Saxophone

Preparation: Overcoming the Pressures of Performing

By Lindsey Berthiaume

Okay, they called my name. I'm up! Checklist,... instrument, music,...music? Where's my music?? Phew - it's in my hand. As I am making my way up to the stage I can feel my legs shaking with each step and my palms getting colder as I get closer. This is the same feeling as the last performance. Why do I keep doing this? Why does my teacher make me do this?"

Indeed, why do we as educators provide our students with these anxious moments and opportunities? Is there a way to provide similar experiences through other venues or is performing the best preparation for life's performances?

Throughout our lives we are required to perform, be it through presentations, relationships or academically. Preparing for a musical performance can aid one in developing the life skills necessary to execute these tasks. There are many aspects to preparation - from the physical skills to logistical planning - and each area requires a different set of life skills. In sports, teams and individuals train for an event as we do similarly in music. However, the one area that remains under wraps is the mental preparation necessary to prepare for these performances.

SBO Report: Writing & Arranging

By Vince Corozine (ASCAP)

The ability to write simplified parts or to edit existing parts that are too demanding for the student, are valuable skills for a school music director to acquire. Often the limited technical ability of certain students will necessitate that a simplified part be written in order to assist the student with the music to be played.

Here are a few suggestions for writing simplified parts. Each part should:

Woodwind Doubling

It’s the end of June and your first-chair clarinet wants to sign out a saxophone for the summer. Two thoughts cross your mind initially. Scenario one is that if you hand over the sax, there is a chance that the new enchantment may result in a loss to the clarinet section. Scenario two is if you don’t hand over the sax, you may lose the student’s interest in band. At what cost does doubling come?

There is a point in a music student’s academic career when the thought of learning a second instrument is enchanting and a new challenge. There are advantages and disadvantages to allowing your students to participate in this type of learning experience. The origins of doubling go back to the big band era of the 1930s and ’40s, during which reed players frequently doubled on parts in Broadway shows, big bands and station bands. In these cases, the saxophone players doubled on clarinet, flute, oboe or bassoon.

UPCLOSE: MICHAEL PAYTON

By Jennifer H. McInerney
Photos by Carol Cunningham, Cunningham Photography, Waianae, Hawaii.

On New Year's Day, the 400 students in the Hawaii All-State Marching Band proceeded down Colorado Boulevard, awash in wave after wave of rainbow colors, their hula skirts swaying as they marched to the steady beat. Their band director, on the other hand, was "walking on eggshells" that day, and for good reason: Jan. 1, 2003, was only the second day this oversized band of students from all the islands of Hawaii had come together as an ensemble, making its performance debut at the Tournament of Roses Parade in California. Director Michael Payton, a music educator for 35 years, had been asked to lead Hawaii's first all-state marching band to represent the 50th state of the union in one of the country's most prestigious exhibitions for marching bands.

"When we started, almost half the kids weren't in an established marching program, and half of that group hadn't even marched before," he recalls.

UPFRONT: BEGINNING FRENCH HORNS

Do you have trouble finding and keeping French horn players in your elementary or middle school band? Do you have some students trying to play horn but they drive you crazy? There are practical things you can do to make life easier for both you and them.

The Secret of a Good Woodwind Sound

Recently I was in Washington D.C. doing a residency for the Kennedy Center. One of the groups I coached was the award-winning Walt Whitman High School Jazz Ensemble. When he heard me playing long tones to warm up, director Chris Allen said to me, “There are only two kinds of players that practice long tones: Beginners, because they can’t play anything else, and professionals, because they know how important long tones are.”

It’s so true. Every teacher tells students to play long tones, and every student thinks they’re the most boring thing in the world. What’s interesting or fun about holding out one note for a long time?

REPORT: WHERE ARE ALL THE WOMEN DIRECTORS?

Male high school band directors outnumber women in that field by a ratio of three to one, according to a 2001 study conducted by MENC, the National Association for Music Education.

Circumstantial evidence and casual observation, including Web searches of high school music programs, informal surveys and enrollment figures at band director conferences, make that ratio appear even greater - perhaps as high as five to one.

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