November 20, 2002
75 piano players tickle the ivories ensemble concert
By Carol South
Herald contributing writer
Coordinating six hands on one grand piano keyboard is not as easy as some area piano students made it look.
On Sunday, 75 students from elementary school through high school participated Sunday in a Piano Ensemble Concert. Playing duets, trios, quartets and sextets, the event was held at the First Congregational Church and featured music ranging from classical to jazz, folk to popular.
Timing is crucial when you are sharing a keyboard with one or more players.
"It is hard to keep it in synch," acknowledged Adam Begley, who performed as part of quartet.
Ensemble students spent the past few months practicing with their partner. In addition to learning the music, they had to work out the sharing of the keyboard and learn to avoid collisions. These logistical challenges helped to reinforce their understanding of a piece.
"You really have to know the music," said Jessica Domine, who has been playing the piano for seven years and is a eighth grade student at East Junior High.
The student performers welcomed the chance to play with others on stage, saying it was both a challenge and a somewhat easier than solo performing.
"Performing with others is louder and can sound a lot more complex without being harder for each person," said Begley, who has been playing the piano for seven years and is a eighth grade student at East Junior High.
Piano teacher Dorothy Vogel said that the ensemble performances provide her students with good lessons in teamwork for an instrument that is usually practiced and performed solo.
"It isn't the most natural way to play, because even if there are just two people on a keyboard, the internal elbows can bump into each other," Vogel said. "Only one person gets to use the pedals, so the student on the left side plays them and the other person has to learn to keep their feet out of the way."
Another benefit of the annual ensemble concert is that performers had fewer stomach butterflies before going on stage.
"When I play as a group, I don't get as nervous," said Sarah Keyes, who has been playing the piano for ten years and is a tenth grade student at Central High School.
The Grand Traverse Music Teachers Association formed in 1975 and currently has 15 members. It is a local chapter of a statewide organization. Piano teachers whose students participated in Sunday's ensemble concert were Vogel, Laurie Schneider, Sally Lewis, Reiko Lewis, Nancy Larson, Susan Day and Barbara Coulter.
Barbara Coulter, a piano teacher in Traverse City, founded the local group. Calling it a support group for colleagues, she the group offers a variety of workshops, programs, conventions and master classes to the affiliated teachers, allowing them to develop professionally and musically.
However, Coulter emphasized that the primary focus of the group is to promote a lifelong love of music among their students.
"We encourage each other's continuing education but we mostly exist to provide opportunities for our students," she said.
The Grand Traverse Music Teachers Association offers annual student achievement testing, where an outside adjudicator assesses their progress in various aspects of musical development. The group also sponsors master classes and offers an honors recital as well as the ensemble recital every year.
"We come from all different walks of life, young and old, men and women, but we all hold our students' interest foremost in our goal setting for the group," Coulter noted. "Anything we can do to give the kids more opportunities to feel like they are growing musically and to foster an appreciation and love of music ongoing in their lives."