EILEEN MOWREY
Assistant Reverb Editor
“As a researcher, you’re always saying, ‘I wonder what would happen if … ’” said Jill Reese, an assistant professor of music education and recent recipient of a two-semester grant for an “iPads for Music Making and Music Teaching” program. Reese, along with co-investigator Matthew Wilson, a visiting lecturer of music technology and lab coordinator for the School of Music Technology Lab, will be examining the effects of technology on music learning at both elementary and secondary levels, as well as creating an iPad ensemble called iPAD.
The project, primarily the purchase of the iPads, was largely funded by a SUNY Innovative Instruction Technology grant of $10,000. According to a SUNY Fredonia news release, “the IITG program funds campus innovations and initiatives that have the potential to be replicated elsewhere within SUNY to benefit students and faculty across the state and worldwide.”
The cost of the 20 iPads, along with the accompanying learning lab and necessary apps, came to more than $10,000, but, luckily, the Fredonia School of Music director agreed to provide the remainder of the funds.
While the ensemble portion of the program will not begin until November, Reese and her students have already utilized the iPads for the elementary general music methods and secondary general music methods classes, the other two sections of the grant project. They have begun by integrating the iPads into the student’s field teachings at the Campus and Community Children’s Center on campus and at the Fredonia Middle School.
The project inherently requires a certain aptitude with the iPad technology — especially when it comes to the plethora of apps. The music creation applications that Reese and her students have and will be using include Bebot (a program that makes robot type noises as you move your fingers across the screen), ThumbJam (with lines on the screen, each for a different note in a pentatonic scale, and the instrument tone can be changed), MadPad HD, SoundPrism, Bloom HD, Garageband, HexASound, Figure: Propellerhead, Audio Palette and Audiobus.
Reese said that she is learning a lot from her students, especially when it comes to the technology.
“I’m not tech savvy at all, but I’m interested in learning,” she said.
These apps do not require users to know how to read notes, which makes them equally accessible to both music majors and non-music majors. In some ways, Reese feels as though the technological aspect will equal the playing field for participants in the ensemble.
The ensemble will be open to both music majors and non-music majors, but since there are only 20 iPads available, priority will go to music education and therapy students before invitations are extended to other music majors and students. Reese is considering allowing students with their own iPads to join as well but has yet to make a definite decision.
According to their web page, iPAD will be a student-led ensemble whose purpose is to create and perform music. As a member of the group, students will have the opportunity to express themselves and create musically while shedding the confines of traditional instruments and conventions associated with typical music learning and performing. Ensemble members will be referred to as “iPadists.”
Part of the grant dictates that members of the ensemble will also participate in a partnership with senior adults and share their learning experiences with them. Then, together, they will put on a mini concert later in the year. The iPad interface is a lot easier for seniors to use than actual instruments because they require less dexterity in the fine motor skills while still allowing seniors to create and express.
Along with their experimentation, participating students will be asked to keep a weekly journal describing their experiences creating music with the iPads and their interactions with other ensemble members and their senior partners.
The ensemble’s music will be more improv-based than anything, and the group will not play together so much as they will break into smaller “chamber groups” to play either their own creations or cover songs.
Reese stressed that non-music majors were equally as welcome as music majors. She said that students don’t need prior musical training to be a part of this ensemble, “you just need to be interested in making music and not be scared of the technology.”
In fact, Reese believes that sometimes it is easier for people who are not formally trained in music to create and explore using the technology because they are less focused on perfection and more focused on exploration.
“Formally trained musicians sometimes struggle to improvise and create because they are so focused on playing perfectly what is in the notation, and I am finding in their reflections that the students feel freed with the technology because they’re not sort of restrained by notation and there aren’t really expectations for correctness,” said Reese.
Because the interface is not traditional and does not look like an instrument, people who are not music majors are on an equal playing field with their musically trained peers. Reese says that this creates a change from the perceived standard where the music majors are the ‘experts’.
Reese became interested in the idea of an iPad ensemble and the effects of iPads as learning tools after borrowing her mother’s iPad and seeing all the different music apps available. She also saw one such ensemble at the University of South Florida when she was attending the Suncoast Music Education Research Symposium, and thought that it would be a cool project for her own students.
After just two weeks of using the iPads, Reese’s secondary general music methods students had come up with creative ways to use the iPads with their own students and had learned some valuable lessons. The undergraduate students who used the iPads in field teachings found themselves learning from the children.
“That’s one of the good things about doing these field experiences with the undergraduates is, they have this feeling that they need to be the most knowledgeable ‘other’ all the time, and it’s a good opportunity for them to realize that they can learn from their students,” said Reese. “I learn from my students all the time. I think it helps to be a two-way street. If it’s not, then both groups are really missing out.”
An informational meeting will be held on Nov. 7 at 7:30 p.m. in Mason Hall 2001 for anyone who is interested in joining the ensemble. The purpose of the project, along with the expectations of the ensemble members, will be further explained and iPads will be available for students to experiment with.