The Flame: Teenage Years

2002 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joanne Haroutounian
Keyword(s):  
Elementary School ◽  
Musical Training ◽  
Talent Development ◽  
College Education ◽  
Music Students ◽  
Ivy League ◽  
Piano Students ◽  
Piano Lessons ◽  
Private Studio ◽  
Late Starters

Close to a dozen years have gone by and we find ourselves seated on folding chairs enjoying the final recital of a private studio of talented piano students. Each year there are a few new eager faces as the younger students deftly work through pieces that seem very complex for such little fingers to play so quickly. We notice the students who have been seasoned through training, now in those tenuous intermediate years. Their intense desire for precision shows maturing musical ideas, but often arrives at awkward adolescence when being on stage has an added gravity of meaning. We search for the advanced teenagers—those students we have seen truly blossom through the long process of talent development. Numbers have dwindled in this studio. One has decided to move out of state and is now studying at a conservatory. Another has decided to concentrate efforts on the oboe, begun in elementary school band, with time restraints easing piano lessons out of her schedule. Academic and parental pressures have caused last year’s shining star, a junior seeking an Ivy League college education, to quit as well. There remains one teenager who ends the program with a flourish, receiving many hugs from young admirers and awards galore following the program. This is our tiny, eager student from the front steps. A senior, having completed a full twelve years of instruction with many competitions and solo recitals under his belt, he bids farewell to this comfortable, nurturing studio. He enters college as a math major. Many private teachers, parents, and music students may recognize this scene as a very realistic portrayal of possibilities in musical talent development. The first years of training are “romance,” with parents aglow when hearing their talented youngster perform with such confidence and flair. The middle years consist of flux and flow, a phase when students search for the “whys” and “hows” beneath the notes that were so easily played in prior years. Musical training now presents persistent challenges. Late-starters may speed into these years with determination. Others may begin a second instrument or composition classes to broaden musical experiences.

Evaluating Large-Scale STEM Outreach Efficacy with a Consistent Theme: Thermodynamics for Elementary School Students

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph DeWilde ◽  
Esha Rangnekar ◽  
Jeffrey Ting ◽  
Joseph Franek ◽  
Frank S. Bates ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Elementary School ◽  
Learning Outcomes ◽  
Elementary School Students ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
College Education ◽  
School Students ◽  
Central Concept ◽  
Specific Goal ◽  
Survey System ◽  
Society Today

A biannual chemistry demonstration-based show named “Energy and U” was created to extend the general outreach themes of STEM fields and a college education with a specific goal: to teach the First Law of Thermodynamics to elementary school students. Energy is a central concept in chemical education, most STEM disciplines, and it is the concept at the foundation of many of the greatest challenges faced by society today. The effectiveness of the program was analyzed using a clicker survey system. This study provides one of the first examples of incorporating real-time feedback into large- scale chemistry-based outreach events for elementary school students in order to quantify and better understand the broader impact and learning outcomes.

Kindling the Spark

2002 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joanne Haroutounian
Keyword(s):  
Musical Training ◽  
Music Educators ◽  
Home School ◽  
Wide Audience ◽  
Specialized Schools ◽  
Additional Information ◽  
Teacher Researcher ◽  
Training And Research ◽  
Private Studio ◽  
Different Levels

Gathering perspectives of musical talent from the psychological, musical, and educational fields, Kindling the Spark is the only single sourcebook that defines musical talent and provides practical strategies for identifying and nurturing it. Joanne Haroutounian uses her experience as teacher, researcher, and parent to clarify central issues concerning talent recognition and development in a way that will easily appeal to a wide audience. The book describes the different stages of development in musical training, including guidelines for finding a suitable teacher at different levels, social and psychological aspects that impact musical training, and research on talent development by ages and stages from infancy and preschool years through the teen years. An important feature of the book are "sparkler exercises" designed to provoke observable talent behavior in home, school, and studio settings. The book also includes an Appendix of Resources which lists books, media, organizations, and specialized schools that offer additional information on musical talent, identification, and development. For music educators in both public school and private studio settings--as well as for parents and their musically inclined children--Kindling the Spark provides an invaluable summary of the research on talent and a wealth of resources for developing it.

Talent development in natural science in elementary school: A juxtaposition of research and practice

2021 ◽  
Vol 104 ◽  
pp. 103366
Author(s):  
Elena Mack ◽  
Moritz Breit ◽  
Mireille Krischler ◽  
Jessica Gnas ◽  
Franzis Preckel
Keyword(s):  
Elementary School ◽  
Natural Science ◽  
Talent Development ◽  
Research And Practice

Scelsi, Giacinto (1905–1988)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Drott
Keyword(s):  
Musical Training ◽  
Twelve Tone ◽  
Early Music ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Piano Lessons ◽  
The 1950S ◽  
To Come ◽  
The Way

Giacinto Scelsi was an Italian avant-garde composer best known for the single-note style he developed during the 1950s and 1960s, which minimizes harmonic and melodic activity in order to allow microtonal fluctuations and subtle transformations in timbre, intonation, dynamics, and articulation to come to the fore. Although his works were little known and infrequently performed during his lifetime, they gained considerable acclaim in the 1980s. Scelsi’s œuvre has proven extremely influential, and is generally regarded as a precursor to the spectral movement. Many of the elements of Scelsi’s biography remain uncertain, due in part to the composer’s penchant for self-mythologization. His family belonged to the southern Italian nobility, and it was in their ancestral chateau in Irpinie that Scelsi’s interest in music first manifested itself. He had little in the way of formal musical training, apart from receiving private piano lessons in his youth. Scelsi spent much of the 1920s and 1930s abroad, principally in France and Switzerland. It was during this period that he composed his first pieces, most notably Rotativa for pianos, strings, brass and percussion (1930). His early music was stylistically eclectic, embracing post-impressionist, neo-classical and twelve-tone idioms at various points in his life.

Talent development in Chinese and Swiss music students

2017 ◽  
Vol 36 (2) ◽  
pp. 230-243
Author(s):  
Suse Petersen
Keyword(s):  
Music Education ◽  
Talent Development ◽  
External Factors ◽  
Music Students ◽  
Childhood And Adolescence ◽  
Factors Affecting ◽  
Chinese Music ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Internal And External Factors

Musical talent development and the factors that influence it—such as family or peers—have been widely researched, especially in a Western setting. Despite the growing body of research in non-Western cultures and regions, there is still a lack of research comparing the factors and perceptions of musical talent development between Western and Asian settings. This interview study compared Swiss and Chinese music students’ ( N = 19) musical talent development and the factors influencing musical talent during childhood and adolescence, their professional aims, and their perception of internal and external factors affecting talent development. The students had similar opinions regarding the role of their teachers, the roles of internal and external factors in talent development, and their career goals. However, the students from China and Switzerland differed in their experiences of making and discussing music with peers, in the difficulties experienced during their music education, and in their relationship with their families. The results are a starting point for further comparative research on the perception and development of musical talent, and offer material for a mutual understanding of music students’ backgrounds in countries with differing music education traditions.

Color, shape, and sound: A proposed system of music notation

Semiotica ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 2015 (204) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mitchell Wong ◽  
Marcel Danesi
Keyword(s):  
Elementary School ◽  
Music Education ◽  
Music Performance ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Music Students ◽  
Music Notation ◽  
Music Literacy ◽  
Traditional System ◽  
School Music ◽  
Elementary School Music

AbstractThis article presents a system of music notation that uses a combination of colors and shapes to represent sound. This system may present advantages over the traditional system of music notation, as its symbols are inherently related to the musical information that they communicate. The present article explains the basic workings of the system. It then describes an ethnographic study in which the system was used to teach music literacy to a group of elementary school music students. It concludes with the implications that such a system might have in the spheres of music performance and music education.

Velopharyngeal Insufficiency in Woodwind and Brass Players

2004 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-25
Author(s):  
B Schwab ◽  
A Schultze-Florey
Keyword(s):  
Music Teachers ◽  
Medical Literature ◽  
Musical Training ◽  
Symphony Orchestra ◽  
Velopharyngeal Insufficiency ◽  
Music Students ◽  
Pressure Measurements ◽  
Brass Players ◽  
Mean Pressure ◽  
Intraoral Pressure

Velopharyngeal insufficiency (VPI) has received little attention in the medical literature. The aim of the present study was to determine the extent to which VPI constitutes a problem for woodwind and brass musicians. A total of 148 musicians (professionals from a symphony orchestra and students, the latter mainly from a national youth orchestra) were asked if they were aware of the phenomenon of VPI and whether they experienced it. Intraoral pressure measurements were performed to determine pressure peaks, mean pressure, and maximum attainable pressures. Of the 148 musicians, 81 were aware of the VPI disorder, and 24 of them showed symptoms of it themselves. Six of the affected musicians reported that VPI occurred in association with colds or stress or the playing of extremely high notes. One musician noted that it occurred only on return from vacation leave. Of the symptom-free musicians, 15% reported that they noticed symptoms of VPI during their musical training but that these gradually dissipated of their own accord. VPI in woodwind and brass instrumentalists is obviously more common than previously recognized. Despite reports in the medical literature that predominantly young musicians are affected, in our study only 47% of the individuals with symptoms were school pupils or music students (who overall constituted 41% of the study subjects). Oboists and clarinettists were the most frequently affected, perhaps because they develop relatively high mean pressures. Although VPI frequently occurs when woodwind and brass musicians are undergoing training and then regresses, it may persist, particularly in instrumentalists in whom high mean pressures form. To prevent persistent VPI, it seems advisable for music teachers to perform pressure measurements during instructional periods.

What makes practice perfect? How tertiary piano students self-regulate play and non-play strategies for performance success

2021 ◽  
pp. 030573562110109
Author(s):  
Akiho Suzuki ◽  
Helen F Mitchell
Keyword(s):  
Assessment Tool ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
Performance Evaluations ◽  
Music Students ◽  
Practice Session ◽  
Score Study ◽  
Self Reflection ◽  
Self Regulated Learning ◽  
Piano Students ◽  
Study Task

Self-regulated practice is critical to musicians’ development, but it is unclear what components of practice contribute to performance quality. This study aimed to explore tertiary music students’ practice using performance evaluations as indicators of practice efficacy. Five tertiary piano students prepared a quick study task of two pieces for a mock performance, in 2 hours over 2 days. An expert panel evaluated the mock performances and performers were ranked accordingly. Practice session recordings and interview transcripts were analysed according to the three phases of Self-Regulated Learning (forethought, performance, self-reflection) and linked to the pianists’ final performance evaluations. Successful pianists planned their practice and set interpretative goals, while their less successful peers practiced reactively without planning. The highest-ranked pianist’s self-regulation was facilitated by non-play practice which involved taking long pauses and using strategies such as score study, mark score, and listen to own recording. The lowest-ranked pianist failed to identify problems or self-evaluate effectively. Future studies should explore the use and content of non-play practice strategies, especially self-recording, to empower music students to develop and self-regulate their practice. The quick study task provided an effective practice assessment tool and could be used to diagnose and track practice approaches.

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