Building A Library Ed Dumas As a music teacher, one of your most important functions will be to choose the music that your students will learn. Many of the pieces that you choose will certainly come from an already existing library, but at least some will be new music recently purchased by you for your music program. The choices that you make now in purchasing music for your program will ripple into the future and will continue to affect what you can choose from your existing library to reuse and replay once again. It is important, then, to make sure that you choose wisely when purchasing new band music to add to your library collection. You will want to ensure that the items you are choosing now have lasting value that can be replayed in future years. Items that are purchased today which have less “repeatability” means that future years have less choice and more financial cost associated with fulfilling your repertoire needs. Below are some suggestions as to how you can ensure more repeat usability for your library by only purchasing great selections for your concert bands and jazz bands. Look for Repeatability Avoid purchasing music that is very trendy but has a short lifespan. This often includes this year’s favourite pop/rock tune, or theme to the latest TV hit show. For example, I am sure there are thousands of music programs across North America whose library contains the theme from the TV show “Friends,” but I am not at all sure how many students today have ever watched the series. Offerings such as these may seem nostalgic to the person buying the chart but are guaranteed to be almost valueless to future generations. Amidst the excitement of purchasing something recognizable, try to determine how much staying power a trendy arrangement will have. It might be easy to say that new purchases should stay away from all theme music, but that could also cause you to not choose an arrangement which may have lasting staying power. For example, not choosing the James Band theme for your jazz band might be missing an opportunity, since the James Bond 007 spy thriller genre of movies has been going strong for 60+ years so far while the world is impatiently waiting for the next installment to be released. Sometimes it is okay to choose what you know is a one-year chart for either concert band or jazz band knowing that you will use it to raise the profile of your music program. If you use this strategy, though, I would suggest you fix a limit on how much of your budget will be dedicated to short-term music to ensure that repeatability in your library is still maintained. One of the major facets of repeatability is the concept of writing music specifically for the wind band genre, as opposed to transcribing or arranging something written for another medium. I mentioned above the issue of pop/rock tunes being used in a wind band setting, and most music teachers understand how far apart these two mediums are. The nature of electric guitars, bass guitars, and drum sets does not translate well into a wind band using flutes, clarinets, brass and divided concert percussion. But beyond that discussion, consider the more subtle ramifications of transcribing from orchestra to a wind band setting. While these charts can be more successful than pop/rock tunes to wind band settings, they are still often less successful than the writings created by composers specifically for winds and percussion. This is often because specific challenges of writing for strings vs writing for winds do not line up exactly, or even close, for that matter. Even within the winds, writing for one group such as clarinets with the “over the break” challenges is completely different than for brass with their harmonics challenges. A great composer writing specifically for the wind medium can be more precise in their writing for all winds to create a product that is more exciting or more beautiful than a transcription, or both. I would encourage you to choose more specifically composed works for winds, and fewer transcriptions from any other medium brought to the winds. You will find wind compositions to give you more longevity of use in future years. Collect Festival Syllabus Lists I used to keep a paper file of printed syllabus lists from various festivals which I could use as suggestions for new music choices. While this was cumbersome to keep and read through, today's technology allows for a digital file to be kept with all sorts of syllabus selections that can be sorted according to grade level. Festival syllabus lists can be especially valuable since these are selections which some of our finest music educators have already agreed are excellent quality works which will retain playability for many years to come. MusicFest Canada syllabus is a great place to start looking for quality arrangements. This list also contains a large quantity of Canadian content. Even if you are not attending the festival, you are welcome to scan the list and listen to the choices at each level to find quality selections for your students. Local festivals often do not contain a specific syllabus list but are still useful in helping choose your selections for your students. The first place to look would be in attending a winner's performance evening concert where the finest groups from the festival are showcased. Here you will find other teachers’ selections that can lead to great choices for your students. If you are participating in a festival with your students, plan on listening to some other groups in their adjudications. Here you will find selection recommendations from colleagues that can help you with your future music library purchasing choices. Attend Concerts Attend concerts held by your colleagues, community groups, or local university music programs, and while there, keep the program handout. Always take with you to concerts a pen or pencil to write on the program any notes about specific arrangements you heard that might be exciting for your students. Later you can put the program in a paper file, or more likely today, keep a digital file of pieces that you heard that you would like to later acquire. Attend Tapestry Music Reading Clinic Every year, Tapestry Music assembles some of the best new publications for concert bands and jazz bands and presents these new offerings to teachers in a reading clinic. The reading clinics give teachers a chance to play through the new publications, or even to just sit and listen to them performed live. These events are a great opportunity to hear firsthand how successful the new charts might be for your students. One of the biggest advantages of attending the Reading Clinics is that the music has been pre-selected, which means someone with a long history of wind music has already approved the composition as worthwhile to include in the clinic. This year Ken Surges, who has an extremely long history with wind music, is once again choosing the concert band music, while Dave Sabourin, the owner of Tapestry Music, is choosing the jazz band repertoire. The date for the two reading clinics presented this summer will be August 23rd, 2023 in Surrey, BC., and August 24th, 2023, in Lake Country, BC. Contact your local Tapestry Music rep about information to register for either reading clinic. Bring your horn, too! Attend BCMEA Clinics The BC Music Educators Association annual convention has long been an excellent source of advice regarding repertoire for wind bands and jazz bands. There are sometimes workshops called “Desert Island Five” which present teachers’ suggestions of their five favourite works that they could not be without if they were stranded on a “Desert Island.” These events provide excellent resource suggestions for teachers as they most often come from current working teachers who are finding success using the works they have chosen. While at the BCMEA convention, also make note of the honour group performances. The honour groups are ensembles made up of the most talented students in the province and led by prestigious conductors from around the world. The music chosen for these honour groups is always of high calibre and is worth considering adding to your library in future years. Teaching Music Through Performance in Band This series of books and recordings is an indispensable set that has huge value for music teachers everywhere. Released by GIA Publications, this original series for wind bands is now up to twelve volumes and on a second edition of books! The series has also been extended to present volumes for other groups including orchestra, choir, jazz band, and young ensembles. The idea in this series is that the music selected is considered some of the best available for each type of performing group, and is presented by grade level for each group. Writeups and analyses of the selection are also presented to help the classroom teacher judge the suitability of the recommendation for their students. Full-length recordings of all the music chosen are also provided, and these recordings can be of significant value to you and your students. Purchase of the entire set in any one category can be daunting to say the least, considering how encompassing this series has become. But even just adding a single volume each year can soon add up to an extremely useful teacher resource for finding high-quality literature for your groups. A good plan could be having your school district purchase one complete set for whatever performance groups are offered in your district and make them available for all music teachers through a district lending library system. Even one central music program having a complete set and offering it to all other music teachers is a good possibility as well. Contact your local Tapestry rep if you need help with this resource. Get to Know Historical Repertoire Some of the great names from the beginnings of the wind band genre should never be forgotten. These include writers such as Gustav Holst, Alfred Reed, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Clare Grundman and Percy Grainger among many, many others. While you may not want to program for only the historical greats, it is important to expose your students to at least some of this repertoire during their time in your program. One substantial traditional work per year is probably sufficient. Get to Know the Modern Greats At the same time, it is important to know who the current leading composers are. Frank Ticheli is a name right now that is huge on everyone’s list of great modern composers who are changing the world of wind bands. But beyond Frank Ticheli are many others, such as James Swearingen, Randal Standridge, Robert W. Smith, Elizabeth Raum, Eric Whitacre, and David Holsinger. So many great modern composers write specifically for wind bands at all levels that there is no reason to be satisfied with poor-quality choices. Once you become well-versed in the various composers who write specifically for winds (as opposed to transcribing from another medium), you will find that you will soon be able to name the composer after hearing only a few moments of the music, even if you have never heard that specific creation before. You will come to know the undeniable sound of each composer and will immediately think of them when you hear a new work they have just created. Get to Know the Canadian Greats Finally, music teachers in Canada should know that we have a strong and vibrant history of composing music specifically for wind bands in this country. Canada’s best composers include Howard Cable, Robert Buckley, Morley Calvert, John Weinzweig, Donald Coakley, Andre Jutras, Elizabeth Raum, Vince Gassi, and many, many more. Here on the West Coast, we are blessed to have the amazing Robert Buckley nearby. I have worked with Robert several times and conducted his compositions more times than I can count. I am always impressed at how fine his compositions are and how pleasant he is to work with at the same time. I would encourage you all to include some Robert Buckley and other Canadian content each year with your students and point out to them just how much Canadian content is all around us in the wind band literature. Wish List Finally, I would like to recommend that you keep a wish list of compositions that you would like to perform with your students. You will find new additions to the wish list at just about any time of your day. You never know when a moment strikes you that need to write down the name of a piece of music that you just heard as something that “someday” you need to go back to. Keeping these names of compositions in one place, preferably digitally, will help you do a quick scan later when you are finding that you are missing that one “certain” piece for one of your groups. If the Wish List was kept digitally and accessible from your smartphone, you would find that the list is more useful to add names to or use names from the list. When you get your mindset into a mode of developing a great library of wind band literature, it seems like great options for inclusion always just kind of appear and make themselves known to you. No longer will you and your students be satisfied with the “latest pop tune” to be transcribed for the concert band. When compared to great musical literature composed specifically for concert bands at the level of your group, pop music just seems to be missing so much depth and longevity. Searching for the next great concert band composition becomes an exciting search which enriches the student performance. Original concert band compositions will give your students more “protein in the meal” that helps them continue to progress and develop as musicians.     Ed Dumas is a retired band director who taught his entire career in the Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows School District. Ed is now living with his lifelong partner Laurie in Parksville, BC.  Ed & Laurie also work as Mid-Island reps for Tapestry Music while enjoying making music in retirement. You can find Ed’s other writings for the MusicED Blog at: https://www.tapestrymusic.com/news.aspx If you are not receiving these articles regularly and would like to, please send an email to ed@tapestrymusic.com to join our email contact list!    

Is Music Notation Necessary? Ed Dumas I have heard this question asked of me by potential band students more times than I can remember. Or, at least, the question was asked in one form or another, quite often in the form of a statement such as “I can’t memorize musical notation.” My gut instinct is to tell the students who made that claim that I have never met anyone, ever, who is completely unable to memorize the system of musical notation. But usually, it is not very helpful to tell students that they do not know of what they speak. So instead, I try to show the students that the problem is that they usually do not have a complete vision of where we are heading in the band. I reassure them that the place we are going is totally doable by them and that memorizing the system of musical notation is not hard. As beginning-level music students, they need not have the entire system figured out before starting. They will learn it as we go along. Some students will then double down on their first statement, and say things like “No, I really cannot memorize anything.” As a response, I will say that if they have made it to grade 6 where we are starting in band, I will take that as proof that they can memorize at least some things. Since they can read the English language, it is kind of evident that they were able to memorize the English alphabet. Now don’t get me wrong, I am not talking about special needs students here. What we are talking about is a very common response coming from very typical “average” students who truly believe that learning to read musical notation is hard. It is not. So, sometimes with students that are very persistent in their belief that reading musical notation is difficult, I have often run through an imaginary scenario. This is a situation in which John Williams, the composer, has created an exciting soundtrack for this new movie called “Star Wars.” Star Wars used the London Symphony Orchestra in the soundtrack to the movie, but John Williams lived in New York at the time. So, John phones up the first violinist of the London Symphony Orchestra and says, “Okay, I have this great new piece of music that is going to be a HUGE hit! I will teach it to you over the phone. So, the first note is a D.” The first violinist plays a D – “Daaahhhhh” on his violin. “No, no,” says John, that is too long. “Play it shorter.” “Okay – Daahh.” “No shorter.” “Dah” “Shorter.” “Da.” “Right. Now play me three of them.” “Da. Da. Da.” “Okay, now play me a G after those three notes.” “Da. Da. Da. GGGGGgggggggggg.” “No. No. Too long again. Much shorter!” At this point, I can imagine the exasperated violin player saying to John Williams, “Is this going to go on all day like this? Exactly how short do you want this next note?” This is the first illustration of why we need the musical notation system currently in use. How else can you teach new music at a distance if it cannot be written down? By now, the student who has insisted to me that he is going to learn to play a musical instrument without learning to read music is now beginning to understand the enormity of that task. John Williams wrote a two-hour-plus soundtrack for an orchestra of about 100 musicians, and the first musician to learn his or her part would be completely exasperated within the first few minutes of trying to learn Star Wars by memorizing the sounds instead of learning the system. My student by now would begin to see that learning to read the conventional notation system is actually the FASTEST route to playing something like Star Wars music. Anything else takes just WAY too much time when you are talking about a large group of musicians all doing different things. Now I have had similar discussions with students wanting to play guitar in the secondary school jazz band. My response is always along the lines of “Yes, you are welcome to play guitar in the jazz band, but keep in mind that you must be able to read musical notation by the time you get there.” Some students will then claim that they are learning to play guitar by TAB instead of notation, so they will need to have the music given to them in TAB format. When I then show them that jazz band music only comes in notation format, and that I will not be rewriting it for them in any other format, they again begin to understand the enormity of their requst. Since TAB for guitar does not contain rhythm information and only contains information on where to place their fingers, spending a great deal of time re-writing notation into TAB means that the student still must listen to someone else play it first to copy it. This is a huge waste of valuable time in an educational system that is already overloaded with things to do and learn. So, going back to the question posed in this article, “Is music notation necessary?” The answer is that no, it is not absolutely necessary. But, it is by far and away the fastest route to success, and learning to play a musical instrument without learning notation at the same time means that your progress will be dramatically slowed by having to memorize so many things that could be easily delivered using a traditional notation system. “You can spend a few hours now learning how to read music, or you can spend countless numbers of hours having someone else (not me) help you memorize each one of the pieces of music that we will play only once in a concert before moving on to something else new. Trust me, reading notation is the easy route!” So, the question for teachers is what resources should you consider using to help your students learn to read the musical notation system. My first-year players, then, were asked to purchase three small books along with their rental instruments. The first, of course, was their “Method Book” which was the first-year songbook, such as Standard of Excellence or Essential Elements. The second book I asked students to purchase was a performance book, which had a collection of band arrangements that were suitable for a first-year performance. The third book was a theory book where the students could practice the intellectual part of learning to read music. The book that I used for many years was Alfred’s Essentials of Music Theory Book 1. This is an excellent quality book that gives the students plenty of practice in all of the steps of learning to read music. It is a very affordable book as well, costing about the same as a method book. There are some specific advantages to using a written theory notation book as compared to other alternatives that I would like to suggest to you. It is Already Created When I started my career in music, I began with creating some note-naming practice pages and some musical counting practice pages. These were very helpful and useful, but I did spend a fair number of evenings creating these pages. I still had to photocopy them at school later, and standing over a copier was another big chore. Once I found Alfred’s Essentials of Music Theory, all of that time was recovered to be able to do other things. For a busy secondary music teacher, this was very valuable to me. One Book for All Instruments The point of using a theory book is that the students are learning the System of musical notation. They are not learning the system that goes with their instrument. They are learning the one common system that everyone plays under, therefore everyone does the same pages. This includes bass clef and treble clef note naming pages regardless of which instrument the student plays. What I have usually told my students is that regarding the “other” clef, they need to know enough about those note names that they could then learn the system better if they should happen to switch instruments, which does occur fairly often. Usually, that just means doing what the book asks. No Computers Not very often will teachers suggest that not using computers is an asset these days, but in this case, I believe it is, especially for beginners. That is because, in most rooms where your students will be learning and making music, there will not be placed a full class set of computers for students to use. That means when you want to have your class complete a music notation assignment on computers, the class must put down their instruments, go to a different location, settle in, and log on before they can begin naming their pitches. This is just far too intrusive and cumbersome when a simple paper assignment will likely meet the same objective in less than half the amount of time. I have seen classes complete their one-page assignment for this week in about 5-10 minutes of band class time. The rest is for us to get back to making music. No Photocopies Besides the fact that you as the teacher do not need to stand over a photocopier for hours on end, there is an additional benefit to having the students bring a booklet to class for their theory work. Over the years of my work as a teacher, I have seen a profound change in how some students deal with paper. Some students today are so disorganized that a single sheet of photocopy paper going home with them as an assignment is almost guaranteed to be lost or destroyed, never to be returned to the teacher. For some students, the only way to have a single page returned is to complete it in class in front of the teacher. A small lightweight book about the size of a method book, though, tends to stay intact longer and come back to class more regularly. Having the students write their name on the book right away means that more likely someone else will help return the book to its owner, instead of being tossed in the recycle bin. This may sound like a small point that is not worth mentioning, but for some students, this can represent the difference between initial success and initial frustration leading to leaving the music program. Write-In Book Alfred’s Essentials of Music Theory is a book which students are expected to write in to complete the exercises, not just a text that they would read. This means the book cannot be used in future years, but it also makes the book extremely practical and successful by helping your students learn to read the notation system. Make sure, though, that you also direct your students to complete all of their work in PENCIL and not pen. That is because when you find that they have completed the assignment incorrectly, you will want them to redo their work to show they now understand it properly. The most common student error that you will find when using this book is when treble clef players have to write in letter names in the bass clef. It is very common for these youngsters to write in a bass clef, and then proceed to name all of the notes using treble clef letter names! At that point, you will want them to understand that in bass clef it is not just the clef that is different, but the letter names are different as well. With a pencil, they will be able to erase and fix the problem. Final Thoughts If you are wondering if it is really necessary to have a music notation book, no it is not absolutely necessary. I have found though, that using this book for decades has given my students great success in learning to read notation while I could spend time more time teaching the ins and outs of their instruments to them. My beginning band students would see me twice per week at the elementary level, and in each class, they were asked to present something to me. In the first class of the week, the students would bring up their practice record to me which showed me how many days they practiced in the last week. I would quickly write the number down in my marks book. In the second class, the students would bring to me the one page of Alfred’s Theory that they were asked to complete over the last week. Usually, it would take the students 5-10 minutes at home to complete it, and this was not much for each week. I could then quickly check it over for correctness, and if it looked like they understood the work, I would give them a check mark at the top of the page. I would also then give them a check mark for that completed page in my book. These presentations to me were done in usually just a few minutes at the beginning of the class, and it was during that time that the entire class was also getting set up and beginning to warmup. Once students were set up, they could bring their materials to me and I could quickly make the necessary marks before getting on with playing. It would always take a few classes to establish the routine, but once established, the students could move through this task quite quickly. Finally, I would like to make a final comment about writing note names on the music. Students must be told that they should NOT be writing note names on their music for everything that they play. First-year students in particular want to write the note names on their music “just until I have it memorized.” I have heard that comment more times than I can count. It is important, though, to help the students understand that as long as they write the note names on the page, they will NEVER memorize the notation system! The reason is very simple. Once they write the note names down on the page, their eyes will always be looking at the letters they wrote down, and not looking at the note-heads which give them the letter information. As such, this now completely undermines their ability to memorize their note names, and they will be doing this system forever, or until they quit, which is most common. If your students are having trouble memorizing their note names, do this strategy instead. Place a piece of blank paper below their line of music. Then, using a pencil, write the note names on this second piece of paper. That gives them the practice of figuring out the note names and learning them. Then, and this is important, take that piece of paper away and just play the music with no letters written down. If they are still struggling, they can do this exercise a few times more, but writing on the music all their letter names and leaving them there will destroy all of that effort! The intention of using a paper-based notation book is to help students overcome their dependence on writing letter names on their music. Writing on paper in Alfred’s Essentials of Music Theory Book is better for memorization than a computer screen, cheaper & more available than technology, and more consistent than photocopies. Plus, practicing writing in Alfred’s book will not undermine their reading of the musical notation system later on! Parents will understand the small added cost of this book if you also explain the huge added benefits that come with it.   Ed Dumas is a retired band director who taught his entire career in the Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows School District. Ed is now living with his lifelong partner Laurie in Parksville, BC.  Ed & Laurie also work as Mid-Island reps for Tapestry Music while enjoying making music in retirement. You can find Ed’s other writings for the MusicED Blog at: https://www.tapestrymusic.com/news.aspx If you are not receiving these articles regularly and would like to, please send an email to ed@tapestrymusic.com to join our email contact list!  

Natural & Unnatural Accents Ed Dumas I have found over the years that teaching beginning band to young students starting in grade 6 has been incredibly rewarding to me as their teacher. The progress demonstrated by eager young students is a pleasure to see and experience. At the same time, young students have taught me many things about how they learn music best. This has caused me to try to find ways to reach a natural state of learning in them that requires less effort and, well, fewer words from me which can save a significant chunk of time in short classes with young students. One of the many remarkable things that these students have taught me is that their understanding of natural accents is critical to their learning to play and count in various meters of music. For example, I have often wondered why playing 3/4 time was always such a challenge for young students. One of the things that I realized was that they had such little experience with 3/4 time because so much more music now is written only in 4/4 time. In contrast to today’s students, when I was young and growing up in Northern Alberta, it seemed that wedding events were constantly happening around us. And of course, those weddings were very traditional due to the European immigrant family nature of everyone around me. As a result, I had a huge exposure to 3/4 time music due to the many waltzes that were commonly played at wedding receptions. Students today have less exposure to weddings since they have fewer cousins, they have less exposure to traditional waltzes and very little exposure to music not in 4/4 time. This got me thinking about what it is that makes 3/4 unique from 4/4 music, and that is what I thought I needed to concentrate on to help them understand the basics of the meter. The answer was in the natural accents of 3/4 time. As soon as I showed them that difference, playing and counting in 3/4 was easy for them. Unnatural Accents So, the natural accents are the beats that have a heavier feel about them, even though they are not marked with the sideways V or upside-down V accents that are common in our band repertoire. These are the places where the music just naturally wants to fall a little bit heavier. When you point out these places to students, their counting ability usually increases quite rapidly, as does their playing abilities in that meter. Now, if you are wondering what an unnatural accent is in music, that is a band teacher joke that you are welcome to have for free! Since all music has natural accents, then there must also be some unnatural accents, right? I think that was a question that some far too bright student asked me one time, and that has led to too many years of making a joke about the “unnatural accents” in music, as if making music was something that could ever be seen as “unnatural.” Feel free to use it at your peril! But, going back to natural accents, when you explain this to students, as usual, begin with what they know, and that would be 4/4 time. As you conduct nothing but air (without students playing), say to the students: Strong – weak – Medium – weak Say that a few times to them to give the students a moment to absorb it. Point out to them that the Strong beat always lands on the downbeat of the conducting pattern. Have your students say this with you as you “air” conduct it. Then you can count to them: 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 - 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 - 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 You can point out again that count one always lands with the downbeat of the conducting stick. Then, have your students count along with you conducting it. By the time in the school year when the beginning band students are expected to learn 3/4 time, they will have mastered playing 4/4 time. So, point out to them again that the reason for doing this with them is to now contrast the 3/4 time. Here, 3/4 time looks like this: Strong – weak – weak – Strong – weak – weak  Again, point out that the Strong beat always lands on count one with the downbeat of the conducting stick. Ask the students to say it with you. Then ask your students to count along with you: 1 – 2 – 3 – 1 – 2 – 3 – 1 – 2 – 3 You can even have your students stand up and learn how to conduct both meters with you. The students truly love this activity, and it also gives them a bit of a “physical break” from always just sitting still in music class. Make sure they use their right hand and then start with: Down – left – Right – up – Down – left – Right – up Here they will feel that the strong beat is always down, and the last weak pulse of the measure is always up. Left goes before right, and the medium beat is the outside conducting pulse. For those students still struggling with left and right, I have often used: Down – inside – Outside – up – Down – inside – Outside – up In 3/4 time they can then conduct: Strong – weak – weak – Strong – weak – weak Or: 1 – 2 – 3 – 1 – 2 – 3 Have them see that One is always down, and the last weak pulse in each measure is always up just before the next downbeat. Make sure that they are now conducting: Down – outside – up – Down – outside – up And NOT conducting: Down – inside – up – Down – inside – up  Now after doing the above exercises with my beginning band students for several years, I found it to be successful with most of the students in the class. Yet, there were always a few that still struggled to play music 3/4 time, and this still confounded me. So, looking for something that was even more basic and able to reach the inner parts of the musical brain to help them make sense of 3/4 time, I had my students use their bodies to create some foot taps and hand claps. That is, I had them do the following: Tap – clap – clap – Tap – clap – clap  You can even have them say what they said above to your conducting at the same time as they tap and clap. Now the physical actions that they are doing are extremely close to them, and this reaches their musical brain better. While the students do the taps and claps, I would conduct and have them watch me conduct so that they can feel the 3/4 time better. Just about every time, there would be some student who decides that it would be great to overdo the exercise and get goofy with the taps and claps to draw attention to themselves. Usually, this is just because they are a little nervous about being asked to do something they have not done before. So, just remind the students that the objective of this exercise is to “program their brain,” but not in a bad way. I would suggest to the students, “This is just a simple exercise to create the programming that is needed to be able to comfortably play in 3/4 time, so please don’t get goofy about it. Just quietly do it, and let the programming do its magic with you!” Once the students settle in and just go with the exercise, there will be no one left in the class who cannot play in 3/4 time! I was reminded of this activity once again just a few days back when I encountered another class of young beginners who were struggling with 3/4 time. Being short on remaining class time, we bypassed all the conducting parts of the activity and went straight to the taps and claps. The students chose to do it quickly without getting goofy about it, and their success with learning 3/4 time was perfect, immediate and lasting! I would encourage you to use activities like this that draw attention to the natural accents in any meters that your classes will encounter to quickly help them get over their counting troubles. Other Meters Over the years, I have extended the student learning using this system to more advanced meters that the students were needing to play in band class. As the students got older and more experienced, though, I found it less necessary to have them physically tap and clap the natural accent feel of each meter. As they developed, it became only important to point out WHERE the natural accents fell, and less important to make students feel it with taps and claps. This kind of points to the idea that as the musical imagination develops, students get the same benefits in learning just by imagining the completion of the actions. Now, the next meter to come along is usually cut time, or 2/2. As soon as we begin cut time, I would point out to students that the accents here are: Strong – Strong There is not a weak pulse in cut time, since so much of cut time is used in marching. 4/4 is generally not used to march to, since we have two feet and not four. We also do not want to be stepping out unequally to strong and weak beats in 4/4 time, as this would cause the marching group to curve what should be a straight line. Using cut time with only strong beats helps to keep the marchers stepping out equally and therefore travelling straight. Following cut time is usually 2/4 time, which only differs on the second beat. 2/4 time is usually: Strong – weak This difference in the second beat is the biggest reason why 2/4 (and 4/4) should not be interchanged with cut time. Many folks in the past have responded to playing in cut time as “Just play it in a fast 4!” Doing so would confuse the students at a level that is below words. This confusion could create a situation where the students have trouble even putting into words what the problem is and therefore cannot ask the correct question to seek clarity. This is a common situation that I have found with students that have been allowed to learn cut time as a “fast 4.” Students would find that playing in cut time becomes harder once this is done when the objective should be to make it easier for them. Instead, point out that in cut time the natural accents are different than in either 2/4 or 4/4, and show them how they are different. Then show them that when you conduct in cut time, you are now conducting half notes and no longer conducting quarter notes. Then, allow them to figure out how the music should go if you are marking half notes. Usually, students will realize quite quickly that the music progresses twice as fast if you are now marking larger notes, but now they should also be able to feel that the natural accents are different. Shortly after cut time comes 6/8 time. Here the students need to know that there is slow 6/8 and fast 6/8 time. In slow 6/8 it will be: Strong – weak – weak – Strong – weak – weak In fast 6/8, it will feel Strong – Strong like cut time, but each pulse will have three divisions (eighth notes) instead of two (quarter notes). Soon also comes 5/4 time, and here students need to know that there are two ways of dividing 5/4 time. It could be: Strong – weak – weak – Strong – weak Or, it could be: Strong – weak – Strong – weak – weak The really fun 5/4 meter is when the two different types of natural accents in 5/4 time are alternated, first one then the other. It is important when teachers see this to point this out so that students then understand how the natural accents must change each measure. Note that your conducting pattern should also change! One of the most common pieces of music used to help students learn 5/4 time is the theme from Mission Impossible. This, of course, is the theme from the original 60’s and 70’s show, not the later movies which disappointingly changed it away from 5/4 time. In the original theme, the 5/4 time should be conducted using 4 pulses. These pulses should be along the lines of one 6/8 measure combined with one 2/4 measure. Here you would then have two long pulses (of three eighth notes each) followed by two short pulses (of two eighth notes each). This 5/4 meter is fairly advanced, and while I love the Mission Impossible theme for this, it is not where I would want to start 5/4 time. Advanced Meters By now you should be getting an idea that there is no end to how meters can be combined and made into all sorts of complexities. These include 9/8, 12/8, 7/8, 6/4, 3/2, and many others. The key for students to master these is in your ability to simplify it for them. At this stage, you will want to talk about the “primary pulse,” the “first subdivision” and the “second subdivision.” For example, the 9/8 measure will have a dotted quarter note as the primary pulse with three eighth notes as the first subdivision of the primary pulse and each eighth note dividing into 2 sixteenth notes as the secondary subdivision. The primary pulses will usually have a natural accent pattern of: Strong – weak – weak By the time your students reach the senior grades, just pointing out these basic ground rules of the meter and natural accents will help students in their learning of this music. No longer will you need to do anything more if you have prepped them for these kinds of discussions along the way. Keep in mind, though, that composers are famous for changing the ground rules of their work, and these can be the unique things that make their music so special. For example, a composer writing in 10/8 could be often thought of as having 5 pulses in a measure with each pulse consisting of two eighth notes per pulse. It will be up to you as the teacher to analyze the score to determine if the eighth notes are all grouped in twos, or have some been grouped in threes. If some are grouped in threes, then the 10/8 measure could have 2 short pulses of two eighth notes each and 2 long pulses of three eighth notes each. Note that these long and short pulses can also be placed into each measure in different orders as well, and these long and short pulses could also be frequently interchanged for more mixed meter fun! No matter how it is presented to you on the score, if you can present those basic meter ground rules for that composition to your students, they will surely be more likely to find success with the work. I have usually found that senior students do not have too much trouble learning how to play a piece of music once they understand how the meter and natural accents should fall. Keep it as simple as possible, and begin by pointing out the strong and weak pulses to your beginners right away, as soon as they first learn to play an instrument.     Ed Dumas is a retired band director who taught his entire career in the Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows School District. Ed is now living with his lifelong partner Laurie in Parksville, BC.  Ed & Laurie also work as Mid-Island reps for Tapestry Music while enjoying making music in retirement.   You can find Ed’s other writings for the MusicED Blog at: https://www.tapestrymusic.com/news.aspx   If you are not receiving these articles regularly and would like to, please send an email to ed@tapestrymusic.com to join our email contact list!