No Song this Morning

(A final post from the Denver AOSA conference by POSA veep Mark Anderson)

And just like that, it's all over but the shuttling to the airport to catch the cheap crowded flight home.

There's a post-Orff letdown that comes after any of our gatherings. We are a different breed of teacher, and while so much of our work involves building musical community among our charges, those charges are, first and foremost, children. What we do with them, we do in isolation from others like us. While the kids get it, have a deep understanding of what it is we are doing, better than any of the adults we work with every day, they cannot be the community we crave most: a community of musical peers, of fellow travelers who are both saturated as we are with music, and are old enough to know how special that is.

I've been to big music education gatherings sponsored by other organizations. As a grad student at Illinois, I was part of the huge contingent we sent to the national MENC convention in Chicago in 1984. The following summer, I was able to attend the ISME world conference in Eugene. I heard incredible performances, attended workshops with nationally and internationally renowned educators, and was in the company of hundreds of colleagues. Neither made an impression on me. State association gatherings have similarly had no impact, no afterglow.

Things were different while I was in ministry--different, at least, in the sense that gatherings of both clergy and laity get community, know how powerful it is to sing together, think together, be together. Unfortunately, the power of Methodist singing, as inspiring as it can be for those who are engaged in it, as magically as it can turn a bitter disagreement into a moment for prayer and some kind of unity, is only a taste of what gathered musical zealots.

I found Orff five years after leaving ministry, and much to my delight, was instantly at home. It started with a drum circle, the opening activity of Orff 101, September 2005. Rosalie worked her special magic, and I was hooked. It continued with my first Doug Goodkin workshop. In both cases, I felt my heart synchronize with kindred spirits, felt myself become part of something far greater than myself, and left energized and empowered to begin the hard work of transforming my conventional classroom into a place where musical magic could happen.

Workshops were great, but nothing compared to trainings: Level I, the Jazz Course, Level II, Level III. Summers without a training felt somehow empty. After the last four days, I know that what was lacking was not so much the training, or even the workshop atmosphere, as it was the company of my fellow Orff practitioners, and the magic we make when we sing together, play together, dance together, create together.

The only other place I've found this spirit is in the world of improv, and I highly recommend it to all of you. Improvisers practice the art of "yes and..." It means taking what's given to you by your fellow performers and, rather than denying it, embracing it, making it bigger, better, more wonderful. It's precisely what we who practice Orff do when we create together, though in the dramatic (and usually comedic), rather than the musical, sphere.

But this was not an improv conference. It was all music, all the time. This morning did not start with song, and it felt to me like I missed my morning devotions. This tells me I need to make some adjustments to my own spiritual practice, building more solo keyboard into my day when I'm not able to perform with others. It also tells me I need very much to keep participating in these events, to never miss a workshop, to make plans for future conferences and, if possible, master classes. I encourage the same regimen for you. It will make all the difference not just to your teaching, but to your life.
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Viva la musica!