Why we teach music

WHY WE TEACH MUSIC

 

MUSIC IS A SCIENCE.  It is exact, specific, highly organized and must be 100% correct.  It embodies many levels of physics from acoustics to architecture.

 

MUSIC IS MATHEMATICS.  It is rhythmically based on the subdivision of time in space into fractions, which must be done instantaneously, and not worked out on paper, in a highly specific form with regard to exact placement and symmetry.  It is disciplined and logical.

 

MUSIC IS LANGUAGE.  It is composed of phrases, thoughts and ideas.  Its goal is to communicate and to reach a part of us where words no longer suffice.  Most of the terms are in a foreign language, mostly Italian, German or French.  The line notation is certainly NOT English, but a highly developed and organized symbolic system.

 

MUSIC IS HISTORY.  It is the only art form we can hear as people hundreds of years ago heard.  Unlike paint, whose image is always there once created, music is perpetually "repainted" each time it is performed.  The feelings and thoughts of countless generations are forever cast into sound.

 

MUSIC IS PHYSICAL EDUCATION.  It required fantastic coordination of fingers, eyes, hands, lips, cheek and facial muscles, in addition to extraordinary control of the diaphragmatic, back, stomach and chest muscles.  There are as many calories burned by a symphony trumpet player in one performance as there are by a quarterback in a professional football game.

 

MUSIC IS ALL OF THESE THINGS AND MORE, BUT ABOVE ALL, MUSIC IS AN ART.  It allows a human being to take science and technique and create EMOTION.  This is the one thing that science cannot duplicate – human feelings and emotions.

 

THIS IS WHY WE TEACH MUSIC.  Not because we expect to produce music majors.  Not because we expect people to play all their lives.  Not so you can relax.  Not so you can trot around a field in a uniform……

 

BUT SO YOU WILL BE MORE HUMAN.  So you will recognize beauty.  So you will be more sensitive, especially to all the thoughts and feelings put into sound throughout the ages.  So you will have something to cling to.  So you will feel the beauty of being alive.  And so you will come to know the value of your own self.

                                                                                    (author unknown)

 

--
Joyce Keil

Artistic Director

Ragazzi Boys Chorus

Re: Singing benefits

In a study funded by Chorus America, the following was found to be true:

The 2009 study included a new component that explicitly examined the effects choral singing has on childhood development. The results show children who sing in choirs display many of the enhanced social skills found in adult singers, substantiating earlier conclusions that singing in childhood is likely to have an enormous influence on the choices individuals make later in life. Additionally, both parents and educators attribute a significant proportion of a child's academic success to singing in a choir.

Children who sing in choruses have academic success and valuable life skills.

Several of the study's major findings (A study funded by the National Endowment for the Arts) for young singers include:

• There are approximately 10.1 million American children singing in choruses today.
• The majority of parents surveyed believe multiple skills increased after their child joined a chorus. Seventy-one percent say their child has become more self-confident, 70% say their child's self-discipline has improved, and 69% state their child's memory skills have improved.
• More than 80% of educators surveyed—across multiple academic disciplines—agree with parent assessments that choir participation can enhance numerous aspects of a child's social development and academic success. Educators also observe that children who sing are better participants in group activities, have better emotional expression, and exhibit better emotional management.
• Ninety percent of educators believe singing in a choir can keep some students engaged in school who might otherwise be lost—this is particularly true of educators (94%) who describe the ethnicity of their schools as diverse.
• Children who participate in a chorus get significantly better grades than children who have never sung in a choir. Forty-five percent of parents whose children sing state their child receives "all or mostly A's" in mathematics (vs. 38% of non-choir parents) and 54% get "all or mostly A's" in English and other language arts classes (vs. 43%).

--
Joyce Keil

Artistic Director

Ragazzi Boys Chorus

--
Joyce Keil

Artistic Director

Ragazzi Boys Chorus

Singing benefits

In a study funded by Chorus America, the following was found to be true:

The 2009 study included a new component that explicitly examined the effects choral singing has on childhood development. The results show children who sing in choirs display many of the enhanced social skills found in adult singers, substantiating earlier conclusions that singing in childhood is likely to have an enormous influence on the choices individuals make later in life. Additionally, both parents and educators attribute a significant proportion of a child's academic success to singing in a choir.

Children who sing in choruses have academic success and valuable life skills.

Several of the study's major findings (A study funded by the National Endowment for the Arts) for young singers include:

• There are approximately 10.1 million American children singing in choruses today.
• The majority of parents surveyed believe multiple skills increased after their child joined a chorus. Seventy-one percent say their child has become more self-confident, 70% say their child's self-discipline has improved, and 69% state their child's memory skills have improved.
• More than 80% of educators surveyed—across multiple academic disciplines—agree with parent assessments that choir participation can enhance numerous aspects of a child's social development and academic success. Educators also observe that children who sing are better participants in group activities, have better emotional expression, and exhibit better emotional management.
• Ninety percent of educators believe singing in a choir can keep some students engaged in school who might otherwise be lost—this is particularly true of educators (94%) who describe the ethnicity of their schools as diverse.
• Children who participate in a chorus get significantly better grades than children who have never sung in a choir. Forty-five percent of parents whose children sing state their child receives "all or mostly A's" in mathematics (vs. 38% of non-choir parents) and 54% get "all or mostly A's" in English and other language arts classes (vs. 43%).

--
Joyce Keil

Artistic Director

Ragazzi Boys Chorus

Pescar Camaron

Listen to Pescar Camaron here!

Sine Nomine rehearses in Cuba

 

Here is a short story about one of the choirs I heard during my trip to Cuba in January 2010. We entered a courtyard of the Museum Alejandro von Humboot. Two huge, perfectly preserved skeletons of dinosaurs, donated by Mexico in 2007, filled the yard. I heard some powerful, rich falsetto singing coming from upstairs. We were ushered up to the rehearsal of Sine Nomine, an eleven-voice professional all-male choir. Their conductor was Leonara Suarez and they were perfecting a program which the conductor wanted them to perform without her. The first piece was a beautiful Renaissance piece by Victoria with perfect 5ths that rang and with crescendos and phrasing that astonished. They sang the famous French chanson “Il est bel et bon bon” by Passereau and then a Hassler piece with strong clashing harmonies, incredible crescendos. It was in five parts, SSATB, and as they sang with long breathed phrases, they leaned into the dissonance before releasing it. They took it very slowly. The text is about how the singer has suffered (loving you) and it has cost him his life. The conductor corrects them: more feeling, more intimacy. I was in tears hearing the beauty of their singing. They gave me this piece.

 

They then sang a heart-wrenching “Danny Boy” and a great medley of Beatles and Queen music. All the rehearsing was done by memory by both singers and conductor.  The conductor told me that they start each concert with musica antica and then sing all styles. She says “they sound like an SATB choir.” All rehearsing is done by memory, but I was hearing them right before a concert the following week. Expressive extremes. They breathed deeply through the nose.

 

Their English is better than ours because all the vowels are formed consciously and beautifully. They sang so beautifully, but their rehearsal room was divided only by wooden slats which did not protect them from the street noises, including loud honking horns. Somehow they were able to keep their focus. Each time they sang, it was full of feeling.

 

 

 

Joyce Keil, Artistic Director

Ragazzi Boys Chorus

Carol (Bells Pieces)

Works best in Explorer:

Teamwork, Self-Reliance and Happiness

I have been reflecting on how Ragazzi contributes to the health and happiness of our boys and how this helps our society. I see Ragazzi building teamwork among our members and I see the boys responding with joy to music.

This summer it was my good fortune to immerse myself in the study of early American cultures. As we studied the ancient Native American cultures and then the world of the early Western pioneers, I was struck by a new insight.  We have always, in our society, cherished the concept of self reliance but when we look at the reality of those early times we see the huge role that is played by community. People got together to build barns, to put up vegetables and fruit, to plow the fields, to educate their children. What was truly important was the way these early people worked together.

I also read in the New Yorker a fascinating article about happiness, healing and the role of the body. Starting with Norman Cousins, who in the 80’s wrote famously about beating disease by watching comedies, there has been increasing interest in how physical manifestations of happiness (laughter, smiling, up-beat movement) cause internal changes in the body. I saw this Wednesday night in our first rehearsal of the new season. When we took out a bouncy, happy song, the boys began to move rhythmically as they smiled broadly to the music. Music not only expresses feelings, it can also create feelings and as the research is beginning to show, good feelings have a salutary effect on our body.

 So as we educate our boys, we celebrate the power of teamwork and community in raising responsible, self-reliant citizens. We celebrate the joy of making music in community and the healing benefits of happiness.

 

Joyce Keil, Artistic Director

Ragazzi Boys Chorus