Brass Class

Nice work today, guys! I really enjoyed your presentation! I LOVED the animal musicing, too!

So anyway, I thought I'd share a bit of my musicing experience with you, and how it helped me and didn't in certain ways...

I had to take brass practicum in undergrad to learn how to play all the instruments in case I taught band. DJE was my teacher, and the entire class was premised around musicing. You know how we talked about how certain students have certain levels of challenges and when they achieve these challenges they reach a sense of self-growth and self-esteem? Well, I could not buzz on a mouthpiece to save my life in the beginning of class, while other people could already play the instruments. Automatically I felt like I couldn't "DO" (like the question James posed to us today--what about the kid that can't "do") and felt like a failure. DJE made the class very individually centered and put us on our own levels of music... and yet, for some reason it didn't make me feel bad that I wasn't playing the more advanced pieces by the end of the semester because I was making music and I was rising to my own challenges and growing more confident on the brass instruments. I was musicing. Granted, on different levels than my peers, but I was doing, and actively, too.

Now, I don't think DJE would have taught a regular band class in this sense, but his approach to teaching this class not only conveyed his philosophy of musicing, but gave us more I want to ask him insight into teaching brass instruments. I wonder how he would teach a regular band class of middle schoolers. How do you think he'd do it?