Music 2 Save Music Part 1

I have always designed experiences for learner musicians to create music and perform for their peers. This is an important process of being a musician. Last year, I was inspired to broaden the musician’s audience by creating a YouTube Channel and uploading our songs to NUMU, a community for young people to showcase their music and collaborate. This was my first step to creating a PLN for the musicians in my classroom.

This year, I had the pleasure of meeting Kevin Honeycutt (@kevinhoneycutt) face-to-face. We had been social media friends for a while, and finally met my friend over dinner to talk teaching, learning and creativity.

Kevin Honeycutt

Kevin Honeycutt

 

Kevin is an amazing person, speaker and story-teller. If you have ever seen him live, he has you laughing and crying while stretching your thinking as a teacher and charge you with nurturing creativity and 21st century learning with your learners. Dinner with Kevin changed the way I will design the purpose of musical experiences. We started talking about the maker movement and inventing to learn. I shared a Drawdio circuit with him and how I am starting a Makerspace with Makey Makey and Raspberry Pi. We had great dialogue about creativity not only being able to create new things, but also to piece things together in a new way. The resources may already be available, but creativity is also how we use them differently. My big take-away from this dinner conversation was creating a larger purpose to the music we create as musicians in my classroom. “Music 2 Save Music” was born that night.

Music 2 Save Music is an effort to support struggling music programs in schools. I was connected with David Dublis (@ddublis), Music Coordinator for Grand Rapids, MI Schools to talk about bringing music back to schools through our music. We connected on Google Hangouts to discuss specifics.

Above: David Dublis  Below: Michael Medvinsky

Above: David Dublis
Below: Michael Medvinsky

Music 2 Save Music will begin today with the 4th and 5th grade musicians at East and West Hills Middle Schools composing original music to express our concern about the loss of music in schools. These songs will be composed, performed recorded, edited, mixed and shared by the student musicians. We will learn about the dimensions and metadimensions of music while creating in the authentic processes of musicianship. The songs will then be uploaded to www.tunecore.com and published to iTunes. All of the proceeds from our original songs will go toward funding instruments for music classrooms and bring awareness to struggling music programs through music. Our Music. Music 2 Save Music.

This is a small clip of a 5th grade musician playing piano to inspire the music of the classes original song.

 

8 thoughts on “Music 2 Save Music Part 1

  1. I’m amazed by your passion and willingness to jump in and do something positive, right along with your activist students. You are a wonderful role model for other arts teachers. We can’t wait to be cut, our subjects/experiences are too crucial to die!

    • Thank you Kevin. You have inspired me to add purpose to the music we are creating in class. The musicians excitement is contagious. Classes that I haven’t seen yet, are talking about their music already. We teach much more than arts.

  2. I see a session with you and David co-presenting at MACUL. Saving the arts through the arts, let kids create their own solutions!

  3. Keep up the good work, Michael! Music does so much on so many levels for every learner. My 8 year-old daughter is learning piano and when I bring her home from lessons, she has to teach me!. I’m just about keeping up but my daughter’s better in all her subjects since starting music lessons.

    • Thank you! I teach musicians to create and express with sound, silence and the organization of both. This gives them tools to express feelings that words may not. Keep learning from your daughter!

  4. I love what you are doing! What a wonderful way to make music real in the hearts of students in your class and around the world. I can’t wait to share this story with other music teachers. I will buy songs to help support the music program. It’s very important!

    • Thank you Karen. Please share this blog and this story. Like Kevin Honeycutt has inspired so many teachers to do…Live Out Loud. Don’t be a secret genius. Put yourself out there and see what will grow. I appreciate your willingness to support.

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