All-State Auditions

Today we had the All-State Auditions in Northborough, MA. We had three students from Pentucket auditioning...two snare and one cello. I hope they get in! One thing I enjoy the most about this event is seeing all my fellow music teachers from the state. It is always good to check in and see what's happening with their programs. I spoke with Colleen Toland from Weston who was one of two teachers that built their instrumental program to be one of the best in the state. We talked about how to get the district as a whole involved in the schools' bands. Everyone seems to think that all my ideas we are putting into place this year are exactly what they did when they started...so I am pumped to see the results next fall!

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May 31, 2021 at 4:28 AM

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Learning Theory through Pop Music by Matthew F. Finnegan

Did you know that most pop music has a four beat pattern where the snare drum usually accents beats two and four? Example: "Get a Grip" by Aerosmith! At 8:00 am I attended what I consider my favorite clinic thus far at the MENC All-Eastern Music Educators Conference. Titled "From Simple to Complex: Leading the Listener to Learning," clinician Mathew F. Finnegan gave great examples of how popular music can be used in the classroom to teach music theory. The idea is this: teaching music theory through the old school fashion of notes on a page and through classical music does not work in today's classroom. In order to create the motivation for students to want to learn theory, we need to reach out and use the music which relates to them the most and connect it with the content we want to teach them. I found this clinic to be very inspiring. Here we just focused on the beat, but this clinician has already established how to incorporate pop music with the teach...

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