ALT/space

Approximately 2:30 am Monday, Driving from Atlanta to Louisville

Approximately 8:40 am, Arrive at Kentucky Juvenile Facility and begin unloading car

1st Young Man: Morning Ms. Allison!

Me: Morning Guys!

2nd Young Man: Can we help you with the equipment?

Me: Sure sweetie. I’ll bring the things in from the car and I’ll need you to take them on into the classroom. Y’all know how to set everything up, just be careful.

Group of Young Men: Ok! Yes, M’am!

(Another young man joins the group)

3rd Young Man: MS. ALLISON!!!

Me: Huh?

3rd young man: Where did you get that fit? It’s tight!  If I give you some money would you get me some? Man, that is the bomb!

Me: Hang on guys, let’s talk after I finish getting everything out of the car.

(I leave the building heading back to my car. Immediately, I grab my phone and call my stepson who is home sick.)

Me: Sweetie, what’s a “fit”? One of the boys just said he loved my “fit” but I have no idea what he’s talking about.

Stepson: Outfit.

Me: Ohhhhh. Okay, thanks sweetie.

(I re-enter the building.)

Me: So you like my fit guys? I got it from the flea market.

Young Men: Continue to talk to me about my fit as we set up the recording equipment.

For years, I was anemic. If it was anything less than 75 degrees outside I was freezing and I wore sweat suits all the time. My husband, at the time, finally got fed up with the Walmart sweats that I wore and took me to the local flea market. He insisted that if I was determined to wear them the least I could do was be fashionable. We bought thick sweat suits with hoods and some had stripes down the sides. I bought sneakers and some of them even matched the sweat suits. Finally I was warm! But, it never occurred to me to think of my clothes as a way to reach my young juvenile delinquents.

When the young men saw me in these sweat suits, it was as if I’d won the “cool points” lottery. They loved making music and recording CDs with me but seeing me in these hooded sweat suits somehow changed their perception of how they could interact with me. They began to share things about their “outside” lives in ways that they never did before. They always wanted to stay and play on the equipment but now they also wanted to stay and talk to me. It was an eye opening experience for me to say the least.

After that experience I began to pay more attention to the outer me that my students meet. Many times, I’d dress to be taken seriously as a professional for the principal and teacher but realized that that could be a barrier in getting younger people to trust me enough to make art with me. Again, I began looking for common ground and this is where I’ve found it for me. It’s all in the fit.

When I’m working in a middle school or high school, I make sure that the first day I share my love of shoes. Whether it’s my zebra striped boots or my pink plaid peep toes, the teenage girls LOVE them. They talk to me because they want to know where I shop. They stop me in hallways to chat about shoes and ask when I’m coming to their class. They want to know what I do and it allows me to begin a dialogue. I can tell the difference in their initial perceptions of me because sometimes my arthritis flares up and I can’t wear my high heels and then it seems that I have to work harder for their acceptance because they perceive me as old and out of touch.

Sometimes, my clothes actually become part of my lesson plan. Just recently, while teaching an 8^th grade unit on the ancient civilizations of Mali, Ghana, and Songhai, I wore a caftan with an Adinkra symbol of Sankofa printed front and back. It’s the image of a bird flying backward with an egg in its mouth. It means “to go back and get it”, the “it” being wisdom. The students and I were able to talk about the Ghanaian traditions of using fabric and symbols to communicate and we did an art project that allowed them to create their own Adinkra inspired fabrics. As we worked, we began to speculate about enslaved Africans continuing the traditions here in the US during slavery and what meaning that could possibly have held.

Those young men crossed my mind again as I chose to wear all African clothing while teaching 3rd and 4th graders in a remote area of Alabama. The children asked me if I was from Africa, why did I wear those clothes, what was that in my hair (beads), etc. In Alabama, I didn’t choose to use my clothing in a direct lesson this time, but I wanted to subtly expose them to the idea that people who dress or look differently that you are not the enemy. They can love you and be nice, they just look different. If not for that long ago experience in a Kentucky juvenile facility, I would never have thought to use my clothing choices as a way of finding common ground in the classroom. Now, in addition to my planning time, I always spend time looking for the perfect fit.

Allison Upshaw is also known as “MzOpera”, and for the last 13 years she’s worked as a Performing Arts Integration Consultant/ Teaching Artist in AL, AR, GA, TN and SC. Her background includes two degrees in Voice Performance from Oberlin Conservatory and Louisiana State University, a union card from the Actor’s Equity Association, years of studying African influenced dance, and a stint as a college instructor of voice and acting. Allison provides residencies, workshops and professional development in arts integration. In 2012, she had the privilege of being selected to present at the 1st International Teaching Artist Conference in Oslo, Norway.

Also by Allison Upshaw in ALT/space:
Finding Common Ground 

My work with at risk youth began because I needed a job. I went in spite of being afraid and, over the course of the next three years, I met some of the most creative souls I’ve ever known. I even still have copies of the music they created. No, none of it is great by music industry standards, but I watched those boys struggle to recognize notes on a keyboard, to actually write out their thoughts on paper so they could record them as rap songs later, and to control their urges to strike out at others so that they would be allowed to come to my class and I hoped I could live up to their expectations.

I too was struggling in those classes. I had NO idea what I was really doing. Wasn’t it Sesame Street that had the little game “One of these things is not like the other”? I kept playing my version of it and thinking which of these things didn’t belong: juvenile jail, opera, teaching artist or all of the above? I struggled with frustration, fear, and doubts. I struggled to understand the slang that was an entirely different language from the English I spoke. I had to learn fast because they would try to insert gang related things in their raps. They would ask me about the music business and how to get a record deal. I had to tell them that I didn’t know but that I would try to find out. I shared with them my own journey in trying to find out the answers for them. I had to call friends and spend time in the library. I read articles and books on the hip hop industry so that I could give them a list of resources. One day we even took time to figure out exactly how rappers make their money and it’s not from the record sales.

Collaboration skills were nonexistent. I had to remind them over and over that they didn’t have be friends with everyone in their work groups. They simply had to find common ground in order to create this music. I spoke bluntly about my expectations for their behavior and boundaries. Actually, I told them that I knew they had to take their meds but they didn’t know if I’d taken mine that day so they should play nice. That sounds awful doesn’t it? Perhaps it was but these young men were in for serious crimes: assault, assault with a deadly weapon, rape of a 4 year old child, grand theft auto - stolen police car, etc. I couldn’t afford to show anything but truth to them. These teens were not the same people that I worked with in “normal” classrooms around the country. There were armed guards at ALL times in each class yet I never had any physical incidents within my classroom. As a matter of fact, the boys themselves made sure that there were no physical issues in the classroom. They would remind others of the rules that I’d stated on the first day and at least one time I know that there was a fight immediately after they left my classroom.

My heart bled for them and they taught me so much about loving the seemingly unloveable. I worried though that what I was able to give them wasn’t enough, would never be enough. One day, weeks into a particular residency, I saw a young gang leader, notorious in the city of Louisville, stand side by side with a young man from the mountains who couldn’t read, write or barely speak intelligibly, and help him record a “song” by writing down what he wanted to say and whispering the words to him line by line for him to repeat as I recorded his efforts. That day I saw the arts cross cultural and racial barriers, spit in the face of peer pressure and give voice to those from whom silence had been demanded and I knew that whatever I was doing was actually reaching them. I remember these young men and I smile.

It is my experience with these young men that kinesthetically shaped how I learn from my students and how I teach them. I learned that truth is the only defense I have in the face of a student’s fears. I learned that if I share who I am, they will not only share who they are but they will believe me when I tell them they have much to offer and that there are better ways to interact with the world. I learned that I could share my love of opera and they may not like it, but they could respect my love of it because I took time to share it with them. I haven’t worked with this extreme group of at risk youth in a long time but I try to use the most important lesson that they taught me every single day. What is that lesson you ask? It is simply this. The very act of sincerely, not superficially, attempting to find common ground with my students, lays a foundation of trust upon which I can build a successful residency no matter the age or demographics.

Allison Upshaw is also known as “MzOpera”, and for the last 13 years she’s worked as a Performing Arts Integration Consultant/ Teaching Artist in AL, AR, GA, TN and SC. Her background includes two degrees in Voice Performance from Oberlin Conservatory and Louisiana State University, a union card from the Actor’s Equity Association, years of studying African influenced dance, and a stint as a college instructor of voice and acting. Allison provides residencies, workshops and professional development in arts integration. In 2012, she had the privilege of being selected to present at the 1st International Teaching Artist Conference in Oslo, Norway.

A class of 4th graders came in with a poem. It was for a residency I designed using songwriting to explore the relationship between literary voice, choices in musical composition, and how revision plays a vital role in expressing oneself in both media. It was a great project, but not a lot of time in which to do it. I had two half hour sessions with them to turn it into a song that they could perform with me in an assembly. The poem had been written by two of their number; it was lovely, brief, and expressive. Our first session consisted of finding a melody for it and editing the text to make it more rhythmic, more performable. My process was to listen to their words and group-recited rhythms, and then offer musical ideas for them to vote on. (I love the whole voting thing, in a situation where I must provide musical material for a group it enables them make concrete choices and own the composition that results.)

The poem included internal rhymes and half rhymes, its rhythms were quite irregular; in total it was challenging to set it melodically. Once they were able to recite the first two lines rhythmically as a group, they began to gravitate around several pitches. I pointed this out to them and they chose to use it as the main melody of the song. All in all, the first session went well — they had definite opinions about how the song was progressing and achieved consensus repeatedly on the various points of composition.

In the interim I did some planning in order to better proceed in our next session. I thought the song was a good start, but a bit repetitive and directionless. I mulled it around, played it and tried several ideas that I could present to the kids next time. I was unimpressed with what I came up with. At least I was happy that I had thought it through…expending that energy on it, even though not productive of solid notes or even ideas, gave me a foundation and a familiarity with the material that would form the basis of later work with it.

Coming back together with the class, we rehearsed what we had done and tried several solutions for the final section. Nothing inspiring.

“So, okay,” I thought to myself “I’ve got nothing and they’ve got nothing, we need to get a new perspective or something to kickstart this sucker.”

I started asking the class questions, just simple things like “which word is most important here?” or “would you like to hear the melody go up or down?” (I don’t remember exactly, it was off the cuff. Though I had recorded the first session I did not record the second one. I very much wish that I had!)

One girl suggested the melody go up. We tried something and talked some more. One boy suggested that we hold out the last syllable of the word “survive.” (I love comments like these two, it shows me that they are really thinking at the cusp of language and melody.) I noodled around a little more with chords on the guitar and sang some notes for them.

It was at this point that something clicked for me. I believe it was a function of my failed pre-compositional trials and particularly the two comments from students. I tried a chromatic chord and a couple of notes that fit the harmony. Both the kids and I went “ooooh.” We sang it together: it ascended and held the syllable previously suggested, only now it started to move somewhere. Then I got the idea to climb even higher and put the melody on the 7th of a chord. This is all upping the difficulty for young singers and I hesitated to ask it of them, but when I demonstrated it for them they cheered and insisted on it. It came out with a rather dramatic, pop/R&B kind of climax that the kids loved, and they sang it beautifully.

This takes so long to explain verbally and I know that some readers probably have to skim over details like “chromatic chords” and “7ths.” But what I really adore about this little story is that after hitting a wall, we as a group worked out a solution that even with my blahdiblah years of experience I couldn’t come up with alone. The kids were into the song all along, but when this clicked they totally loved it. I did too. The denouement was a flash, but it only could have happened because of the previous work and the open cooperation of a group interested in finding a solution.

Jay Albert is a musician and educator. His professional vision is to share music and help people achieve more of a connection to it, whether helping students learn to play or “teaching” an audience by means of a performance. He founded his company Songdog Music to further that vision. Jay holds degrees in guitar, music theory and composition from Baldwin Wallace Conservatory of Music and Kent State University. He has taught at both of his alma maters and elsewhere, from PreK to graduate level, and has presented at and supervised arts education departments for several organizations. Contact Jay  www.songdogmusic.com

Also by Jay Albert in ALT/space:
Birth of a Song
Finding the In Door to Music

One day Hans (eight years of age) came to his lesson with a song he had written on his guitar (I use the term “written” to mean composed and remembered, not necessarily put down on paper). Hans has been playing the instrument a little over a year, currently strumming quarter note patterns, chords and reading simple melodies. He created his piece out of a chord he was assigned to practice. I showed him the E major chord and though I often do assign him composition, this time I did not. During his repetition of the chord at home something must have caught his ear, drawing him in. That was where he began making aesthetic choices, following his ear. When he was done, it was a song.

To create his composition, he used a fast strum pattern (much faster than anything he had played previously, a technical innovation), and continued to explore this rhythm throughout the piece, playing with its effect on pacing and form. He found new pitch material simply by plopping another finger down where it seems to fit. I find many student compositions have this kind of pragmatic approach. The physical and intellectual tasks at hand can be very solid limiting factors so children just play what they are able and change and add new sounds in ways that are accessible to them. The realization of this puts me constantly on the lookout for items to give to them that offer quality sounds, bits and tasks that yield something that might interest them.

Here is a recording I made of Hans playing his piece:

What exactly are we hearing, and how did Hans invent it?

• It begins with an alternation between an E major chord and its suspension (created by adding one finger to remove one note and substitute another), strummed with the thumb. The chord includes a lower note, almost certainly unintentionally (he just hit another string while strumming). The official name for the chord this yielded is irrelevant but it is important to note that he created a new structure with several components that were not present in his palette previously. I’ll refer to this as the E-plus chord.
  
• The strumming moves quickly in groups of four, coming to an abrupt halt. The ensuing pause establishes the foregoing as a segment and sets up a new segment to come, thus turning a simple strum pattern into a song.
  
• A new chord enters as abruptly as the other ended. This one I helped him with since he had expressed the wish for a new chord but didn’t know how to create one. I suggested he keep one finger where it was and add another finger on the adjacent string. I presented this in terms of finger pattern as it would be easier to see and feel that way and he could see the relation between the E-plus chord and the new one. I also knew what it would sound like and that it was likely to be pleasing; he liked it and kept it.
  
• The song moves in one or two bar segments, several with pauses between them of varying lengths. The stops are abrupt and rather dramatic, and some are accentuated with a light slap of his hand, creating a percussive whap.
  
• The form is five segments beginning with the first E-plus chord, alternating to chord two twice and finishing with the first one again. It is symmetrical, with tonal center established by chord one, movement away from that and a final return to it.

Somewhere in here is the intersection of two educational approaches: putting facts in versus drawing creative inspiration out. The traditional role of the music lesson teacher is the former, my passion is the latter. If I give them the right material and a context that catches their curiosity they get interested in practicing (thus increasing their capacity to create music). If I then ask them to make up some songs for themselves I invariable find that their limited sonic palette is used ingeniously and that their individual voices show through clearly.

I don’t guide much, I just set the stage for them and let them go. That is enough, that and the fact that when they bring in their work I end up exclaiming and fist pumping and high fiving them. They know I’m not exaggerating either; I am overjoyed with what they have done.

Jay Albert is a musician and educator. His professional vision is to share music and help people achieve more of a connection to it, whether helping students learn to play or “teaching” an audience by means of a performance. He founded his company Songdog Music to further that vision. Jay holds degrees in guitar, music theory and composition from Baldwin Wallace Conservatory of Music and Kent State University. He has taught at both of his alma maters and elsewhere, from PreK to graduate level, and has presented at and supervised arts education departments for several organizations. Contact Jay  www.songdogmusic.com

Also by Jay Albert in ALT/space:
Finding the In Door to Music

I’m going through a phase. It began about a year ago. An eager young face looked up at me, cradling a too-big guitar on her lap; written all over the face was “teach me.”

I live for this: helping others in to the world of music, sharing what I have learned. We had gone over a few sounds you can make, exploring the box and the strings to see what they do. We had seen and felt how to hold it without it trying to fall off. Then I opened the method book, the one that purports to show a beginner how to play the guitar, how to read music, how to make music. For my student’s first portentous and exciting try at making a song she was given something like this:

Now, if you don’t read music, this sequence of notes falls just barely short of incredibly, mind-numbingly boring. No melodic shape, no rhythmic interest, no lyrics, no sense of key for your ear to hold onto. Nothing. It is a very standard way for one of these books to begin and it is, to my mind, non-music.

Having attempted to use this kind of book before, I had become accustomed to making apologies like “Well, this isn’t exactly exciting but there are some better ones later.” But this time I snapped. Why would I give this kind of material to someone who has asked to learn music?! And why is there no tool I can use that does provide something inspiring for a beginner to learn with? So, I decided the time had come to write something better myself.

Since I have the good fortune to be teaching both lessons and classes weekly, I began to experiment with content and techniques regularly, always with a mind toward codifying them into future publishable/sharable form. On the first day of a guitar class with five elementary-age students I planned a lesson to get them playing immediately.

I showed them some strumming patterns, very simple ones with no left hand needed at all. Then I had them play one of those patterns and stop the strings with a firm tap on the neck of the guitar, yielding a nice “whack.”  I then morphed it into  We Will Rock You (you know, the “Boom Boom Whack!” part at the beginning of the song). This adaptation makes a very convincing version that is wonderfully easy for a room full of kids to play on guitars. They went nuts. They played it loud and together and in time. We split the class in half to play it. We played solos. We sang “We will, we will rock you!” while playing. Still nuts. I sang the very rap-ish verses for them and showed off a little guitar riffing. More nuts. It was like dodgeball day in gym class.

It was inspiring to me how well it worked. I  had found an “in” for my students. It was a simple way that they could play something that really sounded good and that, luckily, all of them knew. (It is often not possible to find a song that every member of a group knows, yet if the song still sounds good and they can play it, score.). What they got out of it was an experience learning by sight, sound and feel; playing in an ensemble; reading music; keeping time; playing within a representative style; singing and playing at the same time; arranging; performing with confidence; and having something to share at home.

I was giddy to have found one possible answer to a problem for which for years I had been finding mere work arounds. So the “phase” of which I spoke is truly that, a portion of a cycle of continuous refinement of my teaching methods and materials. As a teaching artist involved in teaching a very skill-oriented aspect of music, I am always cognizant of the need to balance its detailed knowledge work with the engagement and expression that make music exciting in the first place. I don’t want my students walking out of the room feeling like there’s work ahead, I want them bouncing out of the room primed to go show off what they can do with their new instrument and eager to discover more.

Jay Albert is a musician and educator. His professional vision is to share music and help people achieve more of a connection to it, whether helping students learn to play or “teaching” an audience by means of a performance. He founded his company Songdog Music to further that vision. Jay holds degrees in guitar, music theory and composition from Baldwin Wallace Conservatory of Music and Kent State University. He has taught at both of his alma maters and elsewhere, from PreK to graduate level, and has presented at and supervised arts education departments for several organizations. Contact Jay  www.songdogmusic.com