Grade 9ers tune in, turn on
11 schools get music workshop 500 novices form giant ensemble
Fighting a bout of laryngitis, conductor Roman Yasinsky croaked a plea for silence and then waited patiently while a cacophony inevitably rose from a mass of Grade 9 musicians. Only seconds later, however, a remarkable thing happened. The 500 students stopped making noise and, at Yasinsky’s signal, began making music — together. To Colleen Bobbie, 14, that kind of togetherness is the beauty of being in the high school band. “Everyone is one band and one sound. If one person hits a wrong note, we all get a wrong note. But when we perform, we’re all one,” said the St. Aloysius Gonzaga student.
It was the second year the DufferinPeel Catholic District School Board held an instrumental clinic for its Grade 9 musicians. Last year, about 400 students participated. This year, with 500 musicians from 11 high schools, organizers moved the clinic from Gonzaga to the ballroom of an airport hotel. Most of the students had only been playing their instruments since September. They spent the morning yesterday in small groups tutored by 15 board teachers who specialize in the various instruments. Then they came together in a mass ensemble under the direction of Yasinsky, a veteran music teacher at St. Joan of Arc Catholic Secondary School in Mississauga.
“Arts equal smarts. Making music makes us smarter,” said Yasinsky of the challenge of bringing so many inexperienced musicians together. Instrumental music demands student musicians make the “ fantastic step” into a special world of non- verbal communication where they have to simultaneously play, watch the conductor and listen to the musicians around them. With their home music teachers cheering enthusiastically, the giant band of 11 school groups met that challenge on a selection of pieces including a jazz standard, a processional and a few Christmas tunes.
Instrumental programs that encourage musical literacy — as well as performance — develop leadership, organizational skills and communication, say the three Gonzaga music teachers, who organized the event.
“ You can be musically illiterate and play. Anyone can learn to play, but literacy is understanding the terms. Today is about music literacy,” said Mark Spisic. High school bands build student confidence too. “ I’ve seen kids afraid to say a word in Grade 9. By Grade 12, they’re giving class speeches,” he said.
Thirty to 40 per cent of students have had private piano or guitar lessons before they get to high school, but few have played wind instruments. Most arrive wanting to play the clarinets, trumpets or flutes, but that’s not enough to make much of band.
Brian Li, 14, was surprised to be handed a tuba when he started at St. Francis Xavier Secondary in Mississauga, but the instrument is growing on him.
“ My teacher said I’d do well and I trusted him,” he shrugged.