Low Cost MusicTechnology Options For The Music Education Classroom
Low Cost MusicTechnology Options For The Music Education Classroom

Finding ways to stretch your budget in a music classroom is always important and even more so when trying to purchase high tech electronics, software, and other materials.  This article provides an updated list of dozens of different low cost or free alternatives to expensive music education products.  It includes such categories as music notation software, drill design software, special needs hardware, and many more.

 

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The Star Spangled Banner- Free Sheet Music For Band Inst.
The Star Spangled Banner- Free Sheet Music For Band Inst.

This document contains sheet music for all common instruments to play The Star Spangled Banner, also known as the sheet music to the National Anthem of the United States of America. You can view the sheet music online or download the individual parts arranged for all common concert band instruments.  If you do not see your instrument listed please scroll to the bottom of the page and try one of the the other instruments.  Most musicians will be able to find at least one instrumental part that matches their range and preferred key signature.  If you are seeking a simple piano version of the song please select from the voice, trumpet, or alto saxophone versions.

 

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Using Plickers as an Assessment Tool in the Music Education Classroom
Using Plickers as an Assessment Tool in the Music Education Classroom

Music, band, choir, and orchestra classrooms can be huge and assessing the knowledge and retention of individual students in such a large class can be daunting.  Plickers are one of several solutions that can be adapted to work in large groups, making the act of assessing a student’s understanding a little easier and a whole lot faster.  

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Is Marching Band A Sport? Pros, Cons, and a Reality Check
Is Marching Band A Sport? Pros, Cons, and a Reality Check

In recent years the question of whether or not marching band is a sport has been brought up time and time again for various reasons and by various groups.  On one side you have the YES crowd who says that marching band is competitive, physically demanding, and every bit as much a team event as any traditional sporting event.  On the other side of the coin are those who say no, that marching band is NOT a sport and it is a musical pursuit that happens to involve coordinated movements.  Both sides are right, but to make a final decision we need to look deeper into the facts.  Read on to find out what they are!

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Portable Digital Audio Recorder Buying Guide With Reviews
Portable Digital Audio Recorder Buying Guide With Reviews

Scroll down to view the comparison chart of over a dozen different portable digital audio recorders.

Buying a portable digital audio recorder is a major decision.  The balance between price, features, and quality is a fine line that has many different options to choose from.  There are dozens of different models of portable digital audio recorders, some of which have drastically different sets of features yet sell for roughly the same price.  This easy to read head to head comparison chart and guide to many of the more popular portable digital audio recorders is intended to help potential buyers more easily see these differences and make an educated buying decision.

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Apps and More for the Choral Classroom
Apps and More for the Choral Classroom

The number of apps, software, and gadgets available for use in the music classroom continues to grow each year but finding things that can actually be beneficial to your classes grows more and more difficult as well.  We spoke with Dr. Christopher Russell, Director of Choirs at Oltman Middle School in St. Paul Park, Minnesota to get his must-have list of apps.

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Trumpet Pro iPhone App Review

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Trumpet Pro Home ScreenMusic education related iPhone apps that are actually useful seem to be rather few and far between.  When I was informed of the Trumpet Pro apps now available for both iPhone and iPad I was a little skeptical, having seen other fingering training apps that failed to live up to my expectations.  When I saw the pricing associated with these two apps I became a bit more skeptical but decided to give them a try anyway and see if they were truly worth the investment.

Trumpet Pro Provides Flexible Settings and Lots of Exercises
Both apps promise to help trumpet or french horn players develop and hone their fingering skills by doing interactive fingering drills.  The free trial versions of the apps come with the major scales and a few sample song clips and are adequate to let the user get a feel for the full version of the applications while the full Trumpet Pro HD app for iPad and Trumpet Pro app for iPhone come with 600 different songs already provided as well as slots for 99 additional custom songs that the user can create on their own.  In addition to the scales and selected etudes additional exercises were provided by brass musicians such as Eric Bolvin, Craig Fraedrich and Jay Lichtmann.

Using Trumpet Pro
In each of the apps the user holds the iPhone or iPad on its side with their three playing fingers touching the instrument buttons on the screen.  A staff of notes shows the notes to be played, and a moving highlight moves across the screen to show where in the music the song is currently playing.  Incorrect fingerings are marked in red while correct fingerings remain in black.

In playing the with application it was obvious early on that this is a very well thought out application with a lot of potential for helping students learn fingerings in a fun, challenging way.  The tempo of each song can be adjusted or transposed as desired, and the player’s score can be uploaded to a leader board to see how they compare to other aspiring performers.  In fact, the amount of customization one can make to this application is perhaps one of its greatest selling points.

Big Value and Minimal Concerns With The Trumpet Pro App
The only real problems I had with the application had to do with the use of alternate fingerings.  At first I was unable to figure out how to make the app do alternate fingerings the way I wanted them to.  However, after watching the Trumpet Pro video tutorials I began to understand how the alternate fingering system worked but was still not incredible satisfied.  You cannot have the same note accept more than one fingering unless the note head is altered with a natural sign (or something equivalent).  In other words, a C on the staff is always one fingering while a C w/natural sign can be a different alternate fingering but never both fingerings at the same time.

Trumpet Pro for iPhone currently sells for $19.99 in the iTunes App Store and should be considered to be a great value for the amount of materials and amount of customization provided in the app. Trumpet Pro HD for iPad sells for $29.99 but the beefed up screen size on the iPad means that more measures can be shown and with less eye strain on the user.  The ten dollar up charge is well worth it for those that have iPads.  Also available from the same company are apps for practicing French Horn fingerings as well.


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