Those who had the honor of meeting or studying with Leonard Bernstein (1918-90) will never forget his passion and his dedication to teaching. He communicated through physical expression, enthusiasm, and a gift for making the most complex musical topics easy to understand. Thirty years have passed since the end of his Young People's Concerts with…

In this article, the author profiles her son Nathan Watt, a 14-year-old who was born with Spina Bifida, who does not allow setbacks to keep him from achieving his goals and dreams in the areas of writing, recording, and performing his own music. He has also opened a business website and turned his story, "Anything is Possible," into a color story…

Partnerships between established music performing organizations and public schools are becoming more widely used and are gaining recognition as an effective means of increasing exposure to music for underfunded public school music programs. However, as financial shortages deepen in public school, and there is an increased emphasis on testing,…

Music teachers are often influenced by pedagogical practices in the collegiate ensembles in which they performed. Opportunities to participate in collegiate world music ensembles have increased in recent decades; West African ensembles and steel bands represent the second and third most common of these in the United States. The absence of…

This book is a nuts-and-bolts manual for teachers of middle and high school performance-based classes such as band, orchestra, and chorus. This practical "how-to" guide shows teachers--pre-serviced or experienced--efficient ways to manage large performance-based classrooms. With wit and sage tried-and-true advice, Haugland provides a complete…

Written by a team of creative and highly qualified music therapists, this publication provides content training for the use of group percussion strategies with mature adults. In fact, the book promotes senior peers as group facilitators and/or coleaders. The grace of this approach is that no previous musical training is necessary in order to…

Three experiments investigated whether musical memory was context dependent. Instrumental musicians memorized music in one context and recalled in either the same or a different context. Contexts included atypical performing environments (Experiment 1: lobby/conference room) or commonly encountered environments (Experiment 2: practice room,…

The work the author has done with children with special needs in the music field has been heavily influenced by a number of eminent music therapists. She says this work has also been the most enjoyable and often the most exciting of all her experiences as an educationist. She started off as a classroom teacher and at that stage had no aspirations…

Twelve professional, non-classical musicians were interviewed about the impact of internal and external factors on their development as musicians. The data were qualitatively analyzed, and observations concerning psychological characteristics of developing excellence (PCDEs), social and environmental influences are reported. The insights of the…

This article reports a project designed to foster first-year music students' academic study skills and to investigate their expectations and experiences of starting at university. Data gathered through questionnaires, diaries and in-class tasks reveal the change in learning strategies and musical identity the students experience in their first…

The pragmatic use of nicknames as clarifiers separates the Maltese usage from those so common throughout the world where the nickname is used as a means of hiding identity. The familial character of most nicknames in Malta suggests they are the vestiges of a pre-Christian naming system. The major peculiarity in Malta is in the intermingling of…

Both musicians and nonmusicians identified correctly the examples of decreased pitch levels significantly more than pitch increase examples. However, tempo increase examples were identified more accurately than tempo decreases by each group. (Author/RM)

This study investigated the relationship of tonal pattern to tonal concept development and performance achievement of beginning instrumentalists. Tonal concept development was compared with technical skill development. Results indicate that tonal concept development improved the melodic sight-reading skills more successfully than the traditional…

A very successful artist-in-education program in which jazz musicians introduced elementary students in Augusta (Georgia) to jazz music is described. Students were involved in many activities, including instrumental improvisation, singing, reading staff notation, choreography, and composing jazz. (RM)

This article was written for those who believed that commissioning music for the high school band was an impossible dream. Author described two successful high school commissioning programs, their benefits for the students involved, and how to approach a composer to seek a new work. (Editor/RK)