Sigma Alpha Iota

children's music Keeping Music Alive Mary Jane Y. Tashiro created the Children's Piano Course to encourage musical curiosity in youngsters. T By Mary Jane Y. Tashiro he Fall 2008 PAN PIPES began a fourpart retrospective of material published in the journal since 1909. Among the authors quoted within was Dr. Samuel Schroetter, Director of Music at Virginia Institute, whose article in the very first PAN PIPES said, "There is no human product under the sun nearly as powerful as music.... To them who understand its mysterious language, music has in it all the essential elements appealing to all the best that is in man." Knowing the value of music, two artists expressed concern. In the Dec. 1949 PAN PIPES, Hans Rosenfeld wrote in "The Role of the College in Contemporary American Art," There are among our young creative Americans those who have developed, in addition to the love of writing music, that for teaching it. They are in the minority — perhaps not as far as the wish to teach is concerned but ... as regards their ability." In "Bringing an Understanding of Twentieth Century Music Into the Twenty-First" in the Winter 1992 PAN PIPES, Canadian composer Violet Archer wrote, "Children need to be exposed to the new music at elementary level....... that is when they can read music adequately." Mr. Rosenfeld and Ms. Archer hit upon the two major "roots" of what is remiss in music education. Now 2012, it is still questionable whether we are resolving this problem. I feel we are at a crossroads with time ticking away. Realizing the power of music in my life, I wanted to extend this same feeling to young people. The difficulty in accomplishing this was because, time and time again, they came to me for help with "deep seated" problems. Their incorrect patterns of playing were already established so it was difficult for me to change them. One well-known method which produced good performers realized the weakness of stressing "listening" before "note reading" when their students received low scores in sight reading for New York State School Music Association (NYSSMA). More alarming to me was a competition winner confessing that she was unable to play in quartets because she couldn't read notes quickly enough. Many selftaught guitarists and singers can play "by ear," but if they want to create new music, they must depend on professionals to write down the notes. I wanted to make a difference by teaching the proper skills to children fresh and unfettered ALIVE continued on page 28 sai-national.org SPRING 2012 PAN PIPES 27

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