Secondary Music Teaching
I was asked to take over the Kent County High School music program during the summer of 2023 after the long time director retired. I was fortunate to inherit a well-established music program with a strong student leadership team as well as a great deal of parent support. I currently teach one curricular section of band, which is the content area that I will cover here.
Since I began, I have worked to modernize some of our instruction delivery as well as resource management. Students now have access to MakeMusic, which we use for individual practice and skill building. We are in the process of digitizing our catalog of music, some of which they are now able to access through Chromebook tablets.
My primary goal is to provide students with a consistently excellent musical experience that will grow them both as musicians and as people as they prepare for life after high school.
Case Study – Concert Band – “Among the Clouds” by Brian Balmages
December 13, 2024
At our December concert, we performed “Among the Clouds” by Brian Balmages. This is a grade 3 piece. Rehearsals consisted of daily practice with 14 members of the band who were enrolled in band class and six weekly rehearsals with the full ensemble including those who were not able to take band class.
Overall, I was pleased with their performance. This was our first concert together and the students were very receptive to my new leadership. The dynamic variation was good and the clarinet and trumpet sections really shined. (Two of the trumpet players double on french horn to cover solos)
You can hear in this recording that we struggled with intonation in some places. Tempo was not as consistent as it should have been and the low voices are sometimes not clear.
March 12, 2024
“Among the Clouds” was included in this year’s list of pieces eligible for adjudication at District Band Festival.
In January, we began rehearsing to improve and correct the problems we had during the December performance. Both through the piece and through technical practice we worked on intonation and tempo. I spent extra time working with flutes in particular as well as working with lower voices to help their parts become more clear.
We performed the piece as one of three at the District Band Festival in March. Our overall rating was “Superior” which in Maryland is the highest level. This made our performance eligible to proceed to the State Band Festival on April 30.
Among The Clouds
