Tuesday Re-do

I was feeling a bit “poopy” earlier, but now I’m feeling a bit better.  So you can cancel all of your “cheer up” bouquets and boxes of chocolates you ordered for me…I’m cheered up enough for now Winking smile

I’ve got tomorrow morning off due to a field trip at the school, so I’m looking forward to sleeping in a bit and then doing my long run—10 miles on the docket.  My long run has migrated to the middle of the week, and will migrate back to the weekend next weekend.  But tomorrow shall be slow running for a great distance (all my running is slow actually…)

Hopefully it will stop raining by then…

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Looks pretty good, right?  Remember, Saturday is the 5 miler. (I haven’t raced since Phoenix RnR, so I’m pretty pumped, if you couldn’t tell.)

 

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I saw this on the internet and thought it was wonderful. 

Tonight’s dinner:  shrimp, couscous, broccoli.  Life is good.

Ugh, dreary day

It’s raining all day, and I’m tired of it.  I also got some news today (nothing serious) that makes me feel very dreary on the inside as well.  Sometimes the unfairness of life just really kicks you in the face (or stomach), you know?

On the bright side, the SLSO got a good review in the New York Times for their recent Carnegie Hall concert.  Though it’s a very short review, it’s still a positive one.

I picked up my race shirt for this weekend’s race, and was pleasantly surprised that is a tech shirt (made of special fabric to wick sweat away) AND that it came in a “ladies’ fit”.  It’s funny that the normal shirts are known as “adult” and then you can have a “women’s” or “ladies” fit, as if we aren’t actual adults.  Then again, with some of the politics you hear these days, women aren’t adults, and are treated as if they can’t make adult decisions.  I’m finding that I have to turn off the news more and more lately because it just makes me angry, and I don’t see a light at the end of the tunnel.

That said, the race should be great fun—5 miles with my friend Jen, wearing awesome outfits…

Things I love about teaching

When you realize that “pancake patrol” has finally succeeded in helping your students have straighter wrists…and they sound better!

When you realize that your pre-teen or teenage student needs someone to listen to them complain about their day or their asshole classmates as much as they need somebody to help them work on their shifts and double stops.

When your student gets that happy face when they finally “get” something tough or tricky.

When your students learn a new piece that they really love.

When you play an example for your students and they are blown away by how awesome the violin can really sound…

 

On a serious note, I lost one of my favorite students today—he was my first student here in St Louis, and now the family has decided not to continue.  I’m sad.  I absolutely loved teaching him, and his mom was awesome too. I will miss them!

On another serious note, does anybody else have the situation in which your adolescent students sometimes confide things in you that aren’t super serious, but yet you think maybe the parents should know?  One of my students seems to be having trouble getting along with classmates at school and there might be a little bit of bullying going on (him being bullied, perhaps)…I try to just chat it up with him and make him feel like a normal, good, decent person, and hopefully to help him realize that IT GETS BETTER but I don’t know if I should do more?  Basically he’s a bit nerdy and socially VERY awkward but has a great heart.  And I think some kids might be very mean to him at school and maybe pushing him around a bit?  Thoughts?  Suggestions? 

Opera this weekend!

Come see Winter Opera perform Cavalleria Rusticana this weekend at St. Ambrose Catholic Church.  Saturday, March 12 at 8 pm, Sunday, March 13 at 5 pm.  Tickets start at $20, and you get to see me play as concertmaster.

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We started rehearsals this afternoon.   The singers have been rehearsing longer, but for the orchestra, we’ve got today, Wednesday, and Thursday, and then we perform.  Crazy, huh?   In any case, the singers sound FANTASTIC as usual for this company and the orchestra is working hard. 

What else did I do this weekend? 

Saturday I had two weddings—one at a Catholic Church in Maplewood, one in the basement of Herbie’s (I love Herbie’s so much, though sadly didn’t get to eat Lobster Mac n Cheese this time).  The second one was great fun as we got to play over an hour of quartet music after the ceremony.  I also think I’ve figured out what song I want for my processional! (I’m not telling you.)

After the second wedding we walked across the street to Pi and had some wine, salad, and pizza.  Interesting thing we noticed there:  it seemed that all the bartenders looked approximately the same.  Weird, huh? 

Sunday was rehearsal, spinning class, and a 4 mile run outside—it was very sunny though pretty chilly.  20 miles so far this month.

Here comes another week of March—spring is SOOOOOOO close…..

Mark O’Connor Method

If you don’t know who Mark O’Connor is you can visit his website or his wikipedia page to learn a bit about him.  He is a fiddle player who has become a very successful “crossover” artist.  I performed with Mark O’Connor when he played his Fiddle Concerto with the Youngstown Symphony many years ago.

A couple of years ago Mark announced that he was coming out with a brand new method for teaching children.  This method would involve listening and would have ten volumes.  This method would be brand new and completely revolutionary.  This method would involve American music.

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Well, as a Suzuki teacher always looking to improve my teaching, the idea of a revolutionary method is exciting!  However…the Suzuki method already uses listening, has ten volumes, and (let’s not forget) was brand new and completely revolutionary, no matter how much people like to dump on it.  Before the Suzuki philosophy swept the United States there were not enough string players coming through school to fill our orchestras…nowadays there are so many good players auditioning for each spot in an orchestra that very few get a job.  The concept behind the Suzuki Method wasn’t to create professional musicians though—it was (and still is) to help children become better people.  To make the world a better place through music.  Or as Susan Kempter said the other day, to offer an alternative…

Okay, so where does that leave us?  A few weeks ago I learned that there was to be a teacher training seminar for the first two Mark O’Connor method books at Webster University.  The cost:  $100, which INCLUDED the two volumes with CD ($29.95 each, only sold at Shar).  What a fantastic deal!  I signed up immediately. (You know I love my teaching seminars).

Unfortunately I wasn’t able to meet Mark—he was in town on Wednesday and Thursday, but I wasn’t able to get to the workshop until the teacher training officially started on Friday night.  His assistant and editor Pamela Wiley was teaching the course. 

Did I have preconceived notions about the method?  Yes, I’m sorry to say.  I’m suspicious of people who seem to be out to make a buck at the expense of children, and selling the book at only Shar smells like buck-making to me.  Additionally I felt (in advance) that much of what Mark said about his method was insulting to the Suzuki method since that truly was a revolutionary method.  Group classes, listening to recordings repeatedly, parental involvement, very young children playing the violin, and teacher training…all of those fantastic ideas are FROM the Suzuki method (philosophy) and that in today’s music teaching take for granted as things that people do. 

I do have students that grow tired of the Suzuki repertoire.  Often these are students who aren’t progressing the way they should because they aren’t practicing or listening.  But perhaps they just aren’t inspired.  I also have students that do not use the Suzuki method (modified OR full-fledged).  For these students I am constantly looking for better ways to teach them.  THAT is why I jumped on this workshop!  Plus, did I mention it was only $100?

I showed up Friday night with a friend.  We checked in and received our books.  Class started, and it was pretty evident that the teacher was a disciple of Mark O’Connor.  She firmly believed in everything he was doing, which is good for a teacher of the method.  It was also pretty evident that this was not a method for beginning teachers to teach, but for those already pretty well versed in teaching…okay, fine, it’s brand new.  But subtle jabs towards Suzuki kept coming “This is SUCH a better way to teach low 2” or “ HERE is how you really play up-up bowing” or “This is much easier for children to learn than Allegretto.”  Okay…maybe I’m overly sensitive.  But again—let’s not pretend that Suzuki doesn’t make the method possible!  Without ALREADY trained Suzuki teachers teaching all over the US, there would be no real framework for the O’Connor Method to spread. 

Enough of the negative.  What’s good about it?  Well—it’s all American music.  Which is just fantastic for students to relate to.  None of those dead European composers (well, other than Dvorak?!).  Plus each piece or song has a little story about it’s history, which is really interesting and informative. 

But the cool part is:  the children are encouraging to start improvising RIGHT away.  Usually people are trained in a classical manner and then learn improvising, or perhaps start on the fiddle and learn to improvise but never really learn in a systematic way.  But with this method, perhaps kids can improvise in a variety of styles and play classically as well (I say perhaps because there are only two volumes so far, and nothing is proven.)  In just a few days, I myself have learned so much more about improvising and a variety of styles (olde tyme fiddle, blues, irish fiddle) than I have in my life.  I even feel I could teach my students to do this!  And if you start early, well, you won’t be so scared later in life.  Four year olds improvising!  Well, that is almost as exciting as thousands of children playing the same song together Winking smile.  Why is improvising important?  Well, creativity in music (as in life) is always an important skill.  Improvising is one part of creativity.

I doubt I will become a true Mark O’Connor method teacher like Pam Wiley, but I will certainly use the songs and ideas in my own teaching.  Another teacher told me the thing they liked best about the workshop was how Pam had really embraced these new ideas after teaching Suzuki for such a long time—she felt it meant that she would be able to keep growing and changing as a teacher throughout her life, and that you can teach an old dog new tricks. 

Suzuki teaching seminar

I am suffering from brain overload.  As usual after hearing Susan Kempter talk I have a thousand thoughts bouncing around in my head. 

I attended a teaching seminar at SIUE today—the topic was “What I learned since writing How Muscles Learn: Teaching the Violin with the Body in Mind”—and the speaker was Susan Kempter, my teacher from last summer in Kansas.  Her main focus in teaching is having students avoid tension altogether.  So many violinists (myself included) suffer from a variety of problems such as tendonitis and carpal tunnel syndrome, and many of these problems could be avoided by playing in a slightly different way.  It is harder to change when you get older, and much better to teach our students to avoid tension from the beginning. 

After the seminar we all ate dinner together and it was nice to catch up with a few old friends (shout out to Alicia Doudna!) and some new ones too.  The Suzuki world is a close knit world, and I’m glad to meet so many teachers who are both wonderful teachers and great people.

I’m still working on my review/thoughts of last week’s workshop about the Mark O’Connor method.  I’m purposely giving myself some time to think about it. 

I have decided to attend Ottawa again this June (I believe I mentioned that in a previous post.)  Even though I already have Book Five training, I know that Susan will talk about so many general violin related topics that I will learn more than I imagined, and that I will come home with a long bibliography (I have a short bibliography from today’s 2 1/2 hour workshop!) of books to read.  You know I love my books.

But really, I need to relax now—I’m missing the SIUE Suzuki Workshop this weekend due to a variety of gigs and rehearsals.  I’ve been putting a bunch of music together for tomorrow’s gigs, and Sunday is the opera.  I am looking forward to some quasi-spring-break time towards the end of the month. 

Today I went to a spinning class at my gym for the first time.   It was different than my regular class, but I imagine that each teacher brings their own style.  I enjoyed it, but it was a big challenge.  I decided to really push myself and run 3 miles on the treadmill afterwards (working towards that 93 miles in March goal!).  I felt pretty awesome after that, and used it as a good excuse to have two 7-layer bars with dinner. 

It’s storming outside…we have had our share of severe weather this week.  Hopefully tonight’s storms pass through somewhat uneventfully.

thoughts about violin, teaching, running, life.