Post Grad

One of my  job responsibilities include occasionally representing Music for All at trade shows and conventions. The majority of the time it’s a music educator convention, where a lot of the attendees already know who we are, at least in a vague sense.

But occasionally, we go somewhere where the attendees have no idea who Music for All is. This past Saturday I represented Music for All at an expo for the Starfish Initiative in Indianapolis.

The Starfish Initiative is a “college access and readiness program serving economically disadvantaged high school students in Marion County, Indiana.” (http://starfishinitiative.org/about.html)

This past weekend they held The Starfish Initiative’s Back to School Expo. This was a free community event designed to provide the parents of children in grades Pre-K through 12th access to the best technologies and techniques available to jumpstart, excel and succeed in learning and in life.

While the majority of Music for All’s programs are aimed at middle school and high school students, we as an organization are huge advocates of music education (and music appreciation in general) at all levels. One of the take-a-ways we had for this event was an outline of a presentation given by our CEO, Eric Martin, titled “MUSIC (education) IS for ALL!!,  about the benefits of music and why parent’s should get their children involved.

I was completely overwhelmed by the amount of parents and students who approached me that were looking for opportunities to get involved in music at the elementary and Jr. High level. These parents knew the benefits of music, and how it could help their children, but did not know how to get them involved before high school.

It’s a shame that there are not more organizations, more programs, more opportunities in every community to get kids involved in music at a young age. It seems like most options outside of school are simply private lessons, which can be very expensive for most families.

Research confirms that music education at an early age increases the likelihood that child will grow up to seek higher education and ultimately a higher salary.

But what options do parents have to get their kids involved, especially if they come from a lower-income household?

I was lucky, my mother knew that I had a love for music at an early age and paid for piano lessons starting in the 2nd grade. I don’t know if I ever really thanked my parents for the sacrifices they made for me to be able to have that kind of experience (but the next time I talk to my mother, I will thank her). She paid for those lessons for 6 years, until my dad was laid off and they couldn’t pay for lessons anymore. She was heart broken about it. Fortunately, my love for music was already ingrained by this time. I continued playing, learning on my own, and was involved in choir at school.

As someone who had music in school, a very caring and nurturing music teacher, and parents who sought out outside opportunities for me, I still feel like I could have benefited from more exposure to music growing up. I can’t imagine not having what I did have, but I know there are so many out there, who don’t even get that.

The issue isn’t the desire. That was evident to me on Saturday at the expo. We were lucky to be located right next to the Indianapolis Symphony’s Instrument Petting Zoo, which was packed with people all throughout the day. They had all kinds of instruments sitting out for kids to pick up and play. There were violins, percussion, a trumpet, a trombone, a french horn, and few others. All day long I saw kids of all ages making a bee-line to the instruments, picking them up and just trying to play.

I was amazed by quite a few of these kids, whose parents said they had never touched an instrument before, who were able to not only make a sound on the trumpet, but could play a string of notes. I myself cannot make a sound on a trumpet (there’s a reason why I played piano and was a vocalist!).

This one little girl in particular, had to be about 7 years old, was over at the instrument petting zoo for about 2 hours. She played every single instrument they had.

Seeing things like this, make me so incredibly happy. Seeing young kids really loving music makes my day. But this also broke my heart, because these kids had the parents who were asking me… how do I get my kids involved, what do I do NOW. Besides private lessons, getting involved at school,  and just going to concerts to build the appreciation of music, I didn’t have an answer for these elementary and beginning middle school students.

So my goal, as a member of the community of Indianapolis, and as a music advocate, is to learn about all the opportunities for music in my community, to seek out the information, become more aware, and if the opportunities are not there, to possibly start creating some, or help others to create these opportunities. There are kids who want to be involved in music, and they want to be involved early. These kids live in EVERY community. I know I’m going to become more aware, so I can be be a better advocate, and a better ambassador for music.

What are you going to do?