Trying New Things at Cafe 44

On February 19th, I had the wonderful pleasure of attending Cafe 44’s very first open mic night, as part of my research project on music venues in the Princeton area. The whole venue lasted for about two hours, starting at 7pm, and ending right around 9pm, when people started to leave. There were quite a few performers there, who performed all types of music, from popular music, to original works, to well known folk songs. Because this event was sponsored by Westminster students, all of the performers were students themselves. I was very surprised at how successful the event was, seeing as it was quite a small cafe, and that the only people who really knew about it were the students of Westminster Choir College. It was nice seeing how such a small little cafe could hold such a wide array of talent.

When I walked in, initially, the place was packed with people and performers from front to back. Most of the people I saw there were friends and people I knew from school, but there were a few Princeton residents spread out amongst the crowd, as well. I was lucky enough to get a seat right in front, so I could see all of the action right in front of my face. They were promoting their new dinner service, so people were sampling things from their new menu while the show was going on. The atmosphere of the event was very relaxed and casual. People would chatter amongst themselves as performers would sing or play. There was even some interaction between the audience and the performer at times, which was very nice to see. I even saw the manager out and openly interacting with the rest of the people there, which was something that I’m not really used to seeing myself. It gave the venue a very comforting feeling to me, and I felt like I was right at home. There were small groups who performed popular tunes by Mumford and Sons and Bon Iver, and even an a cappella group from Westminster called the “Deaftones” there performing. They mostly performed popular tunes from Florence and the Machine, and David Guetta. There were a few students there performing original songs, as well. Overall, it was very successful first showing of the open mic night, and it inspired them to put on another one, which took place on March 12th. I cannot wait to go back and see what the next mic night has to offer for the Princeton community!

Something for Everyone

Music Therapy is without borders. Through the use of individualized musical interventions, music therapists strive to use music’s therapeutic qualities to satisfy physical, emotional, cognitive, and even social needs of an individual. By creating, singing, listening to, or moving to music, individuals strengthen connections that had once been obstacles.

This is exactly what I use music for. Though I study music as a student here at Westminster Choir College, my connection to music comes from something much more raw–pure enjoyment. The comfort that comes with humming my favorite song, or dancing to whatever’s on is something everyone understands, even at a very young age.

When babies come into the world a bit sooner than expected, it can cause a lot of issues for development, i.e. the inability to feed. This is where music therapists step in. They give a special pacifier to the baby and whenever the baby sucks on it, a lullaby plays. The baby learns very fast that they get to hear the music if they suck on the pacifier, which activates the same muscles needed for the infant to feed! This is called the PALS System (Pacifier Activated Lullaby System).

The PALS system is something Ms. Carol Ann Blank taught me when I interviewed her. Ms. Blank presently works at the Music Together Lab School here in Princeton but has been a music therapist for 18 years. When she first began, she was working with veterans to overcome traumatic experiences and social (self)-exclusion. However, when she had children, she began to find more interest in early childhood development. The idea of swapping to such drastically different groups baffled me! I thought you had to pick a specialty like a doctor picks surgery or medicine. She explained that the approach to the field is all inclusive and it is very easy to retrain yourself to work with anyone.

After speaking with Ms. Blank, I stopped viewing music therapy as this outlandish idea. I saw the proof in the Lab School classroom where children happily created music together. I saw the proof in the joy I got when my favorite song came on the radio as I drove home from my interview. Music doesn’t provide the answers for whatever issues there may be, it’s just a great tool and music therapy is just beginning to explore what it can do.

Second Blog

At the beginning it was very difficult to find a participant who would be willing to openly talk about why they were no longer pursuing music professionally. When I found someone who was willing to participate it turned out that they still wanted to pursue music professionally. They had the impression that I meant classical music only, and because of this the person was no longer eligible to participate. After a few days of scrambling I found someone who seemed to fit the requirements, and was very willing to participate. I called her up, we set the date, and the interview was done!

Hayley Collins was the woman that I ended up interviewing, and may I say this was an interview from heaven. The energy was incredible, the content interesting, and I learned so much from this amazing woman. Some of the personal experience that she brought to this interview really taught me some lessons about life and school. If I had to sum up what I learned in a sentence I would say, “no matter what, give what you do your all.” Hayley is the perfect example of committing to a path, and learning everything she can from it. Then, when life suggests a different route, a route that seems to fit who the person is, you will be ready to take it. Sometimes in life we must make major choices, and even if they seem like mistakes, they would have pointed us in the right direction.

What is interesting about Hayley is that she came to Westminster with the passion to perform. She dedicated herself to her art. She spent three and a half years studying to become a professional opera singer. Toward the end of the road she started to question whether or not this passion, this love for performing, was still present. She began to wonder if she was truly right for this, or if she was just completing a degree program. It was not that she wasn’t succeeding in the program, it was that her heart was no longer into it. Her senior year in college was the year she was faced with a choice. Do I finish the program or change majors? She decided, after much consideration, to change to the Bachelors in the Arts program and graduate with that degree.

I feel like a situation like this would have crippled any person who convinced themselves that they were meant to do something for so long. It can be an incredibly difficult process accepting that we were wrong about ourselves. Hayley however began finding her personal path when she obtained a job at McCarter Theatre in Princeton, NJ. It was here she was exposed to arts management, and truth be told…she fell in love with it. She learned as much as she could from this experience and this aided her when a huge change came about in her life. When she graduated from Westminster Choir College with a Bachelor of Art in Music degree, she knew in her heart what the next step was. The next step for her was attending graduate school for Theatre management.

Like I have previously said, much can be learned from this interview. But the one thing I think everyone should take out of it is to work as hard as you can at something you have decided on. Life has a way of guiding you to where you need to be.

Learning from Oral History

For students pursuing a music education today, the pressure of acquiring a job as a full-time musician is all too familiar. The years of study are meant to prepare the individual and provide them with the necessary skills required of them as a future professional. A university and private instrumental study, however, cannot account for all the possibilities and requirements a job might entail, especially when that means balancing several different jobs at once. A student’s wide range of musical abilities cannot all be accessed at the college level; there is simply not enough time or specificity in the provided curriculum. The majority of growth actually happens after venturing out into surrounding community, where the student can discover through first-hand experiences in the music field. The goal is to test their personal strengths and recognize areas that need more application, while applying the fundamental skills they have already acquired.

It has been an enriching experience personally developing a level of musicianship that will pave the way for a music career. In this regard, the oral history interview I conducted shed light on the possibilities and opportunities for a modern musician. Nicole Cochran, the young organist who answered my questions, is actually a friend of mine. We had first met during my freshman year studying the organ at Westminster Choir College, where Nicole was pursuing a graduate degree in Organ Performance. After completing the graduate program she moved to the Princeton area permanently, in order to continue building her musical resume. It was a great opportunity to be able to interview her in-depth, and also to record the process and share it with anyone interested in learning about the daily demands of a musician’s life.

Besides the personal stories Nicole shared in our interview, I felt she eloquently captured the reason many people pursue studying music and commit to practicing an instrument. Although a challenging and often times tedious instrument to play, the pipe organ holds seemingly endless musical possibilities for Nicole. The excitement in the approach to the instrument and its practice is the principal aspect of sincere musicianship. An attitude of inspired interest, such as Ms. Cochran’s, lays the foundation for developing other musical methods. As evidenced by her ability to simultaneously hold jobs such as teaching privately, choral accompanying, and general performance on the organ and piano. Time management was also reiterated as a necessary step in balancing the grind of travel and organization.

Another discovery from the interview was the importance of synthesizing the skills at our disposal in order to fulfill a role that has not been taught or practiced directly. As a current student of music this is a highly important, yet untaught, part of my musical education. This means developing through experiences with music is equally as important as routinely studying and building practice discipline. It was a positive experience to be able to ask a fellow organist and young musician questions and receive direct feedback. To be able to pass along this knowledge to others who are wondering and asking the same questions is a truly wonderful aspect of an oral history interview.

Music at Bunker Hill

A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of interviewing one of my teachers and mentors, Martha Frampton, about her musical upbringing and her experience creating Music at Bunker Hill, which is a concert series set up in Washington Township, New Jersey, geared towards bringing classical music to a small community which wouldn’t normally have access to it. I sat down with her at Bunker Hill Presbyterian Church, where she hosts her concert series, and we had an extremely insightful conversation about how she began her interest in starting the project, and how it grew from something so small into what it is now.

We began the interview with a brief overview of her life, like where her musical beginnings were, and what kind of education she had prior to pursuing her career in education and theory/composition. I was surprised to learn that she began on the flute when she was younger, and was self-taught before she tried her hand at the bassoon in college, which became her primary instrument. I then asked her what her collegiate background was, to which she replied she attended the University of Florida for a general music degree, because she really had no idea about what she really wanted to do until the end of her college years, which then lead to her receiving her teaching certification and teaching theory at Pennsville Memorial High School in Pennsville, NJ. I found it very interesting that Mrs. Frampton didn’t really have a direction in music, right away, but rather had to sort of go through discovery to find out her true passion. When I asked her about the thought of being a performer, she simply laughed and said that she never felt like she would be good enough to perform, and the thought had never occurred to her.

In the second half of my interview, I began to ask Mrs. Frampton about the beginnings of Music at Bunker Hill, to which she told a very interesting story about how she attended an auction and decided to bid for a piano, specifically a Steinway, which, she didn’t win, but then was later told about another piano which she could have for her church, and she then bought that piano, instead. This piano was just the beginning of Music at Bunker Hill because she finally had an instrument for the church which musicians could play on and showcase their talents to the community. The series eventually grew to include other instrumentalists and vocalists from the Philadelphia, New Jersey, and New York area. When I asked her about her initial struggles with starting the program, she explained that putting together a program wasn’t the hardest part, but marketing became the main struggle. She had trouble with this part most because none of the people who helped to create the program were business people; so learning to market their product was a learning curve. We ended the interview with speaking about how this music series has had a positive affect on the community, and how she is happy to have the opportunity to present such high quality music to her community and how is able to help educate people on an art which is mostly overlooked in her community, as a whole. I had a great experience interviewing her, and getting a more in depth insight into a project she has worked so hard for, and has dedicated a lot of time and effort to get where it is, today.

From Graduation to the Classroom

On November 4^th I interviewed a good friend of mine, and Westminster Choir College Alumni, Sarah Mae Lagasca. Sarah Mae recently graduated from Westminster, not even a year ago in 2013, and is now working as a K-8 music teacher in Freehold. NJ. Before Westminster Sarah Mae attended the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts in New York City. At Westminster Sarah Mae majored in Music Education with a vocal primary. Now almost halfway through her fist year of teaching she is being able to put her skills as an educator to the test as well as deal with this new found territory of being out of school and in the real world.

As a future educator getting to talk to Sarah Mae was a dream come true. I brought this thought up to her multiple times but the process we go through in school is kind of the “perfect process.” While going through this “perfect process” one of the things I fear is that it is not like what will be encountered in the real world. During the interview Sarah Mae expressed that, yes, Westminster does offer the perfect road to music education and that in the real world you don’t have your co-op to guide you. But, the best part about the real world is that it is the real world. You now have real students, and real experiences where you are in charge.

I ask Sarah Mae a lot of questions on what it was like in her first year of teaching. She expressed to me that she had two main struggles while going through her first year of teaching. The first is age. She told me that being a new teacher as well as being a young teacher is intimidating. While her colleagues are great, supportive, and understanding it is very scary to be the new kid on the block, so to speak. The second challenge she had might actually surprise you. If you were going to guess being a female or woman or color you’re wrong. Sarah Mae said that her biggest struggle is actually her height. “If I don’t wear heels to school I get mistaken for a student.” Yes, we had a very long a good laugh about this.

Getting to talk to Sarah Mae was such a treat! She is an extremely bubbly and personable person. Our conversations didn’t feel forced or awkward at all; on the contrary everything seemed to roll from one topic to the next. I came to the interview prepared with a list of questions that I didn’t really get to touch. Sarah Mae was extremely intuitive and answered half of my questions before I had the chance to ask them. I found myself laughing through most of the interview and time flew by so quickly. It was such a fun interview and I would do it all over in a heartbeat if I could.

The interview aftermath

Katie Austin

I have to say, interviewing Katie was more fun than I thought it would be.  When I had first joined my voice teacher Carolann Page’s voice studio, it was the 2^nd semester into my sophomore year and I was the fresh new face in the studio. Everyone was secretly known as a “Pagedoll” because she always called us “dolls” and well… her last name is Page. I knew everyone in the studio by name but was not close enough to call them friends or have stories to talk about with them. But, as semesters went on and more performances in studio were done, I started to get closer to everyone; I even became roommates with one of the girls in that studio.

Before interviewing Katie, I didn’t realize how close we actually became before she graduated from Westminster. When I thought of my topic, I immediately thought of her because she inspired me so much in studio class. She was known to have come into the studio with a lot of stage fright; it really changed her voice and her performance negatively. However, her hard work and perseverance were noticed and I really admired it. The more she performed, the more poised and confident she looked. Once she graduated from college, I was just really curious to see have things have changed for her, what things were easier or not, and what was unexpected for her in the real world.

This interview turned out to be more of a catch up of gossip and the low down between friends rather than a punctual and question/answer interview. I learned a lot about her and got a lot of helpful advice in return. It turns out that giving the interviewee their questions beforehand isn’t such a good idea if you want their natural and funny personality to come out AND if you want longer answers. If you couldn’t already tell, that, among other problems, happened to me. First, Katie and I had completely different schedules and available time slots. Since she lives at an ashram, and I go to college at Stressminster, we ended up having our interview at a solid 10:30pm. Second, because she was nowhere near Princeton at the time, we had to Facetime our interview.

But! Thanks to the power of technology we successfully recorded it! Next, I asked her the assigned questions. I think because she had prepared her answers beforehand, her answers were very short to the point that when I asked her questions off the page while filming, she would answer yes or no.  Once all the questions on the page were done, she relaxed more to her usual quirky self. I got to ask her a lot more questions about how she was and how things were at her ashram, and well… life. I think what I liked most about our interview, was that I also got to tell her what was going on in my life and she gave me some words of wisdom based on her experience.

Music in the Community

In the small, South Jersey town of Washington Township, NJ, lies a tiny, yet promising community of young musicians who are willing to show there talents to their small community of people who are generally interested in the arts, particularly the performing arts. Each year, Martha Frampton, who co-operates, and is currently president of this society of musicians called “Music at Bunker Hill,” calls upon musicians in the South Jersey, New York, and Philadelphia area to come and perform at a small church in Washington Township, to help expose the community to music and the arts, as a whole. Each season, this small musical community rounds up about 5 to 6 performances, each with a different soloist with a different musical background. From violinists, to singing soloists, Music at Bunker Hill features them all, and features them in a way that the community can easily relate to and understand. This season, artists such as Arnaud Sussmann, Barbara Dever, William Frampton, who is actually Martha Frampton’s son, Soovin Kim, Jessica Lee, The Conwell Wind Quartet, and Ran Dank will be featured in this exciting and elaborate program of the 2013-2014 season. This group was founded in 2008, and was founded on the basis of preserving classical music while still observing other musical genres. The goal of this organization is to make great music both affordable and accessible to everyone in the community.

This community of musicians means a lot to me as a musician. Growing up in the South Jersey area, it was always hard to find performance opportunities to attend or to be a part of. The community in which I live is very rural and cut off from the regular world, to put it lightly. I would always have to travel to either Philadelphia or New York City in order see or be a part of a performance, besides my high school performances. So to have a community of musicians who regularly perform classical and new music near my town was a big deal for me, because I was still able to be exposed to that type of music and be educated about it. Being able to have this plethora of musicians around me has ultimately made me a better musician, as a whole, because I have been able to learn from trained professionals how to perform in a small setting. It was a great tool for me to dip into performing, in general, and really got me into my own career path. Seeing those people on stage bringing life to music really inspired me to pursue my own profession, for the simple fact that I felt the strong desire to create beautiful works of art that would touch people emotionally and physically. I’m very proud to say that I come from such a thriving musical town, and that even though it can be difficult to promote such an atmosphere in a cut-off place, this town has done just that, and so much more.

Late to the Game: Discovering Musical Passions

The New Jersey Women’s History Website is gathering Oral Histories on prominent female musicians centered in New Jersey. Mika Godbole is a percussionist and teacher who works at the Westminster Conservatory, The Cambridge School, and a variety of other endeavors such as the Summer Music Festival at Aspen. What struck me about Godbole is that she started taking formal lessons at the age of 17. She was accepted into a studio based on four months of solid practice, on the premise that she would continue to catch up to students who had been playing for years.

She certainly caught up, and has done much more. Godbole now teaches individual percussion lessons as well as a group drum circle at The Cambridge School. For someone who was so late to the game, the amount of success she has achieved is astounding. In under two decades she went from not playing percussion, to being a respected leader in the field of performance and education!

My name is Jonny DeHart, and I was a percussionist at first, before dedicating myself to vocal and choral studies. I was 19 when I decided that I wanted to go down the path I’m on. I often don’t take time to look back during the shuffle of life, but it’s pretty remarkable that I was able to discover and pursue my passion when I was that age. We certainly hear of child prodigies, but it is also interesting to consider individuals who had a delayed start, and made up ground. For example, golfer K.J Choi, who first picked up a golf club at age 16, has won 20 PGA events by the age of 43. It’s fascinating to find individuals who can uncover a hidden passion and talent after years of allowing it to lie dormant.

Today, many professional musicians rely on teaching as their primary income. This practice can be good and bad, as teachers are often extremely gifted musically, but it is rarer to find a teacher who is musically exceptional, and pedagogically exceptional. I think we will be able to brainstorm about some of the similarities and differences between performing and teaching.

Godbole is a female percussionist, which is awesome, and empowering as an example to all young women who wish to follow their paths. As a male, it is hard to get an actual perception of what it is like to be a woman living in 21^st century America. Hopefully, when talking with Ms. Godbole, we will be able to share experiences of being percussionists, educators, and human beings from the lens of both genders.

This interview will be of value to anyone who entertains thoughts of maintaing a performance career while actively teaching in multiple situations. This interview will be of value to anyone who is considering picking up and developing a new skill. I hope this interview will be an inspiration to anyone who is struggling to gain, or retain passion, in their music lives. I hope this interview helps people think about the power that a creative spark can have when given fuel by work ethic. I hope this interview can help us discover that we’re always teaching, and that we’re always learning.

Building a Foundation for a Music Career

For many people, the idea of pursuing a full-time career in music is considered laughable. Due to the economic upheavals being suffered by our current generation, and the lack of support for paid and unionized musicians, the average American is bound to look at a music performance education tentatively, if not suspiciously. Basically thinking, why pay so much money for an education that cannot guarantee a secure job or other typical employment benefits?

Fortunately some students are not so easily convinced of promised failure and the myth of the starving artist. Many decide that pursuing a liberal arts or performance degree in a university environment is quite worth the financial commitment. Besides the obvious academic advantages, these environments allow students to combine their passion and skill for their chosen instrument while simultaneously cultivating their overall musical ability. The undergraduate and graduate level of a musical education are also designed to hone the professional skills needed for their specialized field post-college. They also provide an introduction and specific study of private teaching, choral conducting, accompanying for solo and choral performances, as well as composing and arranging.

One of these former students is a young woman by the name of Nicole Cochran. Growing up in the town of McKeesport, Pennsylvania, Nicole played many different instruments from a young age. This ranged from clarinet lessons in middle school, to the viola and bassoon, and her main focus: the pipe organ. Deciding in high school that her passion could be pursued seriously at the Juilliard School of Music, Nicole auditioned and was accepted into the undergraduate program for Organ Performance. After completing the program, Nicole decided to pursue a Master’s Degree for Organ Performance in order to raise her marketability as a musician which she completed in 2012 at Westminster Choir College in Princeton.

Now living in the Princeton area, Nicole has been working steadily to create a musical resume that will give her the foundation she needs to acquire any job she wants. This includes accompanying for several high school choirs in New Jersey, including Princeton High School. She also teaches piano and bassoon privately, and plays keyboard and sings back-up vocals for a local Princeton cover band. Her schedule can be hectic at times, as she must drive to different towns and homes for rehearsals and lessons. She is also required to juggle lots of repertoire, and simultaneously learn and perform many pieces of music widely ranging in style and genre.

So how can such a magical career be achieved? Well there is really no specific insider secret to Nicole’s success in these early stages of her musical career. Not only are her skills varied over many styles of playing, but her flexibility and adaptability allow her to approach any musical task as an opportunity to learn and to teach. Generally, the musician’s adaptability is what allows them an honest confidence when applying for jobs that they have not necessarily studied or been specifically trained for. As with many careers, the musicians must balance between many factors when taking on any job. The music degree, however, is what gets the proverbial foot in the door.