On Mon, 12 Jun 2000, Lloyd W. Hanson wrote:
>
> I am afraid the same can be said for most music conservatories and
> schools of music. They all tend to be "bottom line" oriented.
> Product before process is their philosophy.
>
> We in institutional education need, above all, to guard ourselves
> from this "devils slide" into creating a product that can be
> purchased by a consumer student. Students are not consumers.
>
> Students are producers. No one in the business world treats
> consumers and producers as one and the same. Producers are never
> considered as those who buy a product but rather as creative
> individuals in whom process will develop into a product as a natural
> outcome of the very being of the individual. This is what education
> is supposed to be about. Anything else is merely training.
Dear Lloyd and Vocalist:
Beautifully written, Lloyd, and I do agree completely. It is indeed a
"devil's slide" or slippery slope. Maybe there is more pressure in a larger
school or music or conservatory to serve up a "finished product" for the
world to see. When I was a grad student at Indiana, it seemed like there
was an tremendous amount of focus put on slapping together those 5 arias and
starting the rounds of auditions. Never mind whether or not one could
actually sing, or sustain an entire role in an opera (as long as you can do
the arias, you can do the role, right?) knew the voice, or had a good grasp
of languages (just as long as the diction was good in the arias). And at a
school like that, there was ample evidence to confirm that this method got
results, because the "finished products" were getting lots of work both
inside the school of music and outside of it.
The attitude in liberal arts colleges seems to be somewhat different. I've
been teaching college in small, Midwestern liberal arts colleges for 7 years
now. Not a terribly long time, but long enough to build an impressive
collection of materials and stories from meetings, seminars, lunches,
de-briefings, workshops and coffee klatches, and to have served on numerous
task forces or panels convened for the purpose of discussing "teaching
improvement" or "effective teaching." These gatherings typically degenerate
into gripe sessions about how frustrating it is to drag Generation X (Y? Z?)
into the joys of process learning and critical thinking (and these
discussions have occurred both in music departments and across disciplines,
by the way). By far the biggest complaint that comes up is that many
students (and parents) view college not as an education, but as job
training. They want the product, with as much time for process as they feel
they can offer. Depending on the student, this can vary greatly. Some
students even clearly want the product without the process. This is the
type of student I worry about the most.
Trading stories with colleagues over the last 7 years has revealed that many
college faculty feel frustrated, anxious, and stressed about working with
students who insist on the product without the process. These same
colleagues can also be extremely creative and persistent in finding ways to
help students (and parents) truly understand the process, and not to view
their college education as a series of hoops to jump through for a grade.
To illustrate the product over process mentality: at Wesleyan we have a
series of Friday morning recitals throughout the semester. The faculty
views this recital as an environment in which a student can present a
work-in-progress, to test the waters before juries, NATS competitions,
auditions, or recitals. When I have a student on a Friday morning recital,
I want to see if the student is able to keep in place things that were
discussed in the lessons. Mistakes and flaws are to be expected; it's all a
part of the process, right? The performance is something that is done to
gather useful information. Sort of like a recital/scrimmage.
The students, however, largely view the Friday morning recital as a place to
present a finished product (although the term "finished" is debatable). As
you can imagine, the last 2-3 recitals of the semester are packed, with some
performances that are indeed polished and well-prepared and others that are
quite poorly prepared and rendered. The other Friday morning recitals
scattered throughout the semester are very brief, sometimes 2-3 students
performing a total of 10-15 minutes of music. Yet I gladly show up, sit
there and listen to them. I appreciate the students who understand the
philosophy behind these morning recitals. I admire the students who have
the guts to honor the process.
And what is this mad dash at the end of the semester really teaching
students? That they can get by with a limited work ethic, that they can
prepare as little and as late as possible and still get results, and that
mediocre=good. This year, one of my students confessed that he had
memorized his songs during his morning French class, which directly preceded
the recital. This was not what I had in mind when we discussed his Friday
recital date and the repertoire, oh those many weeks before. This was not
what I was trying to teach him when we discussed how to practice, efficient
use of practice time, semester goals, and memorization strategies.
Although I end up feeling like a broken record, I constantly stress the
values and rewards of the process. And I think that I do eventually get
through to most of my students, over four years of college.
To wrap it up, I'd like to mention one absolute revelation from my early
years of teaching: many of my students didn't know HOW to practice in the
first place. All my stumping on the benefits of the process didn't begin to
address their needs. Many students understand the need for consistent
practice and are perfectly willing to get into the practice room, but are
easily frustrated and discouraged when they get there. They simply don't
have the structures or the hierarchies already in place, but they respond
well to guidelines and structure once they're exposed to them. Some
students come to college from a rote-learning perspective and are shaken
when they have to actually practice outside of the lesson or rehearsal,
without supervision or tapes. For this type of student, process is great if
the teacher functions like the coach of an athletic team, being with them
all the time, constantly telling them what the next step is and functioning
as a motivator. This type of student absolutely loves the process but is
strangely at a loss to duplicate it without direct and constant supervision.
This type of student has a lot of catching up to do, to be able to work on
the college level. To deal with these problems, I was inspired to put
together a voice handbook for my students, along with giving lots of
presentations and workshops for voice students. The handbook was actually
inspired by my teacher and mentor at UT-Austin, Darlene Wiley, who figured
all this out long before I did and put together a practice manual for her
students. She is actually working on a WWW site that will be a resource for
beginning singers. Many colleagues along the way have helped contribute to
this voice handbook, which includes some articles I have written, along with
umpteen handouts from various workshops and sources. My students seem to
like it.
Thanks again for your post Lloyd!
Cheers!
Jana
--
Jana Holzmeier
Dept. of Music
Nebraska Wesleyan University
5000 Saint Paul Ave.
Lincoln, NE 68504
jjh@n...
402-465-2284
Visit the Music Department website at http://music.nebrwesleyan.edu/
"If you ever teach a yodeling class, probably the hardest thing is to keep
the students from just trying to yodel right off. You see, we BUILD to
that."
--"Deep Thoughts by Jack Handy"
"Did you ever consider how ridiculous it would be to try to cram on a
farm--to forget to plant in the spring, relax all summer and then cram in
the fall to bring in the harvest? The farm is a natural system. The price
must be paid and the process followed. You always reap what you sow; there
is no shortcut."
--Steven Covey, "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People"
"Well my dear, Exuberance is no substitute for Competence."
--"Author Unknown," this quote showed up on my door one day all drawn out in
flowery calligraphy and I vaguely suspect it was one of my students quoting
me (although I don't recall ever saying this).
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