Experiencing the 2009 Macworld Conference

I missed being at this year's Macworld Conference. I love San Francisco and had been able to attend Macworld the past two years, both times while doing some things with Apple. This year, for a variety of reasons, I couldn't get there. But, I feel like I was able to stay in touch with what was going on through Twitter and web sites/blogs such as TUAW, AppleInsider, and Macworld. Their coverage included not only first hand descriptions of events and activities (sometimes in "real time," especially via Twitter), but also lots of photos and even video.

Through this Personal Learning Network, I learned about several new (or updated) things that look very interesting. I think the updated iLife suite, and especially the improvements to iMovie and the new features added to GarageBand are pretty exciting. The new "lessons" in GarageBand are very intriguing. While you can already purchase videos about playing instruments, etc., if these are put together the way Apple usually approaches things, they are likely to be a significant step forward in this category. From Chris Breen's overview on Macworld, that appears to be the case.

There’s more to these lessons than what Schiller demonstrated before his keynote audience. For example, you have the option to view information in a variety of ways. In a guitar lesson, you can view not only the instructor and fretboard, but also view chords, tabs, and lyrics, for example. If you’re a left-handed guitar player, you can see the fretboard in that orientation. In a keyboard lesson you can see notation—bass clef alone, treble clef alone, or both clefs on the grand staff. The videos can also take advantage of multiple views. You might, for instant, wish to focus on what a guitar player’s left hand is doing.

You also have the opportunity to mix what you hear. For example, you can listen to only the instrument without the instructor’s voice. Additionally, in an Artist Lesson, you can mute the band or mix the volume levels of the individual instruments.

I also like the new Keynote Remote for the iPhone. I've already downloaded it (and the 30 day trial version of Keynote '09). It is terrific - I hope to be able to try it out during some presentations I'll be giving next week at the Ohio Music Education Association Professional Development Conference.

It would be nice if more conferences had this type of coverage so that persons unable to physically attend could experience aspects virtually. Perhaps that will be the case in the future.

JamStudio.com

I recently became aware of, and have begun to explore, a new Web 2.0 site called JamStudio.com. JamStudio.com is a web-based music sequencer where you can compose and publish your own tunes.



Jamstudio.com has similarities to programs such as GarageBand and Band-in-a-Box, although not currently as full-featured or flexible as either of those programs. There are free and paid (monthly subscription) versions available, the difference being the features accessible to the user.



Teachers can apply for free "All Access Pass" accounts for themselves and their students through Jamstudio.com's Education Grant Program. This level of account enables the user to download MP3s of compositions that are created. It also allows access to additional sounds. To learn more about the Educational Grant Program, email education@jamstudio.com.



Jamstudio.com is intriguing and would appear to have some applications to music education, especially if it continues to develop and add features. Web applications such as this and Noteflight make it possible for everyone to create music, at least at a certain level, without specialized software and hardware, and at no direct cost. This, I think, is a very good thing!

How do you get to Carnegie Hall?

Here's a project that is, as far as I know, a first of its kind. An opportunity to audition to play Internet Symphony No. 1 “Eroica” for YouTube by Tan Dun at Carnegie Hall this coming April.

Interested in joining the first-ever collaborative online orchestra? Professionals and amateur musicians of all ages, locations and instruments are welcome to audition for the YouTube Symphony Orchestra by submitting a video performance of a new piece written for the occasion by the renowned Chinese composer Tan Dun (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon). We have tools to help you learn the music, rehearse with the conductor, and upload your part for the collaborative video.

On the web site, you can download your part to the symphony, and practice along with a couple of different forms of a video - both show the face of the conductor (as if you were sitting in the ensemble), one with the orchestra playing and one with no sound. I find the one without sound to be a little strange and am not sure how helpful it really would be in helping to prepare the piece. Perhaps more valuable are a series of master class videos by members of the London Symphony Orchestra. When you are ready, you can upload a video of yourself playing some recommended excerpts to audition for the Carnegie Hall performance.

All-in-all, it is a pretty interesting undertaking and an innovative application of Web 2.0 technologies. I like the way video is being used to help people learn about music, even though I might quibble about the pedagogical approach to a degree. An ambitious music educator might utilize a similar method with his/her students. There are actually many videos on YouTube that are terrific for learning about all things music related. Of course the trick is finding these amongst all the YouTube content. Teachers also have to be careful that students don't come access videos with inappropriate content, and it is not uncommon for YouTube to be blocked in schools. Sites such as SchoolTube and TeacherTube may be viable alternatives.

So, how do you get to Carnegie Hall? Well the old adage is to "practice, practice, practice." But maybe YouTube has a role too!


Internet Symphony No. 1 “Eroica” for YouTube

Google Teacher Academy

On Tuesday I had the privilege of participating in the Google Teacher Academy in New York City. It was a wonderful experience and I learned a great deal. This was the sixth academy for teachers that Google has sponsored, and there are now about 315 Google Certified Teachers from the U.S., Argentina, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the U.K.

Besides learning about and gaining experience with various Google Tools [including Search - Scholar, Books, and News; Docs; Sites; iGoogle; Reader; Blogger; Maps (and Mapmaker); Earth; and Sketchup] we also got to enjoy a little of the Google culture. Throughout the building there are small "micro-kitchens" where various snacks and beverages (most of them pretty healthy) are available throughout the day (and night) for employees (and for GTA participants on Tuesday). The building where Google is located in NYC is huge, taking up an entire city block. To more quickly get around the facility, employees use small scooters, and at various locations there are scooter racks where they can be parked. All Google employees are able to partake in free meals that are of very high quality and feature a variety of delicious foods. When touring the building, our guide told us he eats all his meals there. GTA participants were provided with a continental breakfast, lunch and dinner, all of which were very tasty. The building also has a game room for employees; people were playing ping pong and guitar hero when we walked through. This video provides a nice overview of the facility:



Google has an 80-20 rule, whereby their employees are allowed to spend 20% of their time on personal projects. A number of these projects have resulted in Google products that are in use today. Several GTA participants were speculating on how the 80-20 rule might be applied to education. Is it possible in this era of standardized testing to allow students to spend 20% of their time in school on projects of their own choosing?

I'm excited to begin using many of the technologies I learned about more fully in my own practice. I also intend to share some of them during sessions I'll be presenting at upcoming conferences. The challenge, as usual, is that there are too many fun "toys" and not enough time to play with them!

ISTE Music & Technology Special Interest Group

ISTE (International Society for Technology in Education) is the major professional development organization for K-12 teachers interested in integrating technology into teaching and learning. Among ISTE's activities is sponsorship of the National Educational Computing Conference (NECC). I attended my first NECC last summer in San Antonio, TX and thoroughly enjoyed it. The conference was very well-attended and had great energy from the enthusiasm of participants, clinicians, and the many exhibitors.

NECC has "Birds-of-a-Feather" sessions where people with common interests can meet to learn from each other. For the San Antonio conference, I proposed a BOF session on music and technology, which was accepted. Since no music people I knew attended this conference (most music teachers interested in technology participate in TI:ME and/or ATMI), I thought this particular BOF might be a rather intimate gathering. To my surprise, over 40 enthusiastic music teachers, curriculum directors, technology coordinators, and others showed up. We had no specific agenda, but engaged in a productive conversation for about an hour. Afterwards, I started a NING to facilitate continuing discussion.

Following the conference, I received an email from ISTE indicating they planned to expand their Special Interest Group (SIG) program, inviting me to submit a proposal for a music and technology SIG. I did, and this fall the ISTE board approved the new Music and Technology SIG.

Soon ISTE will be allowing members to officially join the SIG. But, anyone, whether they're an ISTE member or not, can join the SIG's wiki. Please consider becoming part of this wiki community and helping to build a valuable resource for music teachers who are interested in utilizing technology for teaching and learning. The wiki is also the space where everyone can provide input on the Birds-of-a-Feather session that the SIG will sponsor at next summer's NECC, to be held June 28 - July 1, 2009 in Washington, D. C.

Obama

We just got back from the Obama rally held in downtown Cleveland. There was a huge crowd (around 80,000 I'm told). People were in good spirits and there seemed to be a real feeling of optimism and patriotism. It seems people are ready for change and for someone to lead the country in a positive direction. Hopefully Barack Obama is that person.



Bruce Springsteen performed before Obama spoke. He gave a pretty moving speech about the current state of the country, core American values, and his hopes for the future before introducing "the next First Family."

I've spent 35 years writing about America and its people--what does it mean to be an American, what's our duties and our responsibilities, what are our reasonable expectations when we live in a free society. I really never saw myself as partisan but more as an advocate for a set of ideas: economic and social justice, America as a positive influence around the world, truth, transparency, and integrity in government, the right of every American to have a job, a living wage, to be educated in a decent school, and to a life filled with the dignity of work, promise and the sancitity of home. These are the things that make a life. These are the things that build and define a society. I think that these are the things we think of on the deepest level when we think about our freedoms. But today those freedoms have been damaged and curtailed by 8 years of a thoughtless, reckless, and morally adrift administration. But we're at the crossroads today.

I've spent most of my life as a musician measuring the distance in my music between the American Dream and the American reality. I look around today and for many Americans who are losing their jobs or their homes or seeing their retirement funds disappear or their health care, or have been abandoned in their inner cities, the distance between that dream and that reality has grown greater and more painful than ever.

I believe that Senator Obama has taken the measure of that distance in his own life and in his own work. And I believe that he understands in his heart the cost of that distance in blood and in suffering in the lives of everyday Americans. And I believe as President he'll work to bring that promise back to life and into the lives of so many of our fellow Americans who have justifiably lost faith in its meaning.

Now, in my job I travel around the world and I occasionally play to big stadiums or crowds like this, just like Senator Obama does. And I continue to find out that where ever I go, America remains a   repository for people's hopes, their desires; it remains a house of dreams. And a thousand George Bushes and a thousand Dick Cheneys will never be able to tear that house down. That's something that only we can do, and we're not going to let that happen.

This administration will be leaving office--that's the good news. The bad news is they're going to be dumping in our laps the national tragedies of Katrina, Iraq, and our financial crisis. Our house of dreams has been abused, it's been looted, and it's been left in a   terrible state of disrepair. It needs defending against those who would sell it down the river for power, for influence, or a quick buck. It needs strong arms, strong hearts, strong minds. We need someone with Senator Obama's understanding, his temperateness, his deliberativeness, his maturity, his pragmatism, his toughness, and his faith.

But most of all it needs us. It needs you and it needs me, and he's gonna need us. 'Cause all that a nation has that keeps it from coming apart is the social contract between us, between its citizens. And whatever grace God has decided to impart to us, it resides in us, it resides in our connection with one another. In honoring the life and the hopes and the dreams of the man or the woman up the street or across town--that's where we make our small claim upon heaven.

Now in recent years, that social contract's been shredded. Look around today and you can see it shredding before our eyes. But tonight and today we are at the crossroads. We are at the crossroads, and it's been a long long long time coming.

I'm honored to be here on the same stage as Senator Obama. From the beginning, there's been something in Senator Obama that's called upon our better angels, and I suspect it's because he's had a life where he's had to so often call upon his better angels. And we're going to need all the angels we can get on the hard road ahead. So Senator Obama, help us rebuild our house, big enough for the dreams from all our citizens. 'Cause how well we accomplish this task will tell us just what it does mean to be an American in the new century, what the stakes are, and what it means to live in a free society.

So I don't know about you, but I know I want my country back, I want my dream back, I want my America back. Now is the time to stand with Barack Obama, and Joe Biden, roll up our sleeves, and come on up for the rising.

Tuesday can't come soon enough!

My Fall So Far...

What a crazy semester it has been! After a wonderful sabbatical, it has been a busy and hectic return to full-time duties at CWRU. This fall I:

• Have taken over as Director of Music Education.
  
• Am chairing a search for a choral music education faculty member.
  
• Attended, along with other CWRU faculty and staff, a 2-day training session in Philadelphia for the Teacher Education Accreditation Council (TEAC). We are going through TEAC accreditation, with a major report called the Inquiry Brief due this spring and an onsite visit next fall.
  
• Started rehearsals for the Wadsworth Community Band in preparation for our December 7th concert.
  
• Chaperoned the Wadsworth High School Marching Band (my senior daughter and freshman son are members) to several events. (I'm also the webmaster of the WHS Band Booster web site.)
  
• Went on college visits with my senior daughter to Miami University and The Ohio State University.
  
• Am working to get an issue of Contributions to Music Education edited and in print.
  
• Reviewed proposals for the 2009 AERA Conference and the The Second International Symposium on Assessment in Music Education
  
• Am teaching Technology-Assisted Music Teaching and Learning (for undergraduates and graduate students) and Music Cognition and Learning (graduate class). Because I haven't taught either of these for over a year, and due to the fact I've reconfigured both courses, it has been a little more work to prepare for these than normal.
  
• Have submitted a final revision of a manuscript that's been accepted for publication in the book series Advances in Music Education Research, to be published in 2009.
  
• Received notice that a proposal I submitted for an ISTE Special Interest Group (SIG) for music teachers was approved. I'm now coordinating the ISTE Music & Technology Special Interest Group.
  
• Prepared and submitted proposals for a couple of upcoming conferences.
  
• Registered and made travel arrangements for a trip to Seattle, WA to attend my first National Association of Schools of Music (NASM) annual meeting.
  
• Visited my oldest daughter in Sarasota, FL where she is majoring in computer animation at the Ringling College of Art and Design. It was Ringling's Parents' Weekend and my fall break.
  
• Received an invitation to participate in the upcoming Google Teacher Academy in New York City, after which I'll be a Google Certified Teacher.
  
  And we're only halfway through the semester...
  
  More about many of these things in future posts.