In this episode of the Rock School Proprietor Podcast, John Kozicki (Michigan Rock School and RockSchoolProprietor.com) and co-host Mandy York (Music Time of Milford) discuss the importance of making the act of playing music a central focus in private lessons, rather than just teaching and learning new concepts.
We discuss the common pitfalls that can cause the essence of playing music to get lost, from the pressures instructors feel to constantly provide new material, to the routines that can become too focused on mechanical learning. Mandy shares her personal experience of learning the ukulele, illustrating how finding enjoyable repertoire can reignite the joy of playing.
We also provide practical tips for instructors to bring the joy of making music back into their lessons. These include playing music together with students, choosing the right repertoire, and incorporating peer-to-peer band programs. By the end of this episode, you’ll have a fresh perspective on how to balance technical learning with the sheer enjoyment of making music.
Join us for an insightful conversation that aims to transform your approach to music instruction and bring back the fun and creativity that lies at the heart of musical education.
Join our private Facebook group, “Performance-Based Music Programs and Rock Schools,” a community for like-minded professionals to connect and share insights.
Episode Transcript:
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Music.
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Facebook group, Performance-Based Music Programs and Rock Schools.
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I know, it’s a long name, but we’d love to have you join us there if you are
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a music instructor or a studio owner.
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We’re talking next-level stuff. We’ve got some great people in the group already.
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On this episode, we’re going to talk about how to put playing music more central
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in your private lessons.
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And I kind of shocked Mandy by suggesting maybe we shouldn’t be so focused on teaching.
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Music.
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Welcome to Rock School Proprietor Podcast. I’m John Kozicki,
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and my co-host Mandy York is here with us again.
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Hi, Mandy. Hey, John. What’s up?
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Well, it is a, as we’re recording, it’s a beautiful September day in Michigan. Yeah.
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Like, really, like, perfect. I know. This is a great week.
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So, you know, the kids are back to school. school we’re back everyone’s back
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in their routines or close to it feels good i know i’ve been feeling the same
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way yep i love summer and then i love getting back to my routine.
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And i’m sure like all of our music teacher and music lesson business friends
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are hopefully feeling the same right that getting out of the summer where it
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just feels like everything’s It’s crazy and chaotic and like no one knows what’s going on.
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Super busy, super fun, but yes, chaotic.
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And then all of a sudden snap back into a routine. Yeah.
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So I thought what we would talk about today is we mentioned this in one of our early episodes.
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It kind of came up just as a side note in our conversation.
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But I’ve observed that sometimes in private music lessons,
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the act of actually playing music, this sounds weird, but the act of actually
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playing music sometimes gets lost or it becomes like secondary to,
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I guess, teaching music or teaching how to play an instrument to the student.
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And I thought, that’s kind of weird, right?
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I think it’s weird. I mean, obviously, I’m coming from that rock school background
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where it’s like, it’s all about playing music. You got to play music.
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I sort of understand why that could happen, but I thought we’d talk about that
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today. What do you think?
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Yes. Yeah, I’m interested to hear what it looks like at the rock school and
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compare it to my ideas, too. Right.
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And you being a music together instructor and facilitator, it’s it’s not like that doesn’t get lost.
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It’s always like we’re making music.
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That’s what every single class is about. Mm not every music instructor,
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but I’ve definitely seen how that can happen.
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Why do you think that happens? Why do you think playing music,
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the act of doing music and playing music can sometimes get lost in private music lessons?
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Well, I think maybe, you know, sometimes you get lost in the weeds, right?
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In the, as a teacher working on Specific skills or like trying to learn the
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actual instrument, right? Yeah. Right.
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I think that’s what you’re talking about. Yeah.
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I, I was, when I was looking at this, I was thinking about music.
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My most recent experience learning an instrument, right?
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Oh, yeah. I mean, I’ve been singing a long time. I played in the band and all that.
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But 10 years, 10 years ago, I picked up the ukulele. Yeah.
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Right. So I’m a singer and I can play wind instruments and, you know, plunk on the piano.
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But like string instruments, I don’t play them.
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So I thought about this, you know, I didn’t really know where to start.
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And i’m just trying to learn chords i
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mean my goal picking up the ukulele was
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to play songs i wanted to play music right
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that’s super important the goal was to
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play music exactly and for me i
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wanted to play it in my classroom so but i
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needed to learn the chords first and i needed and then strumming patterns
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what’s a strumming pattern how do i you know what do
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i do there so you’re i was really caught up
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in those things and actually i don’t know if you remember this i came to you
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long time ago i get i do
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we sat down together for a minute yeah yeah like kind
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of a quick little lesson yeah yes and you
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kind of like i remember after that it
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was very like okay i need to just chill out a little bit because
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i was putting myself too much like in what do
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i do like up up down down up up like i right
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i needed like those specific instructions but really
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what kind of helped me get into it
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and start playing was finding a song that i wanted to use in my classroom that
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had like some pretty simple chords and i and i played that song and i learned
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that song right and so i was playing music i learned those chords i got into
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it i figured out a strumming pattern.
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And then I played that song and
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it was enjoyable and I used it in the classroom. And then from there, I.
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I found other songs with similar chords, right? Yeah.
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And then, and I developed my skill from there.
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Anyway, talking or thinking about this idea, I went back to my most recent experience
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where I could have got really bogged down with just learning the chords,
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figuring out strumming patterns.
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I even picked up a essentials book, a method book.
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I bought a method book for ukulele, which maybe would sound really funny.
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And I started like plucking the strings, you know, like doing little scales.
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But really, I don’t, I didn’t need that. You know, I just, it’s,
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everybody’s goals are different.
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So that’s, just yesterday, I was having a conversation with some parents at the rock school.
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And one of the parents mentioned that his son who’s in our rock band program,
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he gets nervous. He gets really nervous before he performs.
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And he was talking with another parent whose daughter is hesitant to get involved
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in the band program because she gets nervous, right?
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She wants to develop her skills first is what he said, right? Right.
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And in hearing them have that conversation, I got involved in conversation.
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I said, that’s all anxiety.
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It’s right. And the anxiety is either coming from the person learning,
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but also that anxiety can be put on the person learning from other people.
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Right. They could be put on them from their parents.
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It could be put on them from their instructor, I think.
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Right. It could be a lot of pressure to like, well, you got to make sure you
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do this first, because if you don’t do this, well, then it’s not going to work.
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And, oh, maybe that’s part of where this comes from.
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I didn’t even think about it. But in you saying like in you saying and telling
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the story about how you wanted to be able to play one song in your classroom, you chose one song.
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I would imagine that having that goal was the motivation to get you to play the song.
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But at some point you probably had to say like, it’s good enough.
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Yeah. You know, it’s not perfect, but it’s it’s good enough.
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And like maybe I’m going to make mistakes. And that’s the performer in you kicking in.
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Saying like, well, yeah, of course, I might make mistakes in the performance,
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but… You keep going. Yeah, you got to do it.
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So, I mean, I think we’re already into like maybe how this happens.
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Yeah. Another reason that I think this can sometimes happen,
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and you mentioned the method book, is simply routine. Right.
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You come into, you’ve got a scenario in which you’ve got an instructor who is
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teaching how to do something and you have a student who is learning how to do something.
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And week after week, they develop this routine.
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If part of that routine is, or maybe I’ll put it this way.
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If that routine just involves going through that method book and like you finish
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this piece and you’re like, oh, nice work. This is what you did well on this piece.
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Let’s move on to the next page.
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It’s you’re checking off the box. I did that. I did that thing.
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Go to the next page. I did that thing.
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Go to the next. Finish the book. Did that thing. Go to the next book.
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There’s an endless supply of these books.
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So you can you can fall into this routine where that’s all it is.
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And you know i was never content with just like
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okay well did a book cool you know
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i wanted to do the thing i wanted to play music but i can totally see how maybe
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a student is okay with that yay i finished a book they feel good about that
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accomplishment maybe the parent is yay you did great you finished the book maybe
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the instructor is like okay let’s do the next book look,
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maybe that is all that’s sort of given as praise.
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And there’s never, you know, you sort of forget, like, wait,
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why was I doing this thing?
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Why was I learning how to play this instrument? Why was I learning how to play
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music? So I think that could happen.
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Absolutely. Like you said, I think routine is a key word there, right?
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This is just how we do it, what we do week to week.
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And, you know, is that bad? I don’t, you know, it’s, again, lots of different
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students, lots of different motivations to do this.
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But I do think that it can be a trap. And I do think if you don’t understand
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what the student’s goals are, what the parent’s hopes are for that student,
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you’re going to hit a brick wall in that scenario.
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You’re going to hit that point where it’s like, wait, okay, cool.
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And I think this is the same conversation we had when this initially came up
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was like, cool, doing these books, feeling good about my progress there,
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but when am I going to play?
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When am I going to play music? How do I take that next step?
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So I think that could happen. Any other thoughts on how this happens?
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I mean, I think that is it. I mean, that’s how it happens, right?
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Yeah, I don’t know. Yeah, I’ll sort of piggyback on another thing you mentioned
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when you were talking about learning ukulele. Yeah.
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There is a lot of mechanical understanding to playing an instrument. Yeah.
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Some students need a lot more work on how to make the mechanics of that instrument work.
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Other students don’t need as much work. So I think that’s another place where
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you can, and again, a student might be really into that aspect of the learning, right?
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They may really be into the technical aspect of understanding how to make that
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specific instrument work.
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I think that’s a really narrow focus personally, but
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I can see how you’d fall into that trap of of
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kind of putting playing music and and making music
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secondary if you’ve got either a student or an instructor who is hyper focused
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on on things like technique and how to make the instrument work but at that
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point i don’t know if you’re necessarily like learning music as much as Because you’re learning,
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like, I mean, I knew someone at
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one point who likened playing a piano to playing a typewriter, you know?
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It’s like, there’s a certain aspect of it where it’s very mechanical and you
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push this key with this finger and you get this result.
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And obviously the conversation we were having was more about like,
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okay, well, what do you do next? Because that is mechanical. Musicality.
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Yes. You have to bring the musicality into it.
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Right. And, you know, and again, I can see how you would fall into that routine.
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It’s very mechanical. And you just sort of forget like, all right,
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well, what are my goals here? What are the students’ goals?
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What are the hopes of the parents? Yeah. So.
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Right. That’s why we do this. We have goals and ideas, whether it is to just
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find enjoyment or to reach a new level or prepare for a performance, whatever it is.
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Yeah. Yeah. That’s another one, preparing for a performance, right?
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Again, that anxiety comes in. I want to make sure I do this right.
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I better really focus on the mechanics.
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I better really focus on playing all the right notes at the right time.
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Yeah, I can see how it’s easy to get lost. so
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then what well what do we do what if what
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do we do if we find where we have
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a student who’s in that sort of rut you know or we have or we realize that as
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ourselves about ourselves as instructors you know in this routine and the routine
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is fine and it’s going okay for this type of thing but But like,
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what about playing music?
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What about what about that aspect of of like, again, that core goal of why we do this thing?
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Yeah, I mean, I think we say this quite a bit, but it’s about balance.
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It’s how it kind of comes back to balance. Right. Because these things are important.
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But I think one of the most important things, and I’m curious what you think
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about this, is in lessons is choosing the right repertoire.
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So we’re working on the mechanics, the technicality, the vocal exercises,
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all the exercises in instrument learning.
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But choose repertoire that complements that.
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So we’ve talked before about finding music that the kids are really interested
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in. Yeah. That’s important because that’s really motivating, right?
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They want to learn a song by their favorite artist.
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Great. We’ll do that. But then, well, I guess with my ukulele.
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So I didn’t go in. I bought the ukulele, wanted to play it in class,
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but I didn’t have a specific song that I wanted to play in class.
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So what I did was I started learning some of these chords, figuring out strumming patterns.
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Thinking out how to use my fingers something i haven’t
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had to you know do with a string instrument and
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then i took and then
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i took my repertoire i looked at a list of repertoire and what which of those
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pieces had some of the chords that i could play easily right and i started playing
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those songs yeah right so whatever you’re kind of working on with your with your student find
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repertoire that that you know
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complements those exercises right
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yeah and then from there you know i learned a
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couple more chords and i could add more music to my repertoire and it could
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be anything like you know i think about with a singer or a wind instrument i’m
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gonna pick pieces that work in you know maybe we’re trying to extend our range
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right well instead of just doing vocal exercises,
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trying to work on my range, I’ll find some music, right? Yeah.
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That I can accompany my student on, that we can work on their vocal range with.
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It’s making music. It’s not just a vocal exercise. That’s okay. That’s a good one.
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And if we talk about it in the context of voice and vocal lessons.
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It’s different than other instruments because biologically, we all have a vocal range.
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And a student may not understand what their range is, like how low they can
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sing, how high they can sing.
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And I’ve definitely seen it where students have chosen songs that are not in their range.
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Change and it’s not like that they can’t technically
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sing it but it’s just not like they don’t
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have the right anatomy right it’s not their fault sure
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you know and in the
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rock school in the band program i’ve had to explain to the instrumentalists
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look we need to play or make better context no we shouldn’t play this song i
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know you love this song but we shouldn’t play this song because your vocalist is going to struggle.
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It’s not in their range.
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And I don’t care how much you like it. I don’t care how much you want to play
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that guitar solo that you already know how to play.
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The vocalist is going to struggle. And as a group, it’s not going to feel good.
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Not going to feel good in the end. The vocalist is going to feel horrible about
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their performance as a result the band is just going to feel like i don’t know
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why can’t the person do the thing we’re doing our part it’s not their fault
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so great point extend that out to to like,
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every other instrument finding the right piece of music for the student yeah because you can
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use this making music as a as a tool for you know developing your skill if you’re
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choosing the right repertoire right yeah yes.
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Other suggestions on how to put playing music more central?
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I’ve got a few that I would offer up, but if you’ve got more,
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go for it. Yeah. I mean, I think the only other thing maybe,
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and we’ve talked about before, is going back to old repertoire, too.
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Like, you know, you’re, hey, we’ve been drilling this. We’ve been trying to get this down.
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Let’s take a break and play this old piece that you love.
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Yeah. We’ve said that before, right? And then get a good dopamine hit and enjoy
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making this music. And, right?
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That’s a way to just put music making. feel good
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about what you’re doing yes all right so
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my i’ve got three got three i think important points and suggestions on if you
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feel like the act of playing music and making music is not as central as you
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like it things you could do number one stop putting so much focus on teaching and learning.
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I know it sounds weird. A little bit.
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I know it sounds weird, but I think that’s how we sometimes fall into that trap.
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As when I first started teaching guitar lessons, I just felt this immense pressure
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from like self-imposed pressure, right?
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No one ever actually said this to me, but I felt this immense pressure to make
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sure that my students were learning something new every week.
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Like, oh, I got to be teaching them something new that they don’t know.
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You know, I’ve got I’ve got to be giving them this new content so that they
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don’t feel like we did this in last week’s lesson. Right.
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So it was this self-imposed pressure. sure.
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You know, I also thought, well, maybe the parents won’t think this,
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what I’m providing is valuable if I’m not giving them something brand new and
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interesting and like eye-opening every week.
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And it’s like, it’s just not that important.
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Right. You know? Yeah. You got to get that out of your head,
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that negative head chatter.
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And remember that even if
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you are doing the same thing for a couple weeks like they
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are still learning john you you
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i i heard you say like i need to teach them something new every week
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they are learning every week really right
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you know even if you don’t feel like you’re you know
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presenting this brand new because it’s
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it’s a long game yeah music learning
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music playing music it’s a long game and
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again to any method
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i’m not hating on method books but if it’s
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like okay we’re on this page this week and then good job let’s
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go to the next page next okay great next page there’s
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a there’s a written record of what you’ve been doing and when you’ve done it
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and put a date on that one check did it check did it it’s progress but for progress’s
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sake not necessarily for for like the purpose of why you’re doing music so.
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I just chalked that one up, at least in my mind, that was self-imposed.
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You know, that was like me really not understanding like why people were doing music.
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That was just me thinking like, okay, I am providing a service and I didn’t ask anyone,
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but I assumed like they’re going to judge me on how well I provide this service
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based on how much I’m giving the student every week. And it’s just not true.
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So I think take that pressure off of yourself.
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Stop focusing so much on teaching and learning in that traditional sense. That’s number one.
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Number two for private
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lesson instructors make time
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in lessons to play music with
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your students and i i don’t just
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mean in unison right because that’s a very common thing in private lessons we’re
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going to play this together but like make music like jam get creative think
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about that student as if you’re actually, you know, like a contemporary,
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not a student. Think about them as a contemporary.
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Like if you got together with a fellow musician and you were going to play something, play, right?
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Yeah, absolutely. I know it’s weird, but like what you do as the instructor,
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you kind of bring yourself like down to their level and just have fun playing
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at that skill level with them.
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Oh, yeah. No, I don’t think it’s weird. I think it’s really important.
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And I see this in, I can see this working in every tradition and every culture.
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Instrument you know playing the accompaniment
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for your voice student learning duets
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with your clarinet student right and
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mix that’s really fun the kids i you
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know i the kids love to do that they’re it feels like real music right yeah
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you’ve got two different wind instruments playing different parts oh that’s
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so fun for them four hands on the piano that’s great you know piano Teachers
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do that all the time, right?
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They accompany either in the treble or the bass for their piano students.
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Right. My daughters, I have a method book that I really love for piano,
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and it comes with all these awesome background tracks.
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And my kids love to do that. They would put the Bluetooth speaker on the piano,
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and the track came in different tempos, and they would play this really great backup.
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Track and they could play along with it at the piano. Yeah.
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It’s very satisfying and motivating for the kids.
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I’ve got an instructor who’s, he’s great. He primarily teaches drums and bass.
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If he’s got a student, a drum student, he’ll often play bass.
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Yeah. A lot of the students playing drums.
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He’s got a guitar in there too. Sometimes he’ll play guitar.
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If he’s got a bass student, he’ll jump on the drums. Maybe he’ll pick up the guitar. That’s…
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Just the act of the students seeing that, they start to understand there’s like
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way more to this than I put my fingers here and I get this sound, right?
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Yes. I can do this and I get that note or I go through this process and this is the result.
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It sort of opens up this world where it’s not just about, I guess,
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playing what’s on the page, I suppose. Yeah.
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And about making music together, right? We are not learning drums so that we
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can play drums by ourselves.
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Oh, my gosh. Necessarily, right? I was running joke.
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I was running joke about like, because when I was a kid and learning how to
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play guitar, I would learn something and I immediately want to like show my
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friend, hey, look what I learned.
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And I play it without telling him what the song was to see if he would guess
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what the song was, you know?
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And like, then he’s a bass player, so he would do the same thing.
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So it was a little bit harder for me to guess because there’s no chords. It’s just a bass line.
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And then we would joke that like drummers would have the worst case scenario in that.
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Hey, listen to this. Listen to what I just learned, mom.
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Yeah. Like no idea. It’s just a drum drum. Yes. But yeah, exactly.
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Exactly. So playing drums by yourself, the best.
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Right. And that’s skill development because playing with somebody,
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you’re working on your ear there too, right? You’ve got to listen to the other player.
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So, I mean, whether you’re a string player, rock band, you know,
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band instruments, that’s what it’s about, right?
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Hearing the other pieces and instruments and parts around you and working together.
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So that’s all really good and important. Okay, I got one more.
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Big surprise here, get ready, offer a band program.
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Some means, some means by which your students can connect and play music together
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so that it’s, and again, the thing with the instructors, it’s great, right?
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But peer to peer, when students are playing music together,
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other they get to see like oh i’m
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the mistakes that i make this kid makes
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too or like hey i remember when i used to make that mistake that this other
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kid can make and then the student can offer of some suggestions it’s that’s
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where it’s at some some form of that i think is is so valuable,
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And I’ll add, I mean, if you don’t know how to do that and you want to be able
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to do that, please contact me. I’ll do everything I can to help you.
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But yeah, some way of making music together, students, please. As a group.
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That’s where it’s at. Yeah. I mean, you see that, I see, you know,
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in more traditional settings, right?
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There are lots of opportunities for like band and orchestra kids to maybe not
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necessarily compete, but like do different festivals and programs for judges, right?
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For ratings and things like that. Yeah. Pep band also.
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Yeah. Oh, yeah. Pep band, all that stuff. But I know.
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I remember my brother doing that and I was like, that’s cool.
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He just like him and about 10 other kids from band would just show up at a basketball
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game in the stands and play some songs.
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So fun and fun for everybody listening, too.
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Yeah. But in conjunction with private lessons, you can we’ve got,
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you know, brass or woodwind players that learn duets together.
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That can be a really strong supplement to what they’re doing privately.
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And they love it. they love that
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stuff we’ve pulled kids in
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like out of their individual private lessons
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like at like they have private lessons at
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the same time we’ve pulled them out of those private lessons and put them
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in the same room and just be like all right this is you’re gonna do this for
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the next 15 minutes yeah yep yeah and yeah inevitably they always come out they’re
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like oh my gosh that was so fun you know that was that was great and they were
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learning they were learning yeah Yeah, exactly.
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Valuable skills doing that. Yes.
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Final thoughts, any? Should we bring it home?
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I love it. I feel like I have to say you shocked me a little bit with your like,
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stop focusing on teaching and learning.
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I’m like, it’s making me twitch slightly, but I totally get it.
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I agree. I would just like if it
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were me I’m I want to be aware of not
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creating bad habits right that’s
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the only thing have lots of fun you know
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play together play the different repertoire but
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keep an eye on your students make sure
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they’re not developing bad habits technical I think
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you know the technical bad habits and then you can fix them later this
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this is what this is all about with the two of
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us here i know it makes you buckle right it
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does tense up yes yeah
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00:30:33,224 –> 00:30:37,044
quick story my um totally unrelated
405
00:30:37,044 –> 00:30:40,024
my my sister used to
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make her peanut butter and jelly sandwiches where she would take the the pieces
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of the bread and she would purposely put them the opposite way you know you
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got the curved side and you got the flat side She would put them the opposite
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way because one time my mom told her like you can’t do that You’ve got to put it like this,
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I’ll show you, mom. Yeah, right?
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It doesn’t matter. Okay, so I’m not saying don’t teach.
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You know, that’s crazy. No, I know that you’re not.
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Stop feeling like you have to be constantly teaching in the traditional sense.
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Yes, and getting rid of that rooftop chatter I was talking about.
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Yeah. that pressure on yourself and just
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make the music with the kids and but yeah I mean I’m always I’m just always
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on the lookout for those bad habits and reminding like I am too but then I like
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then I get excited about the bad habits because you’re a rock star okay fine yeah I don’t know,
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this is this is great this is why I like to have these conversations where we
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have you know, those opposite perspectives.
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So, well, let’s wrap it up. This episode of Rock School Proprietor Podcast.
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Great time. Fun as always. Thanks, Mandy. For sure. Thanks, John.
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If you have topic suggestions or questions, please contact us at info at rockschoolproprietor.com.
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As always, we would love to hear from you.
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And don’t forget about our private Facebook group of performance-based music
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programs and rock schools.
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Come on over and join the conversation with some great folks.
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Show notes and transcripts for this and all episodes can be found at rockschoolproprietor.com.
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I’m at rock.school.proprietor on Instagram and John Kazicki on LinkedIn.
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Come connect with me, please.
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If you enjoy the show and gain some insight from our conversation,
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then we count that as a win.
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As always, all we ask in return is that you pay it forward. Please share the show.
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Music.
