Band & Athletics - More Alike Than Different
Recently, I have really been struggling with my 8th grade band. Almost to the point of throwing in the towel. I’ve thought many times that I should stop caring so much about a correct process and way of doing “band” and let them do what they want. Just let them play through things and they’ll remain mediocre. I’ll weed out the kids that don’t want to be there IF they make it to high school band and fix them at that point. And then I slap myself and remember that I have higher standards of myself as a musician and as an educator. It’s my job to teach these kids how to band, and I will die on this hill if I need to. I chose this battle, and I will see it through to the end.
Driving home today from school, I thought about the many ways to talk about and teach these students about what we do in band and why it’s important to be able to do all of it, not just the “playing it through" part. What will the kids resonate with the most? How do I make what I am expecting them to do in band relevant or relatable?
Sports. Most of the kids in my band participate in some sort of athletics. If I had to compare a band rehearsal to anything else, it’s closest comparison is an athletic practice. I tried to compare to science classes or english classes, but I always ended back at sports.
Band - Warm-Ups vs. Sports - Stretching
In band we warm-up with long tones, scales, chorales, technique drills, articulation exercises etc. We do these every rehearsal with a specific intent; get blood flowing, get fingers moving, get brains engaged. In sports we stretch and condition with a similar intent: get blood flowing, get bodies moving, get brains engaged. Both band and sports do this to begin (and sometimes end) a rehearsal/performance and practice/game.
Band - Rehearsing/Breaking things down vs. Sports - Drills and Running Plays
In band we have to stop and fix things. We isolate pitch, rhythm, interval, and phrase etc. We pick apart single measures and lines. We start and stop, and repeat, and slow down. We do things over and over again to build muscle memory and train our ears. We do this to make sure we are able to perform all aspects of a concert. In sports you practice free throws, lay ups, field goals, dribbling, blocks and tackles, serves and spikes, curveballs and infielding. You isolate specific parts of your game and make them better, so you are sure when that specific skill is needed in a game, you are ready.
Band - Performances vs. Sports - Games
Both are culminations of practice. Both are the results of the isolation of skills and targeted, specific practice. Basketball team full court pressed the second half of the game? Bet you run drills to beat the press next practice. Struggled to hear the low brass and low reeds at your concert? Bet you play chorales and balance builders at your next rehearsal.
Non-sports Analogy
Say I’m an 8th grade math teacher. I give my students a test; the test has some simple addition problems, a couple of long division problems, some fraction multiplication, quadratic formula equations, polynomial and rational functions, and linear and non-linear regression. Some of the concepts on the test my students have mastered, while others have not. The students hand their tests in and return the next day. I give them the same test the next day. Over and over again I do this. Now, some kids are smart. Some kids go home and look up sample problems of questions they didn’t understand. Those kids may come back the next day and do slightly better on the test. Many students will not. Some are not even aware they do not know or that they answered questions incorrectly. This is what band would be like if we didn’t rehearse. If we start at the beginning and just play to the end. Most do not know they are playing something incorrectly. If we can’t stop to fix, break down, and isolate, we might as well play the same music every concert, every year at a beginning band level.
I probably won’t talk about this with my 8th graders. They’d probably find some loop hole somewhere about the 17th moon of Jupiter being aligned with Mars and in the path of a comet speeding toward Earth and how those circumstances prevent them from being capable of rehearsing. Or it’s after lunch and the vending machine stole their rice crispy treat so they don’t have the emotional capacity to sit in a chair and listen for more than a nanosecond.
Happy rehearsing.
Steph Williamson
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