Just as a conductor’s preparatory “upbeat” gesture at the beginning of a performance influences the way an ensemble plays, we too get to choose our “upbeat”—our thoughts and attitudes—at the startdsfasdfd of each day, at the beginning of each class, and in our interactions with students and colleagues.

This book showcases the inspiring stories and innovative ideas of music educators who are implementing Social Emotional Learning (SEL) instruction with intentionality in their classrooms at the elementary, middle, and high school levels.

Every student deserves an excellent teacher, a fair chance at success, and the opportunity to participate in a school music program. With considerable depth and care—and wonderful practical suggestions—High Needs, Monumental Successes addresses the nuanced but critically important topic of teaching music to low-income and high-needs students.

Pain in the shoulder region is one of the most common problems afflicting instrumentalists, vocalists, and conductors alike. Musician, Heal Thyself! uses the principles of Body Mapping to free musicians of their shoulder pain, injury, and limitations, leading to more expressive and healthy music making.

This book is a straightforward, practical, easy-to-use tool to improve writing. Author Darrel Walters draws from his experience reading tens of thousands of pages as a university professor to create an essential reference and guide. Simple, Brief, and Precise is destined to become a highly valued companion to anyone aiming to make better use of the English language.

The videos and documents on this site showcase Professor Beyer’s artistic concepts, enabling teachers and performers to comprehend these concepts and exercises with greater understanding and providing them with a practical and understandable pathway to integrate these concepts into their ensemble rehearsals, their daily teaching, and their artistic work.

This beautiful collection of songs and games for elementary and middle school students showcases the vibrant and varied musical traditions of Tanzania, and in particular those of the Wagogo people of central Tanzania.

In this vibrantly illustrated picture book, meet 26 remarkable women musicians who collectively span over 1,000 years of music history and represent a diversity of cultures, races, professions, and abilities. Their incredible stories and beautiful work are sure to inspire a new generation of musicians!

Spring is in the air and the annual piano recital is only a week away! How will our young pianist learn her music in time? This delightful tale introduces Ana and her special friend Henry the Steinway—a grandfatherly piano who speaks to her!

This vibrant collection of folk songs and activities for elementary and middle school students explores the cultures and rich music traditions of four West African countries: Liberia, Senegal, Nigeria, and Ghana.

Voice Collectors is a vibrant collection of the many different musical traditions that come from the country of China. In this book, thirty-two Chinese men and women—representing a variety of ages, occupations, geographic regions, and ethnicities—joyfully recall their musical experiences and share popular or significant songs from their home provinces.

Even the big bad fox can’t resist joining the fun in this topsy-turvy folk song, part of a series of captivating picture books based on beloved songtales from the great American folk music tradition. The song’s catchy Mixolydian melody and comical depiction of Old Joe Clark have made this song an American favorite since the early 1900s.

Perfectly suited for students at the middle school, high school, and collegiate levels, Learning Harmony and Improvisation Using Conversational Solfege is the culmination of John M. Feierabend’s best-selling curriculum.

With its commitment to creating independent musical thinkers through the use of folk songs, Conversational Recorder is a visionary approach to recorder that builds music literacy and independence.

Lillie Feierabend has presented The Nutcracker for over twenty years to the delight of her entire school community. Join her as she guides the first, second, and third grade students of the Indianapolis Children’s Choir in dancing each character and discovering the delight of moving expressively and musically to the Movement Exploration themes.

In addition to creating Arioso, children will be able to sing some of the more accessible songs. This opera comes to life when children are invited to actively participate, to become each character and sing their songs, and to create Arioso to convey their thoughts and feelings.

In Weaving It All Together, author Heather Shouldice draws from her two decades of experience with Music Learning Theory (MLT) to present practical activities, ideas, and strategies to help elementary general music teachers thoughtfully and purposefully weave together the many instructional threads of MLT.

Imagine a conversation among leaders who are passionate about their general music teaching, who have found incredible power in Music Learning Theory (MLT), who exchange ideas about how to be successful in the classroom, and who are eager to share what they’ve learned with one another. This is the magic of Q & A for MLT.

The third revision of Jump Right In is easier to use and as musical as ever! This series includes audio files of the highest quality, is adaptable to the individual needs of your students, and features appropriate sequencing of activities to help students progress from sound to sight.

Habits of a Successful Beginner Band Musician is a field-tested, vital, and—most important—musical collection of 225 sequenced exercises for the beginning band student. The book’s cutting-edge online component, Habits Universal, features a backend gradebook that allows students to submit video recordings of their performances as a primary source of assessment.

This thought-provoking book contains seven high-level exchanges between a leading wind band practitioner and a music education philosopher. Each section of The Future of the Wind Band grapples with the most profound issues facing the music education profession and the path of instrumental music education in our schools.

Written by an all-star team of music educators with over two hundred years of combined experience and success, Foundations presents the fundamental elements necessary for building, maintaining, and growing a successful middle school band program.

Written by a team of authors from Texas, one of the strongest music education communities in the United States, this practical, personal, and conversational guide for aspiring and young instrumental music educators takes a comprehensive view of all aspects of building a successful school band program.

This is the story of the American wind band, told chronologically by those who experienced it in real time from 1835 to 1935. Through source documents and articles, Bryan Proksch takes us on an extraordinary journey from the time of the first brass bands in the 1830s, through the Civil War and the golden ages of Gilmore and Sousa, to the cusp of the wind ensemble just before World War II.

Developing and sustaining a successful band program is no easy task. But there is good news—understanding and implementing critical guiding principles will provide the motivation for consistent growth and productivity. Building a Band Program that Lasts will give you the essential tools you need for lasting success in band and life.

In partnership with Oxford University Press and authorized by the Vaughan Williams Charitable Trust, this major new initiative brings the incredible catalog of Ralph Vaughan Williams to the wind band community, with scholarly transcriptions by leaders in wind band composition.

This book was designed for use in a heterogenous brass methods class and as a reference source for school band and orchestra directors. It provides concise descriptions and recommendations for all brass instruments, including instrument similarities and differences, breath support, historical perspective, and transposition. The information is easily accessible and provides in-depth, yet practical knowledge for music educators, conductors, and students.

A unique resource for both novice and experienced band directors gathering effective teaching tools from the best in the field including more than 40 chapters dealing with every aspect of teaching instrumental music from curriculum to valuable websites. This best-selling and highly praised text has become the method of choice for university methods courses throughout the United States and Canada.

At a time when the calls for diversity, equity, and inclusion are stronger and more important than ever, The Horizon Leans Forward... amplifies the talent and voices of the many underrepresented communities in the wind band field. This significant volume takes an honest look at the past and present state of the wind band profession and lays out a bold and promising vision for the future, one in which there is an equitable and universal representation of all people in all areas of the field.

Volume 12 of the landmark Teaching Music through Performance in Band series continues the tradition of excellence—a resource that has become essential for every wind band conductor looking for the best repertoire or to gain insights from leaders of the profession. Like its predecessors, this mammoth volume includes Teacher Resource Guides for 100 significant works published for Grades 2 through 6, including works by Frank Ticheli, John Mackey, Julie Giroux, Ola Gjeilo, Michael Daugherty, Zhou Tian, and many more.

This book contains collective insights from some of the most inspirational high school orchestra directors in the United States. They reveal their ideas on rehearsal philosophy, rehearsal preparation, warm-up strategies, favorite repertoire, tone/bow control, intonation, articulation, expression, online instruction, recruiting and building community.

This advanced orchestral conducting resource features concise discussions of advanced technical and interpretive issues for 44 major orchestral works that all conductors will perform during their careers. All music examples have been faithfully reproduced from original scores, and Maestro Itkin has also arranged each excerpt for string quintet, ideal for the conducting class setting.

Music Theory for the Successful String Musician is the music theory and history curriculum string programs have been waiting for. In two carefully crafted books, author Christopher Selby presents a comprehensive and pedagogically sound sequence specifically for orchestral string students and also addresses questions and offers guidance in resolving problems that are unique to the orchestra classroom.

This collection of motets for SA(T)B voices is the ideal supplement for advanced choral conducting and rehearsal methods courses. Each brief motet incorporates musical characteristics that require conductors to execute a variety of skills and techniques, including dynamic changes, cues and preparations, tempo changes, legato and staccato patterns, the use of the left hand, and more.

In Creating Excellence in Choirs and Orchestras, noted scholar and conductor Dennis Shrock uncovers the key factors and proven strategies that lead to the achievement of excellence in music ensembles at any level, from youth and volunteer groups to professional ensembles.

Conductor, chorus director, airplane pilot, educator, activist, mentor, and advocate Margaret Hillis blazed a trail upon which many continue to tread. The first woman to regularly conduct a major symphony orchestra, she was the founder of the Chicago Symphony Chorus and served for thirty-seven years as its first director, winning nine Grammy Awards.

Choral conductors shoulder a great responsibility as custodians of their craft. And there is perhaps no better source of inspiration and guidance for today’s conductors than the experiences and insights of choral giants who have blazed the trail we now tread. In Search of Inspiration is a collection of in-depth interviews with fifteen highly respected choral conductors from around the world

In Becoming the Choral Poet, esteemed conductor and teacher Jerry McCoy shares how choral conductors can guide their ensembles to deeper artistic expression through an understanding of and commitment to the poetic expression and emotional content of the words they sing.

In The Musician’s Empathy, James Jordan argues for both awareness and understanding of the essential role Empathy plays in honest musicianship. Jordan states that our awareness of what Empathy is (and is not) will build both new human depth and new connection within the rehearsal room and concert hall.

Help your students Level Up! their sight-reading skills using their minds and ears, as well their voices! Level Up! is a sequential, interactive, and comprehensive resource built from the authors’ decades of research and experience teaching students of all levels and ages.

Jason Max Ferdinand's book Teaching With Heart is the first book to directly help us address the societal issues in our choral rehearsals. Not attempting to separate the music from social issues, this new tool in the classroom uses musical examples to address uncomfortable topics and hopefully 'open minds and hearts.'

Thirteen prominent designers and educators in the marching arts provide insight into their philosophy and creative process for marching band show design and share innovative teaching strategies related to visual fundamentals, visual ensemble, and generating effects that cause audience reaction.

Mastering Sight-Reading for Keyboard Percussion is designed for any performance level. The exercises included can be utilized in a multitude of different methods to allow beginners to succeed and also challenging professional musicians. These are great exercises to incorporate as part of a daily warm-up routine.

At 19 years old, Saul Goodman became timpanist with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra under renowned conductor Arturo Toscanini. Forty-six years later, he retired as one of the most celebrated orchestral musicians of all time. During his illustrious career as composer, inventor, and timpanist, he performed on over 1,000 recordings, placed his students in the world’s major symphony orchestras, and set standards in percussion performance and pedagogy that remain in place to this day.

Written for drumline instructors, arrangers, and performers at all levels, Drumline Gold reveals the philosophies, lessons, and mindsets of over 20 of the most brilliant, creative, and successful game-changers in the marching percussion activity.

Although many of the greatest composers from the Baroque, Classical, and Romantic periods did not write for marimba, their works are still available and are perfectly suited for this instrument. Many of these works were written for violin and contain bowings and fingerings that assist in the stylistic interpretation for violin but do not apply to marimba. To that end, Tammy Chen has arranged a collection of outstanding pieces that work perfectly for marimba.

This publication combines book 1 and 2 of this innovative, popular method. It provides a highly organized, systematic approach to reading and understanding rhythm for the beginning-intermediate percussionist. Basic rhythm patterns including counting system and foot-taping indications are introduced on each page in 8-measure studies followed by a short solo serving as a page summary and motivational tool for students.