NewsBlog Editor’s Note: This post is the sixth of a series written by CMIE Research Fellow Anthony Green, as part of the documentation for Green’s CMIE Research Internship. See other posts in this series here.  

It is always exciting to observe or be pleasantly surprised by behaviors and phenomena that are unexpected in research projects. With that, it would never have occurred to me before commencing this project to examine the relationship between language, culture, and solfege. This relationship, which made itself pleasantly obvious throughout the semester, is something which, in my opinion, should be explored in a second installation of this guided internship. For now, I can only recall the nucleic observations which will hopefully spawn a larger organism in the future. 

It is a well-known fact that learning a language is best done at a young age, when the mind unconsciously soaks in information without formally “studying” it. The mind is simply immersed in a new, unfamiliar environment, and is forced to adapt to its surroundings for survival. In this case, when you are young, and you are hungry, and you are in an English and French speaking household, you know that you can say, “I’m hungry” or “J’ai faim”, and something will come of it. The best part about learning a language through immersion at a young age is that you do not “study” the grammar, the article agreement (if any), the tenses, the cases, the vocabulary, the idioms, and the other idiosyncrasies of language. You just learn it. You speak it. People correct you, and you rarely make the mistake again. This is how fluency is gained. 

When studying a language for the first time as an older person, especially after the age of 12 or 13, it is harder to keep everything together. Learning a language then becomes more of a process of memory rather information-soaking and internalizing. When speaking, the learner more often then not thinks of what he or she wants to say first in English and then translates. The learner doesn’t simply know how to think in that language. When learning a language at the university level (at least this has been my experience), immersion is attempted by having language classes three times per week. A language student should have as much exposure to the new language as possible to guarantee the highest amount of immersion necessary. 

One can easily start to find parallels from the above. At Boston University where I learned solfege (in a rather haphazard way because the “ear-training and sight-singing program at BU, which teaches “fixed do” solfege, is mostly ignored and taught by ill-trained graduate students), I did not even think to relate learning a language to solfege. But retrospectively, I can truly say that my lack of immersion in solfege before BU has definitely hindered my ability to truly internalize it as a fluid language. At BU, I used a process of translation to get through my exercises. This process may actually be beneficial, and it is popular: whenever I sang my melodies, I played the piece on the piano in my head while singing it, and figured out the solfege syllables in that manner. This is nothing new or unique. Students use this technique all the time, most of the time developing it on their own, such as myself, Eric Smith (a student at NEC) and many of my friends, and perhaps some of you readers. 

But is this a good thing or is it a process that truly blocks the internalization process? If personally this process is quick enough for a sight-singer to execute melodies at correct tempi, then this process should be utilized. In essence, this translation process is not, nor ever will be, the same as being able to look at a note on a staff (or ledger line) and say its correct syllable without visualizing an instrument, hands, tables, etc … The translation process becomes even more demanding when reading in different clefs. Not only is the language of solfege getting in the way, but the pattern-language of the clef is shifted. This can perhaps be related to reading books in written in different accents, like Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston. Or better yet, being a native of Korea, learning English for the first time at the age of 15, and attempting to read The King James version of The Holy Bible. 

When a student is immersed in solfege, then the ability is completely, COMPLETELY different! There were students in the “Solfege for Singers” class who learned solfege at an early age. These students were not American. This is where the cultural element comes into play. In my student interviews, so far all of the Americans had little next to no exposure to “fixed do” before post-secondary instruction. Additionally, the little solfege exposure received was usually in passing, and of course in “moveable do”. Admittedly, my only exposure to solfege was singing that annoying popular song from The Sound of Music. Culturally, English is one of the only languages where the names of the notes are letters rather syllables. Other cultures, when it comes to solfege, do not separate between ‘a’ and ‘la’. In other languages, ‘a’ is just a letter and ‘la’ is the pitch. That’s that. 

In other words, other cultures internalize the syllables naturally. There is no process of translation occurring. Listening to the students in class who have internalized these syllables was a source of inspiration to other students, and me as well! It is always magical to see people solfeging at superhuman levels of speed. At the same time, observing these students really made it clear to me how much solfege is linked to language and culture. I have heard stories about the rigorous solfeging exercises at the Paris Conservatoire, and have thanked my lucky stars that I did not have to undergo such training. In the same breath, I wonder why America has not yet picked up on this solfeging tradition. I wonder what type of musician I would be if I was as good at solfege as the students who have internalized the syllables. But I must say, I am not questioning my musicianship, just my solfeging abilities.

One final thought: the Solfege for Singers class at New England Conservatory is held three times a week.

NewsBlog Editor’s Note: This post is the fifth of a series written by CMIE Research Fellow Anthony Green, as part of the documentation for Green’s CMIE Research Internship. See other posts in this series here.

To continue with the idea of “teaching” the language to students, Professor Scripp has utilized some methods that almost seem contradictory to the goals. Other than exercise memorization, exercise “rehearsal” or “practice”, and contextual conducting, another questionable pedagogical method is having students speak the syllables of a sight-singing exercise without pitch.

Initially, this sounds like a great idea. One of the biggest problems for most Americans learning solfege (as I have mentioned before) is getting around our non-use of syllables from childhood or switching from the American “moveable do” system to the more ecumenical “fixed do” system, which both have their own problems. Therefore, any way to simply expose Americans to syllable practice should ideally be a good thing. Secondly, this sounds like a good idea because it rids sight-singing of a difficult element - pitch. When sight-singing after not having been exposed to solfege in childhood, associating pitch with syllables can be a confusing, daunting task. Any method which simplifies elements of sight-singing should ideally be a strong pedegogical tool. Lastly, this sounds like a good idea because, without the pitch element, one can work on syllable-recognition velocity, which is difficult to do when simultaneously singing. By isolating the element of syllable-concentration, then the ability to rapidly internalize and enunciate pitches should ideally develop via strict syllable practice. When isolation occurs in any type of practice, the subject of the focus should ideally be elucidated.

Such is not the case with everyone. People, no matter how much public education strives to view students as learning equals, learn at different paces, on different levels, and in different ways. The strengths of one person might not neccessarily be the strengths of another. Therefore, this method may work for those for whom pitch does not pose a problem. On the contrary, if pitch is a problem for a student, then does this method hurt or hinder that student?

As stated before, the two most popular solfege systems - “fixed do” and “moveable do” (other methods exist, for ex. numbers) - present their own problems. In “moveable do”, the tonic syllable “do” can be applied to any note, and each chromatic step has its own syllables that relate to the “fundamental” diatonic syllable. I’m not completely sure of the correct syllables, but an example of this phenomenon can be seen in the syllables “fa” and “fi”. Either “fi” is “fa” sharp or flat, but in any case one can see that it is a variant of the fundamental syllable. In “moveable do”, each syllable has a sharp or flat variant. But what happens when one encounters double-sharps and double-flats? And what happens when one modulates or tonicizes? Should a new “do” be created, or should one solfege using the variant syllables? Furthermore, it is wonderful that “moveable do” solidifies the relationships between chromatic intervals and their fundamentals, but what does one do when solfeging serial or atonal melodies and harmonies? This is the year 2007, and solfege should incorporate the difficult, atonal melodies that can even be found in works from composers such as Wolf, Scriabin, and late Liszt, to the composers of today.

“Fixed do” assigns one syllable to each note of the C major scale. For example, C is “do”, D is “re”, E is “mi”, etc… When sight-singing, any chromatic variant of the note is sung with the syllable of the fundamental note. For example, C, C-sharp, and C-flat are all “do”. The best thing about this system is that each key area is seperated. The key of F major or minor is the key of “fa” major or minor. The tonic, therefore, would be “fa”, and the distinction between the key of “do” and other keys is maintained. But chromaticism is not fully honed. Having a system where one syllable can be 5 different pitches (double flat, flat, natural, sharp, and double sharp) can be quite confusing when dealing with pitch relationships. For example, the interval of a perfect fourth uses the same syllables as the interval of an augmented fourth (tritone) and a diminished fourth (major third). As a student of solfege, singing “do - fa” as a perfect fourth, a tritone, or a diminished fourth can really negatively affect one’s sense of interval relationship. But, this system does allow for sight-singing atonal melodies with facility.

With this being said, consider the following: student A has pitch problems, but his syllable-recognition is strong. Student B has perfect pitch, but has many problems with syllables. If student A sings syllables without pitches, then he is just developing his strength. But in doing so, his pitch problems actually get worse because of “fixed do”’s problem of the lack of chromatic relationship distinctions. Student A will sing the syllables, and get used to the feeling of articulating the syllables with velocity. But adding the pitch relationship afterward will be very difficult. Student B, on the other hand, will get used to singing the syllables without pitch, and acquire a grounded knowledge of how these quick syllables feel. When adding the pitch at the end, the syllables may improve his pitch accuracy because of the association of pitch with sound. In observing Professor Scripp’s class, I have found that this is the case.

In conclusion, pedagogical methods - especially for solfege - have both their faults and their attributes. What is important is not necessarily the methods themselves, but the order in which the methods are introduced to the students. In other words, students should be at certain points melodically before working on the rhythmic or syllabic aspects of solfege. In my observations, pitch problems have been the biggest deterent in a student’s ability to complete a sight-singing exercise. Once a student is unsure of the pitch, that is when the hesitation happens, the rhythmic problems arise, and the syllables begin to be replaced with “lah” or “doo” or “ah” or some incomprehensible onomatopoeia. In the end, any method that develops an aspect of solfege should be exposed to a solfege student. The question is simply “WHEN?”

NewsBlog Editor’s Note: This post is the fourth of a series written by CMIE Research Fellow Anthony Green, as part of the documentation for Green’s CMIE Research Internship. See other posts in this series here.

NEC is constantly blessed to have such people of note come visit our school as Renée Fleming, Fred Firth, and Steve Reich. Recently, Gustavo Dudamel was one of the esteemed guest, and he presented information about El Sistema, the youth orchestra in Venezuela that has been changing lives and gaining worldwide recognition. The presentation was so highly regarded by Professor Scripp that he cancelled class in order to allow his students to attend the seminars and the performances. More teachers at NEC should adopt such a caring attitude towards their students when such guests arrive. 

In a class prior to his arrival, Professor Scripp presented an anecdote to the class about when he and one of his former students met Gustavo Dudamel. According to the professor, his student was so enthusiastic about solfege that he still remembered (and this is the key word to this whole anecdote) some of the exercises that he worked on with Scripp. I do not remember if Scripp also solfeged for Dudamel, but the highlight of the anecdote is when Dudamel himself waxes poetically about solfege and orally presents his own results of diligent study to his adoring fans: he starts to solfege a fast movement from a Tchaikovsky symphony (I believe it is number 4, the scherzo movement). Amazingly, his syllables were perfect, his pitch was also to be admired – it was obvious that he was a successful student of solfege, and that this technique has shaped his development as a musician.

Gustavo Dudamel story - audio

But something about this charming monologue left a sour taste in my mouth. I had never thought about the real difference between sight-singing and solfege until now. In my undergrad at Boston University, I learned solfege in a “stight-singing” course. We were expected, more or less, to sight-sing. With this in mind, it was strange that Professor Scripp’s former student had learned some of these exercises so well that he remembered them after being away from them for quite a while. I felt the same about Dudamel’s breathtaking impromptu performance. Obviously, these pieces were not sight-read. They were memorized.

It brings up two very important questions pertinent to this course:

Before delving into these issues more, in that very same class, the students were going over an exercise that contained a quick passage: mi! mi-re-do-si-la-do-si-la-mi! re! do-mi-do-la-mi - - mi - - la! By the end of the class, I heard the melody so much that I could sing it without ever having seen the notated music. I cannot even mention where the exercise is from and who composed it! This experience is akin to listening to a snippet of a pop-song on someone else’s iPod, and remembering it because the snippet contained one motive repeated many times. I raised the issue in class; if I remembered this and executed the exercise as well as the students in class, yet I did not see the music at all, then what method of teaching is more important? Furthermore, if the only goal desired in the end is to be able to execute the exercise, then what should stop a student from simply applying pure memorization to the exercises, thus inhibiting sight-singing ability?

Additionally, other comments were made about velocity. One of the students expressed concerns about not being able to solfege a certain group of syllables fast enough. Professor Scripp then proceeded to teach the students how to practice learning how to increase solfege velocity. His method, which is based on grouping and specific syllable emphasis, is a method of practice that corroborates directly with the process of memorization. While the technique is successful, the process of how to instantly recognize groups while sight-singing was never once even mentioned, yet alone taught.

When I brought up such concerns, Scripp gave me an answer quickly: this is a way of involving the students in the language of solfege.

Such an answer is great. I strongly feel that learning solfege is similar to learning a new language. The difference between learning a new language and learning solfege, however, is that no one asks you to read in your new language as fast as you can (although, such exercises should be done, as it would greatly improve conversation skills). Furthermore, it is rare to be asked to communicate in solfege, although Professor Scripp did make the students improvise musical questions and answers in solfege. More of these exercises could have been mandatory, however the fault of these exercises lies within the ability (or lack thereof) of the student to improvise a melody.

Other ways of exposing solfege as a language to students is to force the students to sing scales and arpeggios in solfege at the beginning of each class. Such a traditionally boring approach was hinted at, and I am sure that Scripp strongly advocated such exercises to be done daily by the students on their own. Additionally, the students were advised to create “themes” in each key (see the November 20^th blog “Near-perfect pitch” for details). Another process may be to sing a snippet of one’s favorite pop-song and transpose it to each key, and in the opposite mode (major goes to minor, and vice versa). Modal shifts were rare in this class (but they were done!).

So, what role does sight-singing play in this class? A LARGE ONE! Many classes throughout the semester were sight-singing classes. The students were asked to bring in works and “teach” them to the class using solfege. Often, Professor Scripp would hold classes of reading Bach Chorales, Palestrina, Victoria, and more. The students were exposed greatly to sight-singing. Not officially having to take the final examination or to put together a portfolio, I do wonder what the faculty expects from the students in this class outside of what was made clear.

NewsBlog Editor’s Note: This post is the second of a series written by CMIE Research Fellow Anthony Green, as part of the documentation for Green’s CMIE Research Internship. See other posts in this series here.

Perfect pitch, absolute pitch, relative pitch - all terms thrown around meaning basically one thing: if someone says to someone else, “Sing an ‘A’!” this person can probably do it. Of course, some can do it more accurately than others. More often than not, such a skill is used by those born with this unique ability. For instance, some of my friends have such a sensitive perfect pitch that they can name the notes of the partials of a tire squeaking as it skids. These very same friends of mine have great intonation when performing, and can tune guitars and other string instruments without a piano, a tuning fork, a pitch pipe, an electronic tuner, or other devices which may or may not be readily available when tuning. 

Can solfege be a step in developing such a unique technique? According to a study done by the University of California, San Francisco, absolute or perfect pitch is defined as thus: “Absolute pitch, commonly referred to as perfect pitch, is an intriguing cognitive trait involved in music perception and is defined as the ability to identify the pitch of a musical tone without an external reference pitch. To be considered an absolute pitch possessor, an individual must have the ability to identify pitches accurately and instantaneously.” It is a purely cognitive ability, which implies that it is a trait relating to one’s process of perception and memory. 

In Professor Scripp’s Solfege for Singers class, the students are asked to remember “themes” - the beginning tonic excerpts of popular, tonal works - in different keys. Over the course of this semester, most of the sight-singing exercises used have been in the key of C-major. For this key, the student used a Mozart theme from the Marriage of Figaro - sol-sol mi, sol-sol mi, sol-sol fa re, fa-fa re, fa-fa re, fa-fa mi do. Such an easy melody, whether known before the class or learned in less than 10 seconds during class, has made for an extremely accessible C-major theme for one’s memory. Without having heard a note in the class, Professor Scripp will pull out an exercise, have the students examine it, then ask the students to “sing our theme in C-major.” Without fail, every student will more or less begin on the same note. And during the 3 or 4 seconds of singing the theme, the tonic is eventually established and agreed upon. All of this is done without playing the piano, using a tuning fork, a pitch pipe, an electric tuner - in other words, “without an external pitch reference.” 

These observations have lead me to believe that a goal of solfege, relating to the one the class has already established of reinforcing one’s relative pitch, is to develop or discover an absolute pitch ability within oneself. I have not observed any discoveries in the class as of yet, but I have observed the development of an excellent pitch memory in a couple of students in the class. Knowing that absolute pitch is a cognitive ability, solfege can greatly aid in pitch memory to a point where one can ask someone else, “Do you have a G memorized?”, and this person can respond by singing the Marriage of Figaro theme’s first pitch. After this very basic step, two steps can be taken: 1) the solfege student can develop a excellent relative pitch, which would not only include the ability to sing any interval up or down from the memorized pitch, but also include the ability to reduce intervals to their shortest distances. For example, when I sing an A, I am inclined to sing an A4 in a falsetto. However, if I hear a E-flat2, then I need to either hear that note two octaves up or hear my A two octaves down. Such an ability has been worked on by the students in this class without directly naming this ability. (Professor Scripp encourages the students to jump octaves and sing different parts when sight reading polyphonic works.) And 2) the student can eventually memorize every pitch, and exercise this pitch memory to perfection. In a way, Professor Scripp advocates this method above others, but his method is very subtle, and works on a subconscious level. While the students have not yet sang exercise in every major and minor key yet, Professor Scripp feels it is best to memorize pieces in every key. When this was stated in class, I thought that this would be difficult. But has a music student ever contemplated the amount of repertoire stored in his or her brain? Finding tonal repertoire in each major and minor key might not be as hard as one thinks, if one is a music student. Pianists - if you have played through the beginning of each prelude of the Well-Tempered Clavier, book I or book II, then you can easily develop absolute pitch. 

I must emphasize, however, that this was never directly stated in class, and it is not ever worked on directly in class. If one uses solfege as a method of pitch memory to develop a mild to strong absolute pitch ability, I highly suggest working with an external pitch device extensively in the beginning. I emphasize this because the “sol” in the Marriage of Figaro theme sometimes is a “sol-flat.”

Aside: throughout the semester, I have also briefly participated as a student. The class has helped me memorized an A, a G, an E, and a C. Consequently, when one of my choirs in Providence recently sang a cappella at an elderly person’s home and I did not bring my pitch pipe, we survived.

The Center for Music-In-Education will host a public symposium on November 7, 2007 discussing El Sistema, dubbed the “Venezuelan Music Education Miracle.” The symposium will take place from 2:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. and will feature a panel of invited guests from across the nation and throughout Boston. A showing of the film “Tochar Y Luchar” will open the afternoon session. Further information is available at www.mieatnec.org/venezuelasymposium. Although the Symposium is free and open to the public, we ask that those interested please RSVP via the Symposium website:

www.mieatnec.org/venezuelasymposium/rsvp

A reception follows the Symposium, and will take place in Brown Hall from 5:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.
At 8:00 p.m., the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela will perform at Symphony Hall. Concert tickets are available via the Boston Symphony website (www.bso.org). We advise that you purchase them right away, since supplies are limited, and the concert is expected to sell out!

NewsBlog Editor’s Note: This post is the first of a series written by CMIE Research Fellow Anthony Green, as part of the documentation for Green’s CMIE Research Internship. See other posts in this series here

Recently, I have been assigned to be apart of the research process observing the ear-training component of New England Conservatory. As one small cog in a machine of parts, my responsibility is to observe Professor Scripp’s Solfege for Singers class, which meets Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays from 5 to 6. Time is noted here because vocal chord quality is affected by many things, including time of day.

Just a bit of background about myself, I am a 2^nd year Masters student, studying Composition. I also have a 5-student piano studio, and I am a vocal coach to a local singer (who is not a student), an accompanist, and a music history and theory tutor. More about me can be found on my website: www.agreencomposer.com.

Week One

My first week of this class actually started during the second week of the school year. The students and Professor Scripp were still getting acquainted with one another, and new introductions of not only me but also another MIE intern were made. This initial class began with a recap of what was discussed in the previous week, which was a general introduction into solfege.

The students along with teacher determined that solfege is the use of syllables assigned to pitches to facilitate the ease of sight-reading, especially when singing. It can be used for different goals, such as re-enforcing one’s relative pitch, improving sight-reading, re-representing and re-articulating familiar songs, proving the accuracy of pitches during sight-singing, and more. Students solfeged “London Bridges,” and professor Scripp encouraged the students to learn from the moments of “pause.” He also established the rule that it is most important in this class, when solfeging, to get the syllable correct.

Conducting was examined as a way to verify rhythm. Students observed what information is portrayed through conducting and how, how subdivision can solidify information in a conducting pattern, and how subdivision can aid and correct rhythm. Two main questions were reflected upon:

1) What is rhythm?

“Variation of beats within a given time.”

“Beats arranged in a pattern.”

“Placement of a note in a given time, meaning duration.”

“Proportion, ratio, grouping.”

“Patterns governed by periodicity.”

and …

2) Why do we conduct?

“To verify where a beat should lie.”

Professor Scripp introduced the class to contextual conducting, which is a method in which the conductor chooses hand gestures and specific subdivisions that best represent the music. Such conducting can be used not only when sight-singing, but also in warm-ups and perhaps themes.

The breadth of information in each class is extensive, but is usually in the form of discussion rather than lecture. The students show quite a bit of enthusiasm for participation, and the atmosphere is such that mistakes are welcome and fear or embarrassment is rather low. Another wonderful aspect of this class is the varying backgrounds that the students have in music. The class is approaching a point where it can be a forum for each of the students to draw on each other’s various histories and experiences.

The Artist-Teacher-Scholar framework has been around for over a decade. As far as I know, the term was first coined when during the years I served as the Founding Director of Research at the Leonard Bernstein Center for the Arts in Nashville (along with Eric Booth, Teaching Artist Director, David Steiner, former Head of the National Endowment for the Arts, and Alexander Bernstein) where the term was used to understand the Leonard Bernstein’s persona and his life’s work as a synthesis of his artistry, teaching, and scholarly publications and lectures.

Nine years ago at NEC, I worked with Alan Fletcher (now CEO and President of the Aspen School of Music and Festival) to establish the Artist-Teacher-Scholar (ATS) Framework as the conceptual framework for NEC new Music-in-Education Program. It was the ATS framework – employed as an educational model for MIE students at NEC – that attracted years of federal funding to help NEC establish its Music-in-Education Program and the Research Center, representing the two key components of the Center for Music in Education.

Today I understand that the success of both NEC programs is aligned with the inter-related principles of the ATS framework. That is to say, as many students develop musically over time, they become increasingly interested in both the ‘teaching of the musical arts’ and the ‘artistry of teaching’ in schools or in outreach programs regardless of what career path they choose. And eventually it is not unusual for these musicians to recognize the importance of building both a personal ‘scholarship of artistry’ and a ‘scholarship of teaching’ as they develop career paths.

As evidence of this ongoing progression, NEC faculty whose courses count toward the MIE program - all highly trained and experienced musicians - engage in scholarship that takes the form of publishing, lectures, research, advocacy, community leadership, curriculum development, outreach programs, assessment, social action and policy shaping through our local programs and national collaborations relevant to music in education and our society. I believe that the ATS model helps to explain the genisis and effectiveness of these faculty initiatives.

Further evidence of the impact of this framework can be understood through changes in institutional policy. Nine years after the creation of NEC MIE programs and its research center, there are now guided intern programs, concentration programs in Music in Education, and even new research institutes in our partnering organizations nationally. Googiing on the internet I discovered there are now Music-in-Education programs established internationally independent of our work. I think these events have not occurred in absentia of an evolving conception of the artist’s developing persona as an artist-teacher-scholar.

Personally, the conception of the ATS clarifies the need for research and assessment in music-in-education practices. For me, artistry and education have limited impact on public policy, practices or leadership without ongoing research that is both rigorously conducted and aimed at practical significance for musicians, teachers, parents, administrators and students. Without having to arrive at a lock-step view of the ATS framework as a model for NEC faculty or students, I think it is fair to say that Patrick Keppel, Randy Wong, Lyle Davidson, Warren Senders, and Paul Burdick and our many other colleagues at NEC and in our partnering schools, see this framework as a driving force behind NEC’s national or local initiatives, Journal publications and the presentation of student portfolio work coming out of the NEC MIE and outreach programs.

I look forward to seeing more alums presenting their work on the www.mieatnec.org website and blogs. I hope everyone reading our new Journal in May will be stimulated through seeing the work of fellow MIE interns in other institutions. Nonetheless, it is my fondest hope that anyone investigating the publications, student, and alum work will appreciate the evolving forms of artistry, teaching and scholarship represented by NEC faculty and students as a resource and inspiration for advancing music in education and our society.

- Larry Scripp

Larry Scripp is Director of NEC’s Center for Music-In-Education and Executive Director of the MIE National Consortium. Scripp is also on NEC’s Music Theory and Music Education faculties, and is a professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.