Fine Arts Students Strive With Their Studies

Here in the third term of the academic year, students of Gary Robinson find themselves deeply involved in projects that at once build on the foundations established in the first semester and point to increased mastery of their respective arts in the fourth and final term. (Pictured here is bassoonist Carmichael Caldwell, a sophomore from JL Mann HS.) The Winds Class is working up an original piece written for them by Fine Arts Center Composer-in-Residence Jon Jeffrey Grier. Entitled "Triple Dances," the work will be given its premier performance by the class at the January 19 "Generation-to-Generation" concert. Additionally, winds students are working up solo repertoire and basic improvisation skills that will be showcased in their May 9 recital.
Percussion I students are very busy with concert snare drum studies from Garwood Whaley's "Fundamental Studies for Snare Drum" as well as challenging rudimental solos from Charlie Wilcoxon's "All-American Drummer." Much work is being put into various jazz drum set studies, including exercises from Ted Reed's "Progressive Steps to Syncopation" and rock studies, emphasizing the "Moehler Technique" from John Pickering's "The Drummer's Cookbook." Percussion II-III students are working on a huge array of individual performance projects encompassing two-mallet and four-mallet marimba, tympani, and snare drum. A full listing of this impressive list will follow in a future blog posting, with images of these students as they prepare for spring performances, auditions, and summer workshops. Additionally, Percussion II-III students are concluding a unit on hand cymbal playing.
Robinson's Music Theory I class is finishing a sophisticated unit on four-part harmonic analysis, and are about to embark upon the study of part writing in the style of JS Bach. These students are always working on musicianship studies that include movable-do solfege and rhythm studies from Robert Starer's "Basic Rhythmic Training." Look soon for images of these wonderful students with more detail on their studies.