8 minute read
Wait, Those are Kids Playing That?
from Tuned In
by LASA Ezine
Assistant Director Andrew Corral conducts one of the orchestras at LASA High School in AISD. Masks are required for in-class rehearsals. (photo taken by Davis Burns)
What Happens Behind the Scenes in Music Education, Inside and Outside the Classroom
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By Davis Burns
As the orchestra tunes up and the choir gets on stage, an audience composed of parents, grandparents, relatives, and friends, watches as the director walks onto the stage. They welcome you to the performance and talk about how the musicians have worked very hard to perform this music for you. You feel a rush of adrenaline as the director takes to the podium, raises their baton, and strikes up the performance with the first piece of the evening. Only one thing is different from this performance to a professional one. This ensemble is composed only of students Troughout the United States, both public and private schools cherish their arts programs. Districts from coast to coast invest millions of dollars collectively each year to keep these programs alive for the benefit of their students. However, these programs would not be possible without the time and effort of individual directors, such as Jeni Berecek, Director of Orchestras at Hill Country Middle School in Eanes ISD. “I started playing cello when I was eight years old in my public schools.” Berecek said. Berecek was the orchestra director at Kealing Middle School and Lamar Middle School before taking the position as head orchestra director at Hill Country Middle School. She talked more about her own musical adventure as well as how she landed upon music education as a career. “I stuck with music through elementary school, middle school and high school. When I was about 17 years old, I was thinking about what I wanted to do in college, what I wanted to do as a career because I was starting to look at colleges. And I was deciding between a few different things. I remember one day asking myself, instead of like, what did I want to do with my life? I thought of it like what could I not live without.” Music in the classroom
Jeni Berecek Conducting at the Austin ISD Performing Arts Center
has taken many forms over the years, but in most places it works like this; middle and high schools have a choir, band, and an orchestra, composed of different groups of instruments and vocal parts. Some directors of these groups have other jobs, like playing or singing with other organizations outside the classroom. “I think most music teachers will tell you that they do a little bit of everything,” Berecek said. “If you’re going to be a musician, in general, you will teach. Even if you’re a professional musician in a symphony orchestra, you will still teach. So musicians do both, performing and teaching.” Teaching music to students can be a challenging endeavour. Music educators put a lot of their time and energy into making the choir room, orchestra room, band hall, or other classroom a great place for every student. Educators in general have a very difficult job, and with music, a lot of what happens in your personal life you can channel into the music your ensemble is playing. “As a musician, and as a music teacher, what happens in your life personally, really informs you know, your career, your relationship to music,” said Berecek. “Playing music and being a musician, you have to emulate and play all sorts of different emotions. So if you’re playing a song that’s really sad, you can tap into that, or a song that’s really exciting and happy, you can tap into that.” But you can’t have a fine arts program with only an orchestra. Many schools also have bands and choirs among other things. Megan Starkey is the Director of Choirs at Lamar Middle School and has been for the past 13 years. “I feel like Texas, over other states, puts a lot of value in music education and arts education in general,” Starkey said. She went on to explain how over the years, marching bands were expected to perform well because of how central football is to Texas middle schools, but mostly high schools. The
pressure was on for the other ensambles to do well to match the greatness of the marching band, which caused competitiveness across the state in the field of fine arts education. This pattern eventually evolved into the high value Texas schools place on their arts programs. Contests are another part of the fine arts curriculum, the most popular of which is UIL or University Interscholastic League. Students of a choir, orchestra, band, or other musical ensemble perform prepared music for a panel of three judges. They then go and sight-read music, which is when they are given a brand new piece of music and after some minutes of silent practice, they perform it for another panel of three judges. The group is scored on a scale of 1-5, 1 being “superior” rating, and 5 being “poor” rating.
Jeni Berecek
“Other states in the country look to Texas for resources and music repertoire. They look at our PML or ‘Prescribed Music List’ that we use for you while they pick their music from our PML.” Starkey Described. While directors handle most of the work inside the classroom, private tutors can help with the part that happens outside of the classroom, Practicing. One such private tutor is Frank Jenkins, a cello instructor, and cellist for the Austin Symphony. “I think that access to the arts is important to everyone,” Jenkins explained. “Having the opportunity for creative expression is invaluable for our society as a whole; like that is something that is part of, I think, being a well rounded human.” The pandemic has certainly brought radical change to the fine arts education system. Changes range from being as simple as wearing a mask during rehearsals and performances, to as extreme as not having a performance or rehearsal at all. These changes have rocked the way that teachers do things, and have both closed and opened doors. While the pandemic may have hit ensambles hard, it opened up a world of opportunities for one-on-one lessons. “A lot of groups tried to do virtual performances, and it never really amounted to that much, because it’s just, you miss too many of the important aspects of performance, you know, the social aspects and the physical space aspects, you just can’t recreate those virtually,” Jenkins expressed. Jenkins used to work with students one-onone in person, but now does it virtually. While it might not be optimal, it certainly eliminates some challenges people have like transportation needs or scheduling conflicts. “[If] they have a computer, they can hop on a zoom call, and we can have a lesson. I’d say that lessons over zoom aren’t as effective as when they’re in person, but there’s still value to it. So I think that that has kind of created a positive opportunity for musicians to be able to explore that.” Jenkins stated. Over the pandemic many people have started learning an instrument, not just in the United States, but around the world. For example, a study done by Yamaha reports that about 75% of people in the United Kingdom turned to music and learning an instrument to help wash away the pandemic blues. Others continued their studies, perhaps with more time to focus when other activities became unavailable. Starkey remarked that over the pandemic, “the use of technology to teach different music theory concepts or sight reading concepts that other teachers have made and put out there for anybody to use.” Many aspects of music education have changed with the pandemic and with time. However, through the ages, one thing remains constant. Just like any other activity, fine arts and performing in an ensemble is a way for students to connect and build relationships, something that is invaluable later in life. Jenkins is the school programs manager at Soundwaves Austin, which as
he describes it is “[A] nonprofit group in Austin that provides music lessons, sectionals, private lessons, and other types of support to School programs all around the city.” As he mentioned before, in his mind, access to the arts is important, and Soundwaves works to try and spread that experience to students from all walks of life. Across the country, there have been propositions for cutting funding to public schools’ arts programs because of the amount of money they take up for the little tangible reward they give the school, district, or state. Funding is certainly a concern for many school districts in low-income areas that can’t support large programs with hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of instruments, directors to teach students, and a place for them to perform. So, next time you go to a school concert, in support of a student or just because, think about the hard work that the students and the directors put in. Think about the amount of time that is spent behind the scenes and all of the moving parts that have to fall into place to provide this experience for the audience. As the conductor cuts off the ensemble, turns around, bows and acknowledges all of the students, remember that there are so many things that go on off stage that you don’t get to see, but that all add to the rewarding experience of music education, inside and outside the classroom.
Frank Jenkins
The main hall at the Austin ISD Performing Arts Center (PAC for short). This 1,200 seat auditorium was finished in 2015. Photo by Thomas McConnell, courtesy of Austin ISD
