WSJ: How else do you get your people to be creative?

Mr. Buckley: Everybody wants to find out how to can creativity. You can’t. Creativity comes from freedom, not control. We let all the people in the R&D community spend 15% of their time researching whatever they like.

Now, I have heard of several companies allowing their employees to spend a small percentage of their time researching their own interests with remarkable results (Google for one).  It only makes sense that people are most excited about projects that interest them and in which they have vested interests.

How does that relate to the world of music teaching?

Well, I wonder what would happen if we as teachers allowed our students to spend a certain percentage of their practice time and their music selection on music that they love and pick themselves?  Several years ago, I had a 9th grader who was talented but was just about to quit piano his mother told me.  We worked out a deal where he could chose up yo 50% of his pieces for that year and I would choose the remaining 50%.  He could spend half of his time on music he loved as long as he spent half of his time on the music I assigned.  This was the only way we got through that year, but I’m so excited to say that he is now a senior and has developed into quite the musician!  He continues to study music that he loves, but it is often music that I have picked now that his tastes have developed.  We spent a good deal of time in his 9th and 1oth grade years on Broadway music, church music, holiday music, etc., but it was well worth it as his love of music just grew by leaps and bounds.

I wonder how this could relate and encourage more innovation in the composing/publishing world as well?

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In my reading of Aaron Copland’s Music and Imagination, part of the Charles Eliot Norton lecture series from Harvard, I found an interesting passage about Frederick Chopin.  It seems Chopin’s friends tried over and over again to get him to broaden his portfolio by writing for other instruments and groupings.  From a letter to one of his friends, we can hear his thoughts on the matter:

I know my limitations, and I know I would make a fool of myself if I tried to climb too high without having the ability to do it.  They plague me to death, urging me to write symphonies and operas, and they want me to be everything in one, a Polish Rossinni and a Mozart and a Beethoven.  But, I just laugh under my breath and think to myself that one must start from small things.  Im only a pianist, and if I’m worth anything this is good too…I think it’s better to do only a little but to do that as well as possible, rather than try to do all things and do them poorly. 

Should you need a bit more encouragement in this area, here is the little adage from the What Matter Now series that made me think of that great Chopin quote.

Lesson #1 Passion (page 51)
Lesson #2 Knowing (page 78)
Lesson #3 Change (page 50)
Lesson #4 Connected  (Page 12)
Lesson #5 Productivity (Page 68)
Lesson #6 Strengths (Page 22)

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You can buy this piece of sheet music from any of the online music dealers, your local music store, or directly from Hal Leonard.  See a “Closer Look” at the music and hear an audio sample on the Hal Leonard site.

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I remember when I was a student and my teacher showed me the circle…it didn’t make much sense to me at the time, so I just disregarded it.  However, when several of my students recently told me that they’ve been using my scale order technique to remember key signatures for their theory test , I figured the Circle of Fifths was doing more good than I thought. 

I’ve recently found several good theory worksheets for teaching the Circle of Fifths and for giving students the opportunity to draw the corresponding key signatures around the circle.

Worksheet for identifying the key by the number of sharps and flats.  (Susan Paradis’ site)

Worksheet for identifying the key by the key signature AND drawing in the key signature

Bass Clef Circle of 5ths (delineates sharp keys, flat keys, and enharmonic keys)

Treble Clef Circle of 5ths (delineates sharp keys, flat keys, and enharmonic keys)

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Lesson #1 Passion (page 51)
Lesson #2 Knowing (page 78)
Lesson #3 Change (page 50)
Lesson #4 Connected  (Page 12)
Lesson #5 Productivity (Page 68)

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It is such a privilege to live in 2010 where email and the internet makes connecting with a composer very easy.  I hope all students take the time to connect with the composer of a piece that they love. I know that composers are thrilled to be contacted about their pieces.

What a honor it is to have your piece loved by a student.  Thanks for sending this!

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When I was reading Music and Imagination by Aaron Copland, I noticed he tackled this question as well.  On the subject of what a listener understands when listening to music, he writes,

Were you absorbed?  Was your attention held? That, then, was it; for what you heard were patterns of sounds that represent the central core of the composer’s being–or that aspect of it reflected in the particular work in question.  One part of everything he is and knows is implicit in each composer’s single work, and it is that central fact of his being that he hopes he has communicated.

Copland then goes on to tackle the deeper question:

Are you a better person for having heard a great work of art?  Are you morally a better person, I mean?  In the largest sense, I suppose you are, but in the more immediate sense, I doubt it.  I doubt it because I have never seen it demonstrated.  What happens is that a masterwork awakens in us reactions of a spiritual order that are already in us, only waiting to be aroused.  When Beethoven’s music exhorts us to ‘be noble,’ ‘be compassionate,’ ‘ be strong,’ he awakens moral ideas that are already within us.  His music cannot persuade; it makes evident.  It does not shape conduct: it is itself the exemplification of a particular way of looking at life.  A concert is not a sermon.  It is a performance–a reincarnation of a series of ideas implicit in the work of art.

I feel I must let his words speak for themselves.  I hope this gives you something to think on this week.

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*  Toilet Paper Dynamics: Jason Sifford, a composer and piano teacher has written a great post that encourages further exploration on the topic of dynamic playing which Mary Jane Cope has written about here: Encouraging Dynamic Playing.  Here’s an excerpt from his post:

I think it’s important to realize that dynamics are not volume indications, and they’re not about contrast.  They’re about character.  Forte means more than just turning the volume knob up to 8, it implies some kind of feeling or emotion.  If we look “forte” up in an Italian dictionary, we find words like “strong,” “heavy,” and “large.”  If we look up “piano,” we find words like “carefully,” and “smooth.”

*  The February issue of the MTNA ejournal is now available.  Articles include:
“The Musicians Guide to the Brain:  How to Use Brain Science in the Study of Music”
“A Study in the Relationship Between Selected Characteristics of Private Music Students and Success in Private Music Lessons: Implications for Private Music Teachers”
“Discovering the Thumb:  Empowering the Hand’s Moveable Flying Buttress”

*  Joy, from Color in My Piano, has posted a free printable game, Adventures in Music which can be adapted for any kind of music curriculum you use.

*  The February issue of the Piano Explorer had a great article about Debussy and some of his music.  The online resource page for this issue has some good information and performance links for the pieces mentioned in the article.

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