The Watershed Research and Training Center’s Post

🎶 Enhancing the Orchestra Experience with NAI Techniques 🎶 As a professional in the music world, I've been contemplating how to enrich the experience for our orchestra audiences. The National Association for Interpretation (NAI), renowned for its collaborations with zoos, museums, and heritage sites, provides valuable insights applicable to our musical endeavors. NAI underscores the importance of fostering dialogue rather than simply imparting information. Picture our pre-concert discussions as lively conversations, inviting audience participation, questions, and personal reflections. While exploring various resources, I stumbled upon two intriguing terms: "Interpreganda" and "Interpretainment." 🚫 Interpreganda: "As interpreters, you hold a certain amount of power and influence over what the audience is led to believe. But interpretation is not your personal soapbox and Interpretation should not be "interpreganda." Ignores multiple viewpoints Skews facts toward a foregone conclusion Oversimplifies facts Treats the audience as ignorant Discourages dialogue Does not allow audience members to have and maintain a personal perspective 🚫 Interpretainment: "People come to interpretive programs to be entertained, but interpretation is not simply entertainment. People expect to enjoy their experience in a nonformal setting...they have chosen to attend your interpretive experience, which usually suggests that the guests want to learn something, but they don't want the pressure of a formal learning environment." Stereotypes multiple points of view Arranges facts around a punch line Oversimplifies facts Doubts audience has an interest Does not care what the audience thinks We've all encountered presentations and lectures in the music realm that shut doors, excluding audiences and alienating newcomers. By steering clear of these pitfalls, we ensure our communications are inclusive, respectful, and engaging. Let's forge connections between our audience and the music, fostering deep engagement and mutual understanding. In the coming weeks, I'll be delving into a multi-series article addressing the insights gleaned from NAI's teachings! #OrchestraLife #NAI #MusicEducation #AudienceEngagement #CulturalHeritage

🎶 Wrapped up my 3rd year lecturing “Harmonica and the Blues” remotely for Rochester Institute of Technology! 🎵 Teaching this course has reinforced something I firmly believe: adults should learn instruments. Not because you’ll become the next virtuoso, but because the benefits are undeniable—better memory, less stress, and a stronger sense of connection. The science backs it up. This article from The Atlantic dives into how music positively impacts well-being at every stage of life: 👉 Music Is Good for You If you’ve been thinking about picking up an instrument (or dusting off an old one), there’s no better time to start. What instrument have you always wanted to learn? #LifelongLearning https://lnkd.in/e4XnAQYR

PARTICIPATE IN RESEARCH Are you interested in how music learning links with wellbeing?    Are you seeking the chance to build capacity and musical independence in your students?    Are you an instrumental music teacher in a home-based studio in Victoria with a secondary-school aged student?    You’re invited to take part in a research project from June-October 2024 trialing some brief wellbeing-related activities in your lessons with one of your students.    There’ll be some online onboarding training, weekly reflections about how you’re finding the activities and any thoughts you have (about 60mins spread over the 8-weeks), plus an optional 60min follow-up interview via Zoom once the trial is over, but everything you need will be provided.     Taking part in this research is voluntary but you’ll receive a PD Certificate for 10hrs at the end. If you’re interested, the first step is to get in touch for more information – if you’re able to take part, we’ll then discuss with you the next steps regarding approaching one of your students.    Keen to learn more? Visit: https://buff.ly/4aVHVeH   University of Melbourne || Project ID: 27291 

The Association for Recorded Sound Collections invites proposals for speaker presentations, panel discussions, and posters for ASRC's 59th Annual Conference and Workshop, to be held in Tulsa, Oklahoma, May 14-17, 2025 at the Hyatt Regency Tulsa Downtown Hotel. The deadline for presentation proposals is Friday, January 10, 2025. ARSC welcomes proposals on any and all aspects of #soundrecording, covering all genres of music and speech, in all formats, and from all periods. Topics of interest include (but are not limited to) record labels and artists, watershed moments documented through recorded sound or in the history of sound recording, and innovative approaches to research, #preservation, and access involving recorded sound materials. In recognition of our host city, we particularly encourage presentations that highlight performers, composers, broadcasters, musicians, record labels, studios, songwriters, and personalities from the Tulsa area and from Oklahoma and the South Central region of the United States more generally. We also especially invite presentations that discuss collaborations among stakeholders from different backgrounds in pursuit of shared goals, or that explore innovative applications of artificial intelligence within our field. Please note that this is an in-person conference, and we cannot accommodate virtual or prerecorded presentations. For more information on the conference, visit the ARSC Conference and Workshop website https://lnkd.in/ecKYq2N3.

My research journey focuses on documenting the endangered music of minority ethnic groups, exploring the rich tapestry of cultural expressions that these communities offer. This journey began with a deep appreciation for the diverse musical traditions that, although vibrant and vital to cultural identity, are increasingly threatened by globalization, urbanization, and sociopolitical changes. My work aims to capture and preserve these musical heritages while also examining how they intersect with contemporary social issues such as migration, identity, and resistance. Through fieldwork, interviews, and audio recordings, I immerse myself in the communities whose music I document, seeking to understand the broader social and historical contexts that shape their musical expressions. By highlighting the voices and stories of these communities, my research contributes to preserving their musical traditions and amplifying their perspectives on current social challenges. This research journey has been as much about listening and learning from the people who create and sustain these musical forms as it is about documenting them. It underscores the importance of music as a living, evolving form of cultural expression and a powerful lens through which to view and address contemporary social issues. As I continue this work, I am committed to fostering greater appreciation and understanding of these endangered musical traditions and their significance in our global society.   Article links 1.   https://lnkd.in/e_jJziKM. 2. https://lnkd.in/eEUgYVuf 3.     https://lnkd.in/eh-kFUut 4.     https://lnkd.in/e5imhCBz 5.     https://lnkd.in/eTjTY_4Y 6.     . file:///C:/Users/showict/Downloads/1127%20(2).pdf   7.  https://lnkd.in/ebQR7nVZ 8.   https://lnkd.in/e5HVGyTw 9.   https://lnkd.in/e4hN49Ft

Are you looking for a new approach to music education? Check out Ski-hill Graph Pedagogy Meter Fundamentals! This curriculum helps students connect with music through listening and develops their performance skills. By connecting mathematical aspects of meter fundamentals to the music studied, students can improve timing and expression, leading to increased confidence, critical thinking, and metacognition. Give your students the tools they need to excel in music with Ski-hill Graph Pedagogy Meter Fundamentals. #musiceducation #pedagogy #curriculum

Getting inventive with resources to unlock student potential is one of our goals in the music department here at the International School of The Hague. We prioritise not only leveraging music technology but also exploring diverse resources to foster unexpected connections. In our recent #improvisation lessons, we've been using simple exercises from Bartok’s Mikrokosmos 1 & 2 to help students learn piano skills and recognise musical patterns. Now, students can identify different modes, scales, and chromaticism while improvising alone or with a partner using the stimulus from the pieces they have been studying. These bite-sized learning chunks have boosted our students' confidence levels and showcased their ability to become stronger communicators and risk-takers in our unit. Improvising can be scary, but in #mypmusic, it doesn’t have to be! Video Notes: Watch an example here of a study doing a quick study of Bartok Mikrokosmos No. 54 from Book 2 on Chromatics. Unit taught in collaboration with Samuel Wright and Emilio Parrilla for our Year 10 students.

Hey folks - this is the latest article to be published out of a larger project looking at how an Intercultural Music Engagement (ICME) framework can support positive musical experiences that foster intercultural understanding. It marked an important point in our project where it became clear that "efforts in this area should focus on supporting artists already embedded within communities, rather than solely supporting external organisations. Ultimately, we argue the need for further community-engaged research to identify how a framework in this area can best support existing practitioners." (Spoiler: we've already worked with a team of community-based artists to help co-design an updated version of the Framework, one that acknowledges race-based discrimination in the space, and emphasises the value of things like cultural knowledge, representation, and organisational accountability. Stay tuned, a precursor to that has just been accepted for publication, and the paper with the final model is going in for submission in the next couple of weeks.)

⁉️Did you know that ants can talk? 🐜In this fabulous article, Lisa Schonberg describes how she was able to use specific microphones to record the sounds of ants in a rainforest in Brazil and then create music with these sounds. 👂Read all about this acoustic process, hear the sounds of the ants, and hear the music that was created here: https://lnkd.in/g2tSbma6 🌍“Through this music, Schonberg is hoping to encourage eco-centric thought: a recognition that every species has an intrinsic value that helps to hold our fragile world together.” 🎵Ants as musicians. Ants as co-creators. Ants as co-producers.  💙This slow, exploratory practice with multispecies helps us to open ourselves to the experiences of others, often in ways that we cannot detect. 💙Making music with multispecies is one creative example to cultivate more open, caring and responsible capacities for planetary thriving. 🐸Interested to learn more about how to create sounds with multispecies? Check out our new course Sound Stories for Multispecies Justice: https://lnkd.in/evK6q3A6 🔥For more content, explore Unfolding Aliveness: https://lnkd.in/gAbGTbWN Charlotte Hankin Matthew Bejtlich Coconut Thinking #unfoldingaliveness #regenerative #education #soundecology #sustainability #multispecies #thriving #flourishing #regenerativeeducation #soundstories #planetaryhealth #ecologicaljustice #aliveness #unfolding #soundart #climatechange

When composer-curator Cameron Lam decides which arts projects to take on, these are the questions they ask: ➡ First, is it outside the scope of my current resources? If so, back-burner. No discussions, it can wait until I have access to enough time/money/flying monkeys to realise it. ➡ Second, is it something I can test out first in small format, or am I happy to take the plunge and commit a large amount of time to it – is the passion enough to last a few years? If I’m still excited to write something after a few months, that’s a good sign. ➡ Finally, is there a place for this, or are others around me excited for it? It is so much easier to push through the hard moments when you know you have an excited performer, audience, or supporters on the other end. Read more in our interview.