PLN Week 6: Responding and Listening to Music Through Technology in the Band Room

This week’s readings helped remind me of the importance of how students respond to music that they listen to everyday.  It also reminded me about the importance of listening and how that plays within how we respond to music.   Music has played a prominent role in many functions such as emotional influence, entertainment, ceremonies, enjoyment, and religious worship.  I parallel this blog with current scenes that I have seen in television and movie entertainment.  As I told my wife this past week after watching a scene from Star Trek Beyond, music can use be a powerful weapon.  As the scene played out, I saw that while music is pleasurable to one character, not all characters responded to music the same way as it was seen as obnoxious noise.  On the other hand, I have seen the emotional response on television during the 2016 Rio Olympics as the gold medal winner’s national anthem is played.   I think these two illustrations go well with Hallam’s (2008) writing suggesting that “people respond to music in ways that are physiological, motor, intellectual, aesthetic, emotional, and mood based” (Bauer, 2014, p. 124).  Bauer summarizes this statement saying that people listen to music that they like, however, music can be seen as boring if too familiar, and unpleasant if not familiar at all.  This is much like many of our students we see in the classrooms.  Each student has a diverse taste in music and that music serves a different function to the student.  For example, the athlete may play loud music to pump themselves up before a game or a student may play relaxing music to help them study for a test.  However, much like the Star Trek scene, if a student is exposed to a different style of music they are unfamiliar with such as music played in the ensemble classroom, they may not react the same as they do their familiar.  As Bauer writes, it’s unpredictable.

To promote response in music, listening is an important factor that should be encouraged in the music classroom.  Last year I had the opportunity to hear a guest clinician at my state music convention speak on the importance of listening in the music classroom.  What changed my educational life and the way I now teach my band is her saying that music educators in the ensemble classroom are guilty of not promoting listening enough.  It stuck out to me that listening can change how a student responds to other types of music and can help students improve in their performance.  Both Hallam (2008) and Lehmann, Sloboda, & Woody’s (2007) study describes listening is an occurrence when “active attention involving focused cognition is provided to sounds” (p. 125).   When I think of listening, I think of ones who are actively engaged in the music whether it is their own type of music, music of their peers, or classroom music.  After last year’s clinic, I have been able to put this to the test with my performing group.  I had positive experiences hearing my students respond to the recordings of songs that we would be playing for our concert.  Students would ask and make predictions about why the music was written after hearing the song for the first and they would compare and contrast the styles of different recordings of the song.  Not only did this help them take ownership in how they wanted to perform the song, I believe the students were able to become more familiar and comfortable with a new style of music.

This week after using Spotify and reading how other online technologies can help promote active listening in students, I plan to use these programs to encourage students to listen to multiple ensemble pieces.  Spotify can be an excellent way to bring in new recordings to my classroom whether it is a song that they will play or other band and orchestral works the students should become familiar with.  Knowing what I can do with Spotify, I can create multiple playlists with many free songs.  I can encourage students to use the program for their own personal listening.  YouTube can also be another great tool for students to respond to their performance music with by listening to multiple recordings of different ensembles.  

Bauer, W. I. (2014). Music learning today: Digital pedagogy for creating, performing, and responding to music. [E-reader version] New York, NY: Oxford University Press.