

            Community bands are a great social outlet.  In any community band you will find a group of people of different backgrounds who gather sharing a common interest: the making of music.  I have made long-lasting friendships as a result of my participation on community band rehearsals.  Community band concerts are also a great social outlet for your friends and family, and provide a night of high-class artsy entertainment for the audience.

            Making music is a great stress reliever.  How often do you come home from work feeling tired or fatigued?  While a night out on the town may be fun, it can be more exhausting to our bodies than other choices.  Community band rehearsals are my weekly retreat from the mundane and I find myself more relaxed and energized at the end of each rehearsal than I would from any other after-work activity.

            Making music is a creative outlet.  Many of us do not have a job in which we can express ourselves artistically or creatively on a day-to-day basis.  Music allows us to make beautiful art with sound and community bands allow us to make this art with others.

            Community bands are a great place for a number of reasons.  Don’t be afraid if you haven’t played in years- members are typically helpful and many adult community bands have many in their ranks who hadn’t played since high school when they came back to band.  Consider looking up some local community bands today.  Some great resources include the Lesbian/Gay Band Association, which has member bands in nearly every major city and the Association of Concert Bands.

Free Custom Music Staff Paper

Save time and money by printing custom music staff paper online as you need it. This site is great for people who casually write music, those perfecting an inspired music composition, my own private students, or anyone else who needs staff paper when a melody strikes.


http://www.pdfpad.com/staffpaper/

Professional Guitar Player sought for High School Musical Production Pit. Paid: Cleveland, OH Area

Avon Lake High School is looking for a guitar player for their spring musical. The position will be paid and is dependent on the number of rehearsals/performances that you can make.

Dates:
April 7,8,9 - 3:30-7 PM
April 10,11,12 - 7:30 PM show
April 13th - 2 PM show

If you can fill this position or know anyone who can please contact the director.

David Eddleman, Director of Bands

Avon Lake High School
175 Avon Belden Road
Avon Lake, OH 44012

(440)933-6290 ext. 1503

http://www.avonlakecityschools.org/highschool/band

Digital Distribution and the Evolving Publishing Marketplace

Personal media consumption has exploded in the last few years as a direct result of digital distribution.  Nearly all of our content that we consume is online, whether it be academic, news, research, or entertainment in purpose.  Publishing and distribution have made it much easier for creative professionals of all types to publish their works without having to go through an agent or company to do much of the work. 

These trends also result in greater convenience for the end user.  Single tracks can be downloaded rather than only an entire album.  This is largely because the manufacturing cost to produce a physical single and a cost to produce a physical album are the same, but the profit margin is much higher on albums since they carry a higher retail value.  Digital downloads require no manufacturing cost, so profit margin remains high whether the sales are focused on high-volume small dollar value sales (singles) or small-volume large dollar value sales (such as albums and compilations.)

Already we see many companies moving away from physical distribution entirely.  Netflix’s streaming plan is now the norm, and they have made their physical distribution plans for DVD’s more expensive as the cost to mail physical DVD’s, carry hard-copy inventory, and process the materials is much higher than streaming content delivery.  (Gemstone Equity Research, 2013.) Thus, I think that while there is no replacement for physical albums (sic. vinyl is still around, but not for the every-day end-user) largely this trend will continue and perhaps new methods of digital distribution will emerge as technology continues to evolve.

Reference:

Gemstone Equity Research.  Netflix Right Move at the Right Time.  November 19, 2013.  Accessed on Wednesday, March 26, 2014 at http://seekingalpha.com/article/1848321-netflix-right-move-at-the-right-time.

Musical Instrument Choice by Difficulty and Employability

Many choose a musical instrument based on what sound they like most, but perhaps we shouldn’t use that as our main reason for choosing a musical instrument.  Below I’ve categorized instruments and talk about their choice in regards to difficulty learning them and employability for those seeking careers in music.

Flute, Clarinet and Saxophone:

            These instruments are fairly easy to learn, though hard to play well.  Fingering requires dexterity on all of these instruments, but if you learn one of the three, the other two will come pretty easily; the fingerings are similar on all three.  There is always demand for these instruments, but there are so many players that there is lots of competition for work.  Fortunately, there are many venues and genres for these instruments: theatre, classical, jazz, pop, rock, world music and more.

Oboe and Bassoon:

            These instruments are challenging to learn.  Their fingering systems are much more complicated and it is difficult to get the quintessential beautiful double reed sound that everyone loves.  However, if you can overcome those challenges, these instruments are in extremely high demand and you’ll always find places to play.  However, you’ll be limited mostly to classical music.

Trumpet, Trombone, Euphonium, Tuba:

            These instruments have relatively simple fingerings/slide positions.   However, they require great lip flexibility to make moving between partials clean and beautiful.  Trumpet and Trombone have similar employability level to flute and clarinet, and are used more in jazz ensembles.  The euphonium and tuba are more limited and you may have to do some work carving out your own niche as a player here.

French Horn:

            The horn is difficult to learn, but if you have good relative pitch or sight-singing ability, your job is much easier.  The horn is relatively employable and often in high demand for good players, but at the advanced level there is a decent amount of competition and the instrument is largely limited to classical music.

Violin, Viola, Cello and String Bass:

            These instruments require a great deal of finger, elbow, and arm strength and flexibility, but you don’t have to do a darned thing with your mouth or breath.  It is easy to play these instruments, but very challenging to master them.  They are highly employable, though the string bass may have the same issues as tuba and euphonium, and all but violin are largely limited to classical music.

Percussion:

            This instrument requires no breath control but does require an exquisite sense of beat and rhythm and requires more technique to play correctly than many other instruments.  Notation is generally easier to read with the exception of mallet percussion.  Percussion is in high demand, however, and nearly every genre of music uses percussion in some degree.

BRFB’S 2014 Spring Concert Also Celebrates 10 Years!

The Blazing River Freedom Band  (BRFB) will be presenting  their next concert entitled Fantasy Magic at 3pm, April 6, 2014. The concert will be held at Pilgrim Congregational Church located on 2592 W. 14th in Cleveland's Tremont neighborhood.  This concert is of particular importance because it will mark 10 years of being a community group of LGBT and straight -ally musicians coming together to perform concerts, join Cleveland Pride Parade and other similar venues across the country in making a defiant yet joyful noise, and taking part in the larger LGBT band movement as whole.

From Harry Potter to Disney, Fantasy Magic is a beautiful collection of magic-related selections. The Blazing River Freedom Band’s Flag Corps will also perform original choreography as well. Fantasy Magic will be conducted by BRFB Artistic Director Brandyn Metzko and Assistant Conductor Tommy Casarona.   During the concert  there will be several gift baskets raffled off as well as two pairs of tickets to the August 12th Gay Games Concert Band performance later this summer. We encourage one and all to bring friends and family of any age to attend this fun and family-friendly concert.

If you would like more information about this event, please contact Karl Kimpo at info@blazingriverband.org or opmik75@gmail.com .  You may also call 216-744-3907.

A-Cappella Vocal Ensembles

            I’ve recently become the director of a new a-cappella ensemble in Cleveland, Ohio.  A-cappella groups are vocal groups that use no instruments, only the voice.  Most often a-cappella groups perform covers of existing songs that do include instruments, and use the human voice to imitate the sounds that the instruments would normally produce through the use of varying syllables and vowel sounds.  Some groups include vocal percussion, which is effectively specialized beat-boxing in an a-cappella arrangement that emulates drum set, electronic percussion and other percussive sounds and/or remixing effects.  While a-cappella groups can cover songs in any genre, most often they cover barbershop, do-wop, rock, r&b, pop, gospel, dance and top-40.

            There are a lot of cool features of a-cappella groups over other groups.  A-cappella ensembles may be any size, may be mixed-gender or standard gender, may allow for soloists (‘leads’), and music for the group may be more easily tailored to fit the level of the singers than many other ensemble configurations.  A-cappella can be sung anywhere at any time, since no equipment is required.

            A-cappella teaches many different skills to singers.  It requires a high level of careful listening and teaches singers to react carefully to what they hear from the other singers to create a cohesive sound—much more than they would in a standard choir.  Often a-cappella groups have four or less people on a part, so there is nowhere to hide.  Thus, singers become stronger and more confident as they get used to singing independently rather in a large choral section.  Furthermore, a-cappella develops rhythm in singers much more than other vocal ensembles.  There is no accompaniment or percussion to keep the beat, so the group members rely upon each other to keep the beat steady.

            With that being said, I’m really excited about this new ensemble.  If you are a singer in the Cleveland area and interested in singing a-cappella music, please do consider joining us.  More information can be found on the group’s facebook page.