Monroe Philosophy

8/14/2019 Monroe Philosophy

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PHILOSOPHY OF STUDIO MUSIC EDUCATION

Douglas Monroe

My philosophy of studio music education centers around two basic ideas. First, Iview it as my task to help students develop the clarinet as a mechanism to reach the ideas

and emotions which make them distinctly original, creative people. Secondly, I do not

view the studio as several one-on-one musical encounters; it is a combination of several

distinct personalities with divergent outlooks on life and music. The challenge for the

studio teacher is to create a congenial, team-oriented atmosphere so all can benefit from

each others’ strengths and weaknesses, regardless of level of performance and life

experience.

Helping a student learn to express their individuality through the clarinet is

primarily accomplished through one-on-one private lessons. There are several basic areasof technical development which are common to all students. These basic techniques

include basic finger technique, articulation, embouchure formation, and reed/mouthpiece

issues among others. I have designed a series of technical “warm-up” exercises aimed at

isolating finger motion while at the same time giving the student the opportunity to work

on tone production issues involving voicing and airflow. These are exercises I would

expect each student in the studio to work on regardless of performance level. Another

series of exercises I have for each student involves articulation. The goal with this series

is not only to develop speed and a variety of articulation styles, but also to create a

centered, focused sound on the clarinet. The main focus on these articulation exercises is

tongue position as prescribed by early twentieth century clarinet pedagogue DanielBonade. The other areas of individual lessons, advanced technical and musical

development, would depend solely on the student’s level of performance. In Daniel

Barenboim’s book, A Life in Music, he emphasizes that technical and expressive training

occurs simultaneously. There are several excellent technical studies and scale books for

students of varying levels. I emphasize, even with these exercises, elements of phrasing

rather than simply playing the notes on the page for technical accuracy. Scale books are

wonderful for introducing concepts like William Kincaid’s ideas on note-grouping. I use

many different etude books to help students to develop technique while learning

expression. The solo repertoire is also rich with music to accomplish these same things. I

also believe that all students should be preparing orchestral excerpts.

In my individual lessons, the two questions the student and I will answer are

“What is the composer trying to communicate emotionally through this music?” and

“What can we do to express that emotion?” I hope to emphasize with my students the

collaborative effort between composer and performer. In many cases, this is the most

difficult part of a student’s development, but something I aggressively pursue with every

student. Among the issues surrounding expression, I focus heavily on direction of line

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and tone color to evoke desired emotions. Some of this type of work requires the student

to emulate my ideas on a given piece of music. The ultimate goal, however, is to help the

student learn to make these decisions on their own based on their knowledge of music

theory and music history as well as their own emotional responses to the music. I have

found that many believe they cannot start to think about these questions until they have

reached a certain level of maturity technically, but I believe this process is vital at alllevels.

I believe it is critically important for the entire studio to work together as a whole

for the benefit of each other as individuals. A purely competitive attitude can hinder the

development of individuals. My methods involve each student in the process of working

together to achieve the ultimate goals of musical communication for the individual. This

takes place primarily in studio classes. If I can get students to fix their eyes on the long-

term future rather than their short time at school, I can get them to understand that

cooperation at school will help each of them to succeed in the competitive nature of the

real world. This begins with individual performances in studio classes followed by truecriticism from peers. This is classical criticism in which a professional dialogue begins

over the musical strengths and weaknesses of a particular performance. Too often,

students think of criticism as a negative experience. I ask my students to each share

something positive and an area for improvement over their peers’ performances. I

encourage students to leave the protective portion of their ego at the door so that they can

achieve a sense of working together to achieve all of their goals as musicians. I encourage

students to play for each other on their own time during the week, whether in ensemble

rehearsal or in the practice room, so that they can continue this dialogue.

Another important aspect of community dialogue has to do with ensemble performance. The best way to do this is through sectional rehearsal of wind ensemble/

band music, since these groups involve so many of the clarinetists in the studio. I would

coordinate with the director of bands to determine their priorities on the music and I

would lead the clarinet section in achieving these goals. This serves important purposes;

it gets the clarinet students to think of each other as a team working together to achieve

musical goals and it helps cohesion for ensembles in which they perform.

My approach in achieving all these performance goals is nearly identical for each

student regardless of their specific major. To be truly effective as a performer, educator,

musicologist, composer, or any other musical discipline requires that the musician

understands how to express themselves on their instrument. Otherwise, our profession

would be full of musicians who have less artistic substance to bring to their particular

area of expertise. My studio goal is to graduate responsible musicians.

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Monroe Philosophy

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