Wind Conductor

Attrition is a concern in any program. Every band director continually develops new ways to engage students and encourage them to continue their studies in music and be a part of the band. However, a growing concern for everyone is how the school closures during the COVID pandemic are going to affect our programs. In a recent conversation with Eric Bachmann, award-winning band director at Emerson Middle School in Niles, Illinois, I discovered how much more challenging overcom

A couple of weeks ago, I was researching resources for a middle school band director who was trying find ways to teach young band members in an online setting. That's when I stumbled across Chad Dempsey's YouTube channel, the Hey Band! Network. I watched an excellent interview by Chad with a wonderful middle school band director in Texas, Dorina Kingston. I immediately Facebook-stalked Chad and said, "Hey, that was a great interview! We've got to show this to the Wind Conduct

I had the opportunity to talk with Dr. John Rine Zabanal, Assistant Professor of Strings Education at VanderCook College of Music, about remote teaching for performance-based music classrooms. We had an open and candid conversation about the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on the traditional music classroom while schools are shutdown. Some of the topics we discussed included: Remote Teaching and ideas to make it work Using a Flipped Classroom model for the performance-based m