Music in School

What Childhood Piano Lessons Did to You

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More news about the developmental benefits of music education for children . . .

The study by the University of Vermont College of Medicine found that even those who never made it past nursery rhyme songs and do-re-mi’s likely received some major developmental benefits just from playing. The study provides even more evidence as to why providing children with high-quality music education may be one of the most effective ways to ensure their success in life.

Read at Mic.com.

Balkan Echoes

Balkan Echoes: Voices, Images, and Recordings from Bulgaria and Macedonia

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Martin Koenig, a good friend of the CWM, has spearheaded an extraordinary project to document disappearing music and dance cultures of the Balkans. His efforts are coming to fruition in the form of recordings (in partnership with Smithsonian Folkways), a book, and exquisite fine-art photographs.  Very much worth the attention of lovers of traditional performing arts . . .

After my first visit, I felt an urgency to preserve the music and dance traditions that were disappearing throughout the country. I was driven by the goal of documenting and recording the traditional music and dance of each place I visited, by permanently memorializing them on 16 mm film stock and audiotape.

Browse to Balkan Echoes.com for a look at the photos and book.

NBC News

California Public Schools Get Creative to Save Arts Programs

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The plight of arts programs in California public schools, and its impact on children, was featured in the NBC Nightly News for December 17. The segment shows how Takio drumming–supported by community-based funding–helps to fill the gap in a San Francisco-area school.

Creative young minds, talented kids, who deserve help, but for them the school money just isn’t there anymore, the way it was for so many of us in things like the arts . . .

View at NBC Nightly News.

Worth a look, and some thought: would you consider taking a minute to support this kind of creative effort in San Diego?

Piano

Active Participation in Music Education Improves Academic Performance

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Another good read on the value of music education, noting that the benefits are dependent on learning to play music, not just appreciate it . . .

In the study, which appears online in the open-access journal Frontiers in Psychology, the team showed that exposure to music lessons physically stimulated the brain and changed it for the better. However, simply being exposed to music education doesn’t seem to be sufficient, you have to also be actively involved.

Read more at MedicalDaily.com.

 

Hema Ramaswamy

How Hema Ramaswamy Found Healing Through Traditional Indian Dance

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In a report that may be of special interest to parents of children in our World Music in the Schools program, National Public Radio recently featured a story of healing through practice of Bharata Natyam, the traditional dance of South India . . .

Ramaswamy, who has Down syndrome, originally began dancing for health reasons. “But then it became part of her, and she really loves and enjoys it, and it took her 13 years with a lot of challenges, midway, to complete this,” explained her father, Ram. “And now today is a perfect day for her — her graduating in this art.”

Listen to, and read, the story on NPR

Musical Fix

A Musical Fix for American Schools: Music Training Boosts IQ, Focus, Persistence

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A Wall Street Journal essay highlights the need for more music education in our schools . . .

American education is in perpetual crisis. Our students are falling ever farther behind their peers in the rest of the world. Learning disabilities have reached epidemic proportions, affecting as many as one in five of our children. Illiteracy costs American businesses $80 billion a year.

Many solutions have been tried, but few have succeeded. So I propose a different approach: music training. A growing body of evidence suggests that music could trump many of the much more expensive “fixes” that we have thrown at the education system.

Read the story at WSJ,com (paywall)

Mariachi

Engaging Your City’s Youth Through the Arts

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Here’s a report on an extraordinarily valuable program that supporters of traditional music–or any music–might want to be aware of. Three cheers for the City of San Fernando, with a shout out for the CAC!

The City of San Fernando invests directly in an award-winning Mariachi Master Apprentice Program. Launched in 2001 as an experiment, the program has garnered international recognition. . . . Over the past decade 100 percent of the students enrolled in the program have graduated. Typically comparable rates are less than 60 percent.

Read the full article at WesternCity.com.

CWM Receives Second Highest NEA Award in San Diego

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San Diego Union Tribune, April 16, 2014

The quality of the Center for World Music’s World Music in the Schools program has been recognized by the National Endowment for the Arts with the second highest award in the San Diego area.

$55,000 to support teaching artists from around the globe who will provide weekly instruction in traditional music and dance of Asia, Latin America, Africa, and Europe for elementary and secondary-school students in San Diego.

Significantly, of over 100 NEA education grants funded, the CWM ranked within the top 15, with the likes of Lincoln Center and the Metropolitan Opera

Read the full story on the UT website.

 

Indian Music in Shiley Theater

Shiley Theater’s Night of Indian Music

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The Vista, October 30, 2013

Sitar master Ustad Shahid Parvez and vocalist Sudakshina Alagia, accompanied on tabla by Pandit Abhijit Banerjee, performed on October 26, 2013, in a concert jointly sponsored by the Academy of Indian Music, San Diego, the University of San Diego Music Department, and the Center for World Music.

As the musicians on the stage put down their instruments, a roar of applause echoed through the Shiley Theater. Already past the 9:30 p.m. deadline that was supposed to mark the end of the show, shouts for ‘one more song filled’ the theater.

Read the full write-up in the USD Vista.

Pakaraguian Kulintang Ensemble

World Music and Dance Fest at Scripps Park to Celebrate Nonprofit Milestone

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San Diego Community Newspaper Group, May 2013

A free festival to fete the Center for World Music’s 50th anniversary . . .

From 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on May 11, master performing musicians, dancers and teachers will entertain guests with live performances, host interactive demonstrations and present festival goers with a deeper understanding and appreciation of dynamic performing arts traditions from around the world at Ellen Browning Scripps Park, La Jolla.

Throughout the year, the Center for World Music presents the opportunity for K-12 students to take part in weekly, hands-on world music and dance instruction in schools throughout San Diego. The nonprofit also provides opportunities for the public to enjoy affordable, high-quality public concerts and free or inexpensive hands-on workshops to expand their cultural understanding of varied performing arts traditions.

Read the full story.