Preparing for concerts and MPA Through effective rehearsal
Day to day warm-ups and tips for the developing director
What’s in a good warm-up?
Tone Quality
Intonation
Balance and Blend
Precision
Basic Musicianship
Interpretive Musicianship
General Factors
NCBDA Concert band adjudication form
Tone quality
-This is the most important factor
-This should be a non-negotiable for your group each day
-Longtones
-First 5 notes
-Scale exercises (breathing)
-Remington F, Bb, Bb (must switch octaves)
-Be sure your students have access to what a good sound is
intonation
-This goes directly with TONE!
-Find a way to sound a drone during your long tones
-F around the room
-Korg tuner and the Tuner Caddy
-Tonal energy app, Bandmate tuner app, Harmony Director
Balance and blend
-This goes directly with TONE!
-BAD sounds are impossible to blend
-Chorales as a full ensemble and as sections
-Sections of your music
precision
-Metronome with all warm ups especially in middle school
-Utilize your percussion also to help with time
-Don’t conduct (allow students to be responsible for pulse)
-Float around the room during all warm ups and rehearsal
-The sooner you realize you are not in control of your ensembles pulse the better
-SCALES!!!
Basic Musicianship
Add any of following to your long tones each day:
-Dynamics (exercises at different volume levels)
-Articulations
3 types (staccato, tenuto, accent)
-Tempos (exercises at different speeds)
Interpretive musicianship
-YOU and your STUDENTS finally get to make some musical choices and should collaborate with each other to do so
-Sightreadings are crucial to this
-Chorales are crucial to this
-Talking about what the music really means and what the composer is trying to convey
-These items will be discussed further in our afternoon session
General Factors
-Your students performance in your warm ups will be what they default to in concerts and when under pressure. (think about that one for a minute)
-Do you know what you want from your program and your students?
-The last statement should be changing all the time
-Reflection on what is going well and not so well must be a part of your constant planning each year
-These items will be discussed further in our afternoon session
Rhythm exercises
Take time to work on rhythm in the concert band setting each day.
It is not a sprint it is a marathon!
-I want you all to remember that your group will get better and grow even when it is not as evident to you
-The kids will do what you ask of them
-If you never warm up then that will be the norm each day
-If you warm up for 50 minutes a day then that will be the norm
-It should be something that is in constant flux
-The week before the gig your warm ups and rehearsal should be concert program centric