Wednesday, July 5, 2017
The Marching Arts
I have a strong premonition that most of the people that read this blog know me personally. I have also not made an insignificant number of posts dealing with the subject of the trumpet. I am taking the assumption that either knowing me in person or having seen those posts on this blog are sufficient conditions for knowing that I am a band person.
I think that there is a great misconception about the label of someone in "band". Compared to orchestra, for example, band instruments play a great diversity of styles. Someone's experience as part of a wind choir is going to be infinitely different from someone's experience being in a jazz combo. I am personally very involved with a specific style of "band", which is the marching ensemble. The tragedy is that these ensembles are currently being threatened by the deforestation of fine arts defunding. Programs across the nation are either being directly cut or are otherwise suffering the effects of such cuts.
The value of education has long been monetized. I don't think that there is any debate about that. What I revile is that it is increasingly privatized. Monetization alone is simply a way of quantifying something's value. For somethings this is appropriate. Like a bushel of apples. For other things it is not. Like a human life. My intention is not to argue whether or not education ought to be monetized. My argument intends to rest on the assumption that so long as the things that valued properly, their benefit can be accurately assessed. I believe that the problem arises when unknown detriments are incurred once the value of fine arts programs are overlooked. One quick thing: there is a strong cognitive bias when I say the word "education", especially in the context of a discussion about schools, to think of the traditional fundaments of literature, english, mathematics, and sciences. What I intend to address is education in the strictest sense, but of a different sort. I also want to make it clear that I here have no intention to espouse the benefits of a musical education. I frankly don't understand how this matter can be so conclusively proven and yet so contested.
Certain aspects of schooling have become outright privatized. For instance, the majority of schools themselves never provide lunch for their students. They get a private company to do that. Most schools have contracts with textbook manufacturers instead of generating their own material. This itself may and or may not be a bad thing. The problem is that a schools are beginning to change their model into one that prioritizes getting the most for their money. Like any investments, it's natural for the overlords of these institutions to want to invest the most in the area that they see the most returns. For instance, since scrutiny of the academic competitiveness of primary and secondary schools has recently skyrocketed, many institutions are prioritizing this. The resources for the school such as the school's budget, facilities, staff, and administrative capacity have been directed towards the furthering of this goal. This is paralleled by the demand of these institutions on their students to likewise invest their time and energy. This is not simply a pull force. It is also a push force. The effect is that fine arts programs, particularly in music, are being reduced, redacted, and made redundant.
Why is this? Well there are several realities to contend with. The first is that a music program always includes a premium. Instruments are expensive. Their cost is not only a one-time investment, there is the continual cost of their maintenance and the cost to replace them when they inevitably become unusable. There is also the fact that the learning curve on musical instruments can often seem as barren as the Atacama Desert. It takes many more years to develop anything that would be commonly lauded for its musical merit than a typical student spends at a single school. An average American high school is four years. An average middle school is three. An exceptional music program typically doesn't include elementary schools children for more than three years. It is glaringly apparent to anyone who has tried that this is nowhere near enough time to "get good". Additionally, music by nature is noncompetitive. Of course people make competitions out of it, but that is a superstructure. It's not like a school basketball team where performance can be gauged against another school, as a way for justifying the cost of the program. Music is subjective. So imagine an elementary school program that normally begins students in 3rd grade. The superintendent decides to cancel this program on the basis of its expenses and the fact that the end of year concert for 5th graders still sounds like a flock of Canadian geese and bull elephant calls. Suddenly, instead of getting students with three years of experience, the middle school program has to dedicate its first year to teaching which fingers to press and how to read music. Suddenly, the quality of their ensembles takes a nosedive, and one can imagine how this buck gets passed around. Then at the high school level, the superintendent tells the director to think of ways to improve the quality of the band, when really the only thing that can really be done is for the superintendent himself to go yell at the district budget committee on behalf of the elementary school not to cut its program. Obviously this rarely ever happens.
This situation is even more aggravated in marching ensembles because their membership exists on a recursive trend of increasing exclusivity. Despite being multi-disciplinary (requiring for example a high level of both athleticism as well as musicianship), the near comprehensive majority of people that join a marching ensemble come from a band background. This group of people is a subset of so many sets that there are really quite few people (percentage wise) that find themselves in a position to be successful in the activity.
We are a dying breed. Those of us that run and play, those of us that know to count our steps and stay in line. Those of us that can look sideways without turning or head, and point our toes to the sky. There used to be many but now there are few, of those that can twist their hips and slide. The details, the beats, the turf, the seats. We are indeed a dying breed.
I think that there is a great misconception about the label of someone in "band". Compared to orchestra, for example, band instruments play a great diversity of styles. Someone's experience as part of a wind choir is going to be infinitely different from someone's experience being in a jazz combo. I am personally very involved with a specific style of "band", which is the marching ensemble. The tragedy is that these ensembles are currently being threatened by the deforestation of fine arts defunding. Programs across the nation are either being directly cut or are otherwise suffering the effects of such cuts.
The value of education has long been monetized. I don't think that there is any debate about that. What I revile is that it is increasingly privatized. Monetization alone is simply a way of quantifying something's value. For somethings this is appropriate. Like a bushel of apples. For other things it is not. Like a human life. My intention is not to argue whether or not education ought to be monetized. My argument intends to rest on the assumption that so long as the things that valued properly, their benefit can be accurately assessed. I believe that the problem arises when unknown detriments are incurred once the value of fine arts programs are overlooked. One quick thing: there is a strong cognitive bias when I say the word "education", especially in the context of a discussion about schools, to think of the traditional fundaments of literature, english, mathematics, and sciences. What I intend to address is education in the strictest sense, but of a different sort. I also want to make it clear that I here have no intention to espouse the benefits of a musical education. I frankly don't understand how this matter can be so conclusively proven and yet so contested.
Certain aspects of schooling have become outright privatized. For instance, the majority of schools themselves never provide lunch for their students. They get a private company to do that. Most schools have contracts with textbook manufacturers instead of generating their own material. This itself may and or may not be a bad thing. The problem is that a schools are beginning to change their model into one that prioritizes getting the most for their money. Like any investments, it's natural for the overlords of these institutions to want to invest the most in the area that they see the most returns. For instance, since scrutiny of the academic competitiveness of primary and secondary schools has recently skyrocketed, many institutions are prioritizing this. The resources for the school such as the school's budget, facilities, staff, and administrative capacity have been directed towards the furthering of this goal. This is paralleled by the demand of these institutions on their students to likewise invest their time and energy. This is not simply a pull force. It is also a push force. The effect is that fine arts programs, particularly in music, are being reduced, redacted, and made redundant.
Why is this? Well there are several realities to contend with. The first is that a music program always includes a premium. Instruments are expensive. Their cost is not only a one-time investment, there is the continual cost of their maintenance and the cost to replace them when they inevitably become unusable. There is also the fact that the learning curve on musical instruments can often seem as barren as the Atacama Desert. It takes many more years to develop anything that would be commonly lauded for its musical merit than a typical student spends at a single school. An average American high school is four years. An average middle school is three. An exceptional music program typically doesn't include elementary schools children for more than three years. It is glaringly apparent to anyone who has tried that this is nowhere near enough time to "get good". Additionally, music by nature is noncompetitive. Of course people make competitions out of it, but that is a superstructure. It's not like a school basketball team where performance can be gauged against another school, as a way for justifying the cost of the program. Music is subjective. So imagine an elementary school program that normally begins students in 3rd grade. The superintendent decides to cancel this program on the basis of its expenses and the fact that the end of year concert for 5th graders still sounds like a flock of Canadian geese and bull elephant calls. Suddenly, instead of getting students with three years of experience, the middle school program has to dedicate its first year to teaching which fingers to press and how to read music. Suddenly, the quality of their ensembles takes a nosedive, and one can imagine how this buck gets passed around. Then at the high school level, the superintendent tells the director to think of ways to improve the quality of the band, when really the only thing that can really be done is for the superintendent himself to go yell at the district budget committee on behalf of the elementary school not to cut its program. Obviously this rarely ever happens.
This situation is even more aggravated in marching ensembles because their membership exists on a recursive trend of increasing exclusivity. Despite being multi-disciplinary (requiring for example a high level of both athleticism as well as musicianship), the near comprehensive majority of people that join a marching ensemble come from a band background. This group of people is a subset of so many sets that there are really quite few people (percentage wise) that find themselves in a position to be successful in the activity.
We are a dying breed. Those of us that run and play, those of us that know to count our steps and stay in line. Those of us that can look sideways without turning or head, and point our toes to the sky. There used to be many but now there are few, of those that can twist their hips and slide. The details, the beats, the turf, the seats. We are indeed a dying breed.
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