Posted by jrt002
1. April 17th,
2009 11:30 a.m. - 12:30 p.m.
2. Today I
rehearsed the piece “The Blue and the Gray” with the high school
band.
3. Today Mr. Siegel
started off band rehearsal with four different warm up pieces from
their T.O.S. book. He conducted the warm ups today and the purpose
of this was to get the band to watch him while he was conducting. He
messed with a couple of things such as tempo and dynamics and if the
students did not follow him he would stop and start the piece over.
He also reminded the students of specific aspects of the music to be
aware of such as balance and suspensions in the music. The tubas
were talking when he was about to begin one of the warm ups and when
they missed their entrance because of their talking he stopped and
told them that they need to stop talking and focus on what they are
there to do. Mr. Siegel then tries to continue with the warm ups but
the students are not making a good entrance so he has them start the
piece and won't move until they have a good entrance that is
together. Mr. Siegel then goes on to tune the band and after the
entire group is tuned he tells that that he tuned one note on their
instruments now it is their job to make sure the other notes on the
instruments play in tune. Mr. Siegel then goes on to run the piece
“Inner Peace” and before starting he reminds his students that
they should play through the phrases, where they should breath, and
that if they have to breath before then that they should make sure
they are not breathing while the person sitting next to them is. The
flutes are out of tune when they start the piece so he tunes the
flute by tuning two of the players with a tuner and then has the rest
of the group listen to the correct pitch and make the proper
adjustments. After playing a small part of the piece Mr. Siegel
stops the piece and compliments the students by telling them they are
playing the song with a lot of musicality and it is not boring at
all. While Mr. Siegel is conducting the band he talks to the group
about specific things such as watching him while he conducts. When
he hears that certain areas of the band are out of tune Mr. Siegel
tells them to listen to their intonation and the students adjust.
There are also a couple of students that have bad posture while they
are playing so Mr. Siegel points them out and tells them that they
are better musicians than that and that all of the band should be
conscious of something as simple but important as posture while they
are playing. Mr. Siegel also makes a lot of eye contact with the
band while conducting so that the students are also watching him
while they are playing.
4. Mr. Siegel has a
very good presence over his band while rehearsing and because of this
his students make a lot of fixes when he tells them to. He teaches a
lot during his rehearsal too which I feel is important because the
students keep their focus because they are given information between
playing which is really affective at making the students listening.
I think that Mr. Siegel did a very good job disciplining his members
too when they were not doing what was expected of them. The
disciplining that he does helps the students to be more professional
while they are in rehearsal which means they will most likely treat
their concert with professionalism. Mr. Siegel also shows a lot of
confidence to the students while conducting and it is very obvious
that he knows what he is talking about with his students especially
when he tunes sections through rehearsal because he hears them go out
of tune. I found it useful when he would give the students direction
while conducting the piece because although they are focused on
playing the hear what he asks of them and does not have to stop
rehearsal in order to fix these minor issues. I also think that Mr.
Siegel made a good effort to compliment the band when ever possible
because it was visible that the students felt better about themselves
when he told them that were playing something right.
5. Do students
learn aural training in a situation such as band where they are
playing an instrument or do they have to be taught about intonation
in order to realize they are playing out of tune?
6. I feel that I
learned in this class that sometimes the best way to address issues
in the band setting is to be vocal while the group is playing. This
method keeps the students attention without slowing the pace of
rehearsal and has instant results with the students. It is obvious
that the students do get frustrated and sometimes restless when they
are constantly stopping and starting on a piece of music. High
School students have many different personalities and depending on
the day one particular student may be a completely different person
when it comes to doing work. The students do not always want to
focus on what is happening in the class room so by addressing them
while still playing the students are forced to focus because the
teacher is where their attention already is. I feel that
disciplining the students in front of the entire class really tends
to work very well because the students don't always like being
embarrassed in front of their peers and for some of their students
this is very embarrassing. At the same time there is a problem with
students who like to be the class clown type because they like the
attention that they get when they are called out and so in order to
fix this problem the teacher really has to be stern with them and
show them that they are not kidding.
Be the first to rate this post
- Currently 0/5 Stars.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
