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Welcome to Music Teachers Insightful Practices (MTIPS)
Newsletter!
Written and Published by Nicholas Ambrosino
www.musicsimplymusic.com
mailto:director@musicsimplymusic.com

March 5, 2002

Table of Contents:

1. MTIPS Theme
2. Welcome Notes
3. MTIPS Development
4. Notable Quotables

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1. MTIPS Theme

Artists take risks to express themselves and evolve the art of music
making, We, as music teachers, need to take risks and step out of our
comfort zones as teachers, in order to evolve the art of music
education.

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2. Welcome Notes

Welcome to Music Teachers Insightful Practices (MTIPS)
Newsletter!

A warm welcome to our MANY new subscribers. It is with much
gratitude that I say “Thank you” to all my colleagues and friends who
have passed MTIPS onto your friends and colleagues. That's how we
grow, and your hitting the "Forward" button and sharing your copy
with a friend (or a dozen!) is deeply appreciated. I consider it an
honor that you find MTIPS valuable enough to pass it on. Thanks!

HAVE A QUESTION YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE ADDRESSED
IN THE NEXT ISSUE OF MTIPS? Send me an email at
mtips@musicsimplymusic.com

MTIPS is a FREE monthly newsletter that’s goal is to provide piano
teachers (hopefully you!) with insightful practices that will make the
career of sharing music with soon-to-be-musicians a more rewarding
and successful one. Please let me know how I can be of further
service to you. You may contact me at:
mailto:nick@musicsimplymusic.com

Be sure to check our web site at:
http://www.musicsimplymusic.com
We have lots of information, and resources you can use. We’re
constantly adding and up-dating, so check it often!

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3. MTIPS Development

We have all heard that the study of a musical instrument provides the
skills that are also necessary for success in life; discipline, goal
setting, breaking large challenges into smaller more reachable parts,
handling frustration, etc.

Yet, in a much larger way, the music itself, not just the study of it, is
a metaphor for life. Dissonance creates momentum, which moves
toward resolution. Melody must be in equilibrium with its supportive
harmonic background, balance is key (pun intended!). Different
articulations and phrasings can completely alter the meaning of a
melody.

The most important element is the balance, yet in order to achieve the
balance, we must be keenly aware of the melody. What is the
melody of your life? Of your teaching? Is it stated clearly, or is it
smothered by the slightly less important parts?

I started this year’s MTIPS with the idea that perhaps we should
rethink the idea of goal setting and instead, focus on eliminating that
which distracts us from our primary goals, the melody of our life.
There are some coaches that call this “removing tolerations”. Think
about your lessons with your students? What goes on that is
superfluous? What do you assign them to do that is simply done
because your teacher did it? What do you assign them that is really
best for them?

How much of how we teach is done simply out of tradition? If we
continue to only teach the way we have been taught, then we will
continue to have the results we are having. Now regardless if this is
good news or bad news, I feel as professional music educators, we
have a responsibility to evolve the art of music education. Artists
take risks to express themselves and evolve the art of music making,
We, as music teachers, need to take risks and step out of our comfort
zones as teachers, in order to evolve the art of music education.

Risk taking for a music teacher might mean not teaching out of a
method book for a while. I know for me, method books make my job
a lot less creative, permitting me to sit back and be a professional
page turner. I have 31 years of music making in my history, that’s
what I want to tap into. Not my proficiency at telling a student now
that she has complete page 7 in the book, she needs to go on to page
8!

Is it scary at times? Absolutely! But a little stretching gets the blood
pumping. It gets the mind thinking, searching, yearning to find a
better way. And once you have found it, your contribution to the
evolution of music education needs to be shared with other teachers,
so that they too may challenge the parts of tradition that remain
simply because no one has yet taken the time to find a better way.

Now, I am not saying that some traditions and methodologies are not
valuable. What I am challenging is the processionary caterpillar
attitude. When a string of processionary caterpillars are lined up tail
to head on the rim of a jar, a processionary caterpillar will follow the
caterpillar in front him around and around the rim of the jar, over and
over, until they starve to death! And this is in spite of the fact that
food is at the bottom of the jar!

What if you decide to listen to the melody in your life? What
“harmonies” in your teaching would you thin out, so that your
educational melody may sing clearer? What is superfluous? What is
necessary? What will you contribute to evolve the art of music
education?
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4. Notable Quotable

Difficult people are the greatest teachers.
- Pema Chodron

Submitted by Susan Dunn, M.A., Clinical Psychology, Certified
Teleclass Instructor, who can be reached at sdunn1@satx.rr.com, or
visited on the web at http://www.susandunn.cc

This Notable Quotable was taken from
DailyQuote is sponsored by the Coaches at Coachville
(http://www.coachville.com/).

Copyright © 2000 Nicholas Ambrosino. All rights reserved. Permission is granted to reproduce, copy or distribute MTIPS so long as this cop1yright notice and full information about contacting the author is attached. The author of this article is Nicholas Ambrosino and he may be contacted at:

http://www.musicsimplymusic.com
director@musicsimplymusic.com

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