Instrumental Rehearsal Research Articles

Developing Musical Expression in Instrumental Ensembles

Musical expression is often not explicitly addressed in secondary instrumental rehearsals due to the perception of expression as an obscure concept and the instructional time constraints on music educators. Secondary music educators, however, are encouraged to discuss expressive performance goals with instrumental students from the beginning of formal instruction. The three most common methods of teaching expression in music include metaphor, aural modeling, and explicit instruction regarding instrumental techniques. With the use of plainly stated performance goals, music educators can help clarify the concept of and expectations for expressivity for instrumental students.

Resolving room volume and structural vibration transfer issues at UW Green Bay’s Studio Arts Building

The primary rehearsal spaces for the orchestral, band, and choral programs in the Music Department at the University of Wisconsin—Green Bay are hosted at the campus’ Studio Arts building, which was constructed in the early 1970’s and had not been significantly updated since then. The goal of the building’s renovation was to improve room acoustic response for both spaces, improve on the insufficient acoustic isolation between the large instrumental and choral rehearsal rooms, and to update HVAC services. Because of the many years of wear and undocumented alterations to the building, exploratory testing of airborne and structure-borne vibration paths was necessary to determine the contributing means of sound transfer between spaces. Acoustically isolated construction ultimately was utilized to increase separation between rooms as well as to introduce acoustic shaping to the choral rehearsal room, to maximize reverberation and avoid the typical acoustic pitfalls of a roughly cubic room volume. A new reflector array was installed in the large instrumental rehearsal room, as well as targeted absorptive and diffusive treatments. New variable acoustic treatments were designed and installed in both rooms, while noise and vibration control for new HVAC equipment realized suitably low background noise levels for both.The primary rehearsal spaces for the orchestral, band, and choral programs in the Music Department at the University of Wisconsin—Green Bay are hosted at the campus’ Studio Arts building, which was constructed in the early 1970’s and had not been significantly updated since then. The goal of the building’s renovation was to improve room acoustic response for both spaces, improve on the insufficient acoustic isolation between the large instrumental and choral rehearsal rooms, and to update HVAC services. Because of the many years of wear and undocumented alterations to the building, exploratory testing of airborne and structure-borne vibration paths was necessary to determine the contributing means of sound transfer between spaces. Acoustically isolated construction ultimately was utilized to increase separation between rooms as well as to introduce acoustic shaping to the choral rehearsal room, to maximize reverberation and avoid the typical acoustic pitfalls of a roughly cubic room volume. A new reflecto...

Linguistic Indicators of Reflective Practice Among Music Education Majors

The purpose of this study was to examine linguistic indicators of reflective practice in preservice music teachers’ written reflections following peer-teaching experiences. In an instrumental rehearsal techniques course, eight preservice music educators completed four peer-teaching episodes and submitted a written reflection after each episode. Reflections were analyzed with Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count software to examine students’ usage of pronouns (first-person singular, first-person plural, third-person singular, and third-person plural), temporal focus words (past-, present-, and future-focused words), and affect words (positive- and negative-emotion words). Results indicated significantly more first-person singular words over all other types of pronouns, fewer future-focused words than past- or present-focused words, and more positive-emotion words than negative-emotion words. These linguistic results were observed across all episodes (i.e., they did not change across time). Results are interpreted in light of previous linguistic analysis literature, and implications for music teacher educators are discussed.

Programming remediation to a newly complete performing arts center

A large new performing arts building at a university included an 800-seat recital hall, proscenium theater, black box theater, large instrumental rehearsal room, choral rehearsal room, and practice rooms. It was designed with attention to acoustics concerns throughout, but the final results left the owner with a myriad of problems. These problems included poor hearing conditions in the large performance space, intrusion of exterior environmental noise, excessive mechanical system noise and vibration, and inexplicable lack of separation between rehearsal rooms that were separated by an STC 70+ wall. The authors parsed through the complaints and field conditions to extract a range of reasons for the problems. The paper presents the analysis techniques for these challenges and shows options that were developed for practical solutions.

Influence of Primary Performance Instrument and Education Level on Music Performance Evaluation

The purpose of this study was to examine the impact that education level and primary performance instrument have on the evaluation of music performances. Participants (N = 423) in the study were middle school (n = 187), high school (n = 113), and college (n = 123) musicians who performed on either a brass (n = 115) or a nonbrass (n = 301) instrument. They listened to six junior high trumpet performances by players of various abilities. Results indicated statistically significant findings on six of seven performance subareas for the interaction of education level and performer, and significant main effects for performance instrument, education level, and performer. For many subarea-by-performer interactions, middle and high school students rated performances lower than did college students. In all performance areas (except melodic accuracy), there was a strong lack of influence for instrument (brass, nonbrass) on evaluation. The results suggest that it may be prudent to incorporate activities that help develop evaluation skills in middle and high school instrumental rehearsals.

The Use of Recorded Models in the Instrumental Rehearsal

The Use of Recorded Models in the Instrumental Rehearsal

Conceptual Teaching in Instrumental Rehearsals

Conceptual Teaching in Instrumental Rehearsals

Verbal Instruction in Instrumental Rehearsals: A Comparison of Three Career Levels and Preservice Teachers

Part 1 of this study was an investigation of the verbal instruction used during 60 rehearsals by expert, novice, and student teachers. Frequency distributions were established for 15 performance variables and 10 rehearsal variables and comments as well as for the number of complete sequential patterns of instruction. Part 2 was a pre-experimental study to determine changes in instruction evidenced by preservice teachers (22 rehearsals) exposed to guided observation as part of an instrumental methods course. Evidence suggests that all three groups of teachers address rhythm/tempo the most frequently. Expert teachers devoted more time to overall ensemble sound (including more demonstrations, instruction/explanations on intonation, and guided listening); of their rehearsal segments, 23% were complete sequential patterns. Novice teachers spent the most time tuning individual notes, whereas student teachers spent the most time correcting wrong notes. Gains for the undergraduates included less emphasis on wrong notes and greater emphasis on rhythm/tempo and style. The percentage of complete sequential patterns of instruction used by undergraduates nearly tripled with minimal training.

Time Use in Instrumental Rehearsals: A Comparison of Experienced, Novice, and Student Teachers

Sixty instrumental music rehearsals were videotaped to measure the use of rehearsal time by three groups of teachers. Rehearsals were equally divided among those conducted by experienced teachers, novice teachers, and student teachers at the middle and high school levels. Dependent variables included preparation time, initial teacher talk, time in warm-up, time during each musical selection, breaks, final teacher talk, and dismissal. Variables were measured in real time and converted to percentages of class period. The primary variables for teaching activities were time spent in verbal instruction, nonverbal modeling, verbal discipline (disapproval-social), and performance. Findings include: student teachers talked most and allowed students to play least; experienced teachers provided the most break time, divided rehearsal time more equally between a warm-up and two musical selections, spent more than half the period on performance, used the most nonverbal modeling got the ensembles on-task the quickest, and talked the I least during rehearsals.

Teach Your Instrumental Students to Listen

The instrumental rehearsal makes learning listening skills not only possible but necessary. Using specific examples, James Byo shows how to promote active, thoughtful listening in your students.

Planning an Instrumental Rehearsal

STUDY of the activities of music teachers and supervisors will reveal that the element of planning, so vital to all modern life, is found in widely varying degrees. It is seldom found in its completeness. Often its presence is almost negligible. No one will deny the importance of planning in any kind of teaching. There may be some doubt as to how far it may apply, and as to how thoroughly it should be done. Since rehearsals occupy a goodly share of the attention of the school music teacher and supervisor of today, and since many of the points which apply to the rehearsal may also apply to class and private lessons, the purpose of this article is to offer some sugtions on the problem, Planning an Instrumental Rehearsal.