Five Ways to Get From Noodling to Live Performance
I never, ever thought I’d play in a band. Or perform on stage for anyone. I never thought my time spent musing alone would extend past the four walls of my bedroom.
In the long run, maybe that’s what helped make it all happen.
I got my first guitar, a six-string acoustic, when I was a freshman in college. A few months beforehand, I’d seen a songwriter on TV, accompanying himself on guitar as he performed a Beatles song on the anniversary of John Lennon’s death. I watched as thousands in the audience were enraptured. “I need to learn how to do that,” I thought.
It wasn’t so much the act of performing live that drove my interest. Rather, I wanted to understand the instrument. I wanted to know what it was like to pluck an E-string and to have the sound ring out.
When I got that first axe, I honestly didn’t want to sign up for any lessons. I didn’t want to do anything but noodle away at my own pace, whenever and however I chose. I picked that guitar up and put it down some 50 times a day. If it had been a dumbbell I would have slowly turned my arms to Arnold Schwarzenegger’s.
Somehow, I ended up playing in numerous bands, recording dozens of songs in prestigious studios and opening for prominent, Grammy-winning acts on big stages. I swear, I never thought this would happen. But if I think about it, I know how it did.
Based on my personal experience, here are five tips for getting from noodling to performing. With these in the back of your mind, you too may end up becoming a musician … whether you wanted to or not.
1. Play Often
Yes, practice can be painstaking and arduous. And while it’s necessary at times, what’s more important is for you to keep your spirit up and your appreciation of music intact. If your practicing is breaking the will to move forward, something is wrong. Put down the intricate sheet music and learn a favorite TV theme song instead, or vice versa. Playing often is the key to improvement, but enjoying it is the key to playing often.
And what you play doesn’t have to be strenuous. For guitar players, it can just be putting your fingers on the frets and moving them around. To use a fitness analogy that a wrestler friend once told me, “All that matters is that you go to the gym. Once you’re there, whatever happens is fine.” Just go, then decide if you’re tired.
2. Be Silly
The best musicians in the world like to goof off, whether backstage, during rehearsal or even in the middle of a performance. So let yourself do it, too. Nothing should be totally serious. Stress can easily become your foe.
Musicians can often find new tricks or sonic phrases — even discover an otherwise unimagined spark — when just goofing off. Offering yourself the chance to literally “play” and take the pressure off is important. We can learn as much about our craft when we’re smiling as when our brow is furrowed.
3. Focus (Sometimes)
While enjoyment is paramount, when you’re feeling particularly studious, make sure to spend time on the basics. Mastering scales and key signatures, along with learning how to read tabs and sheet music, can lead to more options for you whether or not you decide to get together and play with others. Music is like any language; to be able to “speak” it, you need to learn some of the rules. There’s no need to overload yourself, but gaining a solid grounding in basic musical principles can go a long way.
4. Follow Your Curiosity
Along the way, if you feel a desire to play with other people — whether in a loose jam session or in front of a live audience — do it. Your curiosity and creative instincts will determine your level of investment in music, as well as your point of view in the art form. But remember: Just because you play on stage once doesn’t mean you have to repeat the experience if you dislike it. Similarly, just because you jam with someone, doesn’t mean you’re now in a band. Your time is just that: yours. Find the best environment for you.
5. Listen
Your ear will teach you a great deal. Listen to the other musicians you play with; listen to yourself as you noodle absentmindedly. But most of all, listen to your heart the whole way through.
An LEA might also address the needs of students arising from the COVID-19 pandemic by using ESSER and GEER funds to implement or expand arts programs, 
Developing and implementing procedures and systems to improve the preparedness and response efforts of LEAs.
Schaffer and the art teacher now start the recruiting process by visiting 5th grade classes together. “[The art teacher] takes a couple examples of artwork, and I do a quick breakdown on [the process of band].”
In his first couple of years at his previous position at 
As they return to “normal,” students may be dealing with grief over lost loved ones and worries about feeling safe. On top of that, they have the evergreen stressors, such as going through puberty, concerns over their appearance or being bullied. Parents are likely feeling anxious, too, with their own worries about employment, physical safety and learning losses for their children.
Road Trip!
After the initial draft was completed, it was clear that one week was not going to be enough time, so I expanded the summer program to two weeks. To help with the next phase of planning, I hired Temple’s music studies coordinator 
July 2018: After about a year and a half of planning, we arrived at our first program in July 2018. We had 18 students in attendance. About half were from out of town and lived in the Temple dorms, and the rest of the students commuted to and from campus each day. Within the first day, our students formed a strong bond, and the mutual support that they provided one another was beautiful to witness.
We had no idea how many applications we would get, so we changed our financial model to pay our instructors a variable rate per student rather than provide them with a base stipend. This made it simple for us to scale the program as needed. By the time July rolled around, we were surprised and thrilled to welcome 50 students (a three-fold increase from previous years) tuning in from all across the United States, Canada, Asia and Australia.
Our 2021 program, which will take place virtually in July, will feature returning instructors 
The school year began with band camp, and I hit the ground running by getting to know the students and community members. At the conclusion of the fall semester, the boosters had raised their concession stand money for the year, but we still needed more money. Going around our small town, I met many people who wanted to support the band. I spoke with my administration about launching a fundraising capital campaign to donate for new uniforms. I decided to send 
The first year of the grant offered $16,000, 20% of which had to go to professional development. With these funds, I planned to repair all school instruments, so they could be used, and purchase some new instruments to start a supply to offer students. With grand funds in the subsequent years, I would add to the collection of instruments.
Next school year, the marching band will be back up and running at full capacity with a new show called “Royals of Rock.” We will chronicle a performer’s journey to become a rock legend by learning from the masters like 
Anecdotally, I don’t think they are. In my experience and discussions with teachers in these areas, I think a few other elements are in place. Suburban schools may have lower instances of mobility and chronic absenteeism than a low-income area school. Less movement means that more suburban students go through an entire school system from kindergarten through high school compared to their low-income area counterparts. Wealthier students are also in the classroom more.
We can give students the skills to practice if they want to or have the time to practice. Explain your practice techniques and goals during a class. If your students haven’t heard you play, perform for them. I’m happy to say that I’ve had a resurgence in playing my instrument in recent years. I use it almost daily in class for a demonstration or to sit in the band when a student conducts.
When I first started this approach, I noticed a decline in participation in solo and ensemble contests. Participation in our district and state music education conferences remained the same, but we also had few students qualify for this over the past 20 years. However, our group performances increased in both quality and quantity. State festival invitations started coming in. College bands began inviting us to perform on stage with them, and we were even accepted into two national-level performances.
To address the halftime entertainment dilemma, I went with a Super Bowl™-style halftime show that featured our rock bands. This effort entailed procuring custom-made equipment carts to mobilize all the gear. The following year, we started performing at halftime with our rock/country/pop bands. Because the program was steadily growing, and the students were so excited to perform, we also built a wooden stage outside the stadium for tailgate concerts before the games. Today our football game atmosphere reflects a school-wide festival with pregame concerts, barbecues as well as cheerleader and dance team performances.
The new focus of the music program has transformed the campus with music becoming a part of everyday school life. The music room was reconfigured to be more student-centric. Instead of walking in and seeing rows of chairs, the room is set up like a live music studio with all the equipment hooked up and ready to provide an atmosphere where students can walk in and begin playing. Seating is set up in a circular fashion where everyone can look at each other and efficiently communicate during rehearsals and easily walk between stations. The idea is that everyone’s part is just as important as the other, and for music to come alive, everyone needs to do their part.
Music students also host “Music-On-The-Deck,” an open-mic performance on the outdoor stage during lunchtime on Fridays during which anyone on campus may perform. Students bring blankets and picnic while listening to their peers play and sing.
Located in metropolitan Atlanta, the 
For instrumental music, we provided band and orchestra instruments for programs with the greatest need. The school district provides funding yearly for larger and more costly instruments and equipment, including low-brass instruments, double reeds, low saxophones, percussion, cellos and basses. Other instruments like violins, violas, flutes, clarinets, trumpets and alto saxophones are usually provided by the students themselves
It all started when a group of students approached me to ask if they could use the choir room for what would eventually become the afterschool Musician’s Club. In the process of agreement, I became the sponsor of this fledgling group of garage band musicians. Each Thursday, we met for an hour after school. These students were passionate about the music industry.
Subsequently, I invited 
Music business education is adaptable to any demographic profile and molds to meet existing needs in a school or district. In addition, music business education is cross-curricular and also addresses the skillsets taught in the STEM pathway. Finally, remote learning is probably here to stay — at least in part. Music business education works on a digital platform just as easily as in person. Unlike a traditional music class where directors have scrambled to create a way to teach and assess a performance-based class virtually, music business is interactive and frees the teacher to design lessons that can be assimilated through a variety of mediums.
One of the things that makes the snare drum and snare drummers special is the capacity and responsibility to lead. Whether laying down a powerful backbeat on drum set, executing a delicate passage in orchestra or cleaning a showstopping feature in drumline, the snare drum acts as the “nucleus” of percussion — the center from which everything else derives.
As the parade floats passed by my family, I could hear something rumbling and sensed a quickening of energy from just over the hill to our left. It was the high school marching band! As the students emerged before us, the crisp, throaty timbre of early 1980s marching snare drums resonated to a fever pitch throughout my entire body. I’ve been chasing this feeling ever since.
Let’s start with the little details — the most basic ways to build a positive relationship with your music students.
Provide ways for students to touch base outside of the classroom. This might be holding regular office hours and encouraging drop-ins, or you could have a classroom “Talk to Me” box, where students can drop in their thoughts.
Why Are Video Calls so Exhausting?
Simply looking at our own faces on the screen can be distracting and even anxiety-provoking. We start to notice our facial expressions, a new laugh line, our eye bags — everything and anything starts to feel a little awkward when stared at for too long.
We have, Corbin posits, become a bit disembodied, lacking in relationships with people in our near proximity, such as our neighbors, fellow parents at our kid’s troop meeting or that dude who comes in every week to the same spinning class. Random, local relationships are a bit awkward — and that is the point. We are forced to mingle, and while it’s sometimes uncomfortable, that sense of friction is good, says Corbin. This is how we learn to trust the people surrounding us, and that sense of trust is necessary for a well-adjusted society.
As music educators, we understood that advocating was an essential part of our job even before a worldwide pandemic where aerosol dispersion was unsafe. And because music educators are resilient in our pursuit to share music with children, we have spent over a year finding flexible and ingenious ways to keep music education moving forward. Through these challenges we have all learned new ways to reach students outside of our classrooms and have continued to be strong advocates for music education in childrens’ lives.
Last March, the world stopped. “Two weeks to flatten the curve” was all we talked about (and Carol Baskins — what does this mean? Sorry, I must have missed it.). “Two weeks” became “this fall.” Then fall came and went. Here we are, a year later, just beginning to see a light at the end of the tunnel.
When COVID-19 restrictions ease, students and educators must adapt and prepare for a return to schools. All school staff will need to support students in their transition back to the classroom, and at the same time, manage their own transition and anxiety. Below are several resources to help as educators prepare to support this transition, particularly for anxious students.
It has been gratifying and a pleasure to be a part of providing tools and compass direction as we all come out of the tunnel of COVID. I know that many of you can only see the dim light at the tunnel’s end, but I assure you that it is near, and we have survived. A new and brighter day is in our immediate future.
The world became smaller when COVID-19 closed our schools. Not because we were trapped in our homes but because teachers rallied online to share their best practices from across the globe. I received advice from Italy, Australia and Alabama all in one thread. Video content, games and songs have been made readily available for educators by the educators who created them.
No matter which cliche you prefer, they all ring true: You can’t pour from an empty pitcher and you do have to put your oxygen mask on before you can help others. After a long, hard adrenalized sprint to “make it happen,” you have to give yourself some grace, so I just want to leave you with a few words on recharging your own batteries.
Recruiting New Students
Two large stimulus bills were passed called the 
Phone Calls — While an “old-school” approach, phone calls remain one of the most effective means of recruiting students. Calling parents individually allows you to speak one-on-one with parents to share your excitement about the program and uncover any concerns. Oftentimes, parents want their child to be in the band or orchestra but may have a misunderstanding about the conflicts or other commitments that might prevent them from enrolling their child. Here is a list of 
