I ran across a really interesting break down of occupational claims created in a data visualization platform called Flare. In it you can search for a specific occupation and the percentage that occupation takes up in the work force. If you search for “musician” you find that the number of people claiming this (or music teacher) [...]
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Hello everyone, thanks to all those who attended Circles and Lines last night, and apologies to those who visit to read articles or download sheet music. To the article/sheet music viewers, I’ve been focusing all my attention on that concert for a while now, hence the extremely light posting. But I did get a review in [...] Regardless of your standing on the effects and benefits of the No Child Left Behind Act (Public Law 107-110), the most recent large scale education reform, the NCLB has had a profound negative effect on music and the arts in general in public schools. Robert Lynch provided statistics in The Hill when the act was coming back up for re authorization in 2007:
This is fairly significant. My introduction to the viola was through the local public school system in Cleveland. An education surely should provide for the basic skills necessary for children to grow into functioning members of society (high school level math and reading levels), but it should also be far more. Any education should provide a broad pallet of topics so students can explore their interests and develop their dreams. When I was attending the music academy/festival California Summer Music, the quartet I was placed in was asked to play an outreach for the local music program. The students at the public school there were largely the sons and daughters of migrant workers in northern-California’s garlic fields. After the program, we were taken out to lunch by one of the members of the school’s PTA and she related a chilling story about how the NCLB act had wrecked the music program at the school. In general, to meet the proficiency-standards in math and reading set by the state, music programs all over the country are moved off of school hours to accommodate more class time for these two topics (the only subjects taken under consideration in the NCLB’s standardized testing). The problem that this particular school had, was that moving the music program directly after school conflicted with athletics. This led it to be put further after athletics, giving the students and staff time to eat dinner. Since the music program was so late after school ended, none of the district’s buses were available to take students home with out paying time and a half, which considering the budgets of most local districts, wouldn’t fly with the board. With this change, the music program instantly lost half of its students. This, for the reasons I expressed above, is tragic. Not only are we thinning our artistic talent pool, and subsequently our ability to export culture and ideas, but we are removing an enriching experience from our children’s lives, regardless of their intent on whether to become a professional artist. Yesterday’s arts section in the New York Times had a nice reflection on Lincoln Center by Anthony Tommasini. In it he talks about criticism leveled at the performing arts center and then spends time reflecting on -and largely rejecting- these criticisms. I’ll take a look at some of his conclusions and add some of my own. Nothing [...] In the Sunday edition of the New York Times’ Arts & Leisure section, Matthew Gurewitsch wrote and unbelievably horrible pseudo-science article on music psychology called Concerto In the Key Of Rx Retardation. Now the principal issue with this article is that it takes simple properties of music (and one misguided music producer) and blows the science behind it out of proportion. This is one of the worst things the media can do to science, as it misinforms the public by either taking things out of context or blowing a simple conclusion out of proportion. The sad thing is that the writer begins the article by referencing one of the biggest musico-media-malpractices of occur in my memory, The Mozart Effect. « Continue reading “A New York Times Fluff Piece” » |
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