Finally today I got around to reading the October 2007 issue of SBO
magazine. In between lessons I flipped through the pages to come
across a strangely titled article by Kenneth Thompson titled Keep It
Simple. As I skimmed the article to determine what exactly it was
about I realized that this was an article that I really needed to
read... Carefully!
I was recently given the opportunity to read and review a new book by author Kristen Laine titled American Band: Music, Dreams, and Coming of Age in the Heartland, published by Gotham Books. When I first heard the title and saw the cover I was excited to have the chance to take a closer look. For many years I have hoped to find a book that is both inspirational, educational, and entertaining that also was closely related to teaching band. I hoped that American Band might provide a glimpse into how high caliber music programs manage to achieve such high marks year after year. American Band provides such a glimpse into the Concord Band of Dunlap, Indiana, during their 2004 marching season but also goes on to delve into the psychological and emotional issues of its students.
I have always tried my best to keep up to date on music education news that is happening around the country. I know that my friend Joe Pisano over at mustech.net also shares that same goal, but he has definately found a way to one-up me in terms of something that is easy to use and read to get all of your news in one convenient place. I may just have to try this out myself sometime and make my own news page using the PageFlakes application that he recently showed off in his blog . I'd highly recommend taking a look at it, and the rest of his site as well if you are interested at all in the latest and greatest in music technology.
Keep up the good work Joe, and thanks for the cool tool!
It is not often that I get a chance to do a product review on a toy, but given that my audience here on MusicEdMagic is obviously slanted toward the musically minded I jumped at the chance to take a look at some new musical toys from Fisher Price. The first of these is the I Can Play Guitar, a self contained electric guitar that your budding musician can hook up to the family television to begin his rock star training. So what was the verdict? Read on to find out!
Several years ago I remember reading about a device called the MusicPad. That novel little gadget was essentially a stripped down laptop computer with one purpose in life, to allow you to display, edit and flip through your sheet music without the hassle of... flipping through your sheet music. The MusicPad is still around, and in fact has gone through several changes since its initial concept, but now onto the scene comes a device so incredibly simple (and comparatively cheap) that it almost makes the MusicPad seem unneccesary (at least when it comes to flipping pages on the fly).
Tales From The Podium 
.jpg "A Rehearsal")
