Welcome to the Common Time Podcast, a show designed to give music educators practical, inspiring ideas for you and your program. Each week we sit down with world class educators, composers, and conductors to talk about teaching, leadership and building programs that thrive without burning yourself out. So whether you're a band, orchestra, or choir director, our goal is simple to help you grow and stay inspired and remember why you fell in love with teaching music in the first place. This is Season 4, and we're diving even deeper. More real conversations, more actionable takeaways, and more voices shaping the future of music education. Let's get into the episode. Our guest today is Gary Lewis. Welcome, Gary.
Thanks so much for having me guys. It's great to see you both.
We are so excited to have you. So Gary Lewis is the director of orchestral studies at the University of Colorado Boulder. He's also the music director and conductor of the West Texas Symphony. And we are really excited to share his experience with everyone today. John, why don't you get us started?
Thanks, David. Hi, Gary. It's so good to see you. Thanks for being here. So I think that I mean when people know you and follow your career, you're kind of like a Unicorn in that you've had success in all the genres. So in for anybody listening, Professor Lewis has had success as a marching band, a director. He's actually my predecessor at Michigan a couple ago. He is also unbelievably successful on the orchestral side of things in higher education and in the professional world. So if we took the tape and rewound your journey, where did it all start for you as a teacher and as a musician?
Well, it has been an interesting sort of circuitous journey. I think it probably started. I attended a church that allowed me to be involved with that, somebody who had taught singing schools all over the South southern part of the United States. So I was reading Shaped Notes from the Womb, Self edging from the womb. Basically, my parents didn't know what to do with me. They got me guitar lessons from a guitar player from the Grand who had a career at the Grand Ole Opry. So I played a lot of country and western, learned how to deal with theory and that sort of thing, and turned into a jazz guitarist through school. But I think certainly the most formative years were during my middle school and high school years. And I owe so much to incredibly inspiring band directors who saw some spark in me and really helped to feed it point me in the right direction. So then I went on to become a, you know, Bachelor of Music Education student at University of Oklahoma and then ghost Boomer Sooner, Sooner. And went. Went directly into a degree in when conducting and then met John Whitwell who hired me, who was another incredible influence of professional father to me and through that connection made it to Michigan and then on as you mentioned so. Yeah, it's it really is an incredible path.
I did not know that you were at OU, Grad. That's right. This is news to me.
We both went to OU's. All three of us are all three. Of us went to OU. How about that?
Well, we've talked about it, but I don't think that our listeners probably knew that you were the director of the Michigan Marching Band at some point in your life, the position that John now holds, of course. I'm just curious if we kind of shift to that chapter. Did that experience shape your thoughts about teaching leadership, you know, managing people at scale, the things that we deal with that you're now dealing with, but many years removed in the orchestral world?
Well, I think for me, my own personal growth was at its peak during those five years I was at Michigan. I think I probably grew more during that time than at any other period of my life, primarily because of the challenge that was presented in a great way by the students in the marching band. John knows first hand the passion and the expectation and the and the standard that they hold to their leaders too. And that was really inspiring to me and I think helped me to grow immensely as a leader artistically. I think I grew more during that time probably than any other five year period just because of being exposed to the giants in the field of the Bob Reynolds and the Gustav Meyers and the Don Santos and these people. I, I remember getting nauseous walking up on the loading dock as I walked into the School of Music every day thinking if I'm not the very best, if I can be today, the comparison is going to really be awful. So it was, it was, it really challenged me in a lot of ways, specifically with the marching band. Man, the experiences were just so vivid and so amazing, both in good ways and then in really challenging ways. You know, the Michigan Daily, the student newspaper call for my resignation at the end of the first year I was there. One of the former conductors of the band came into rehearsal during homecoming and questioned whether anybody who was not a Michigan man could ever uphold the traditions of that band and was screaming at the band with me standing no further than six feet away from him. And so that the first year was really challenging, but 3-4 or five years later, it was really rewarding as well. So yeah, I couldn't, I wouldn't trade those years for anything.
Yeah. You know, it's, it's interesting on so many levels. I, I find it fascinating that you have been successful at the highest, highest level of all of these things in pageantry arts, in wind ensemble when because I mean, you were the director of Manza at Ohio State and then you transition to the orchestral side. So also academic settings, professional settings. I am curious though, from a rehearsal perspective across all the genres are there any or are there things that you carry across, even though they are different genres in a rehearsal setting?
Oh, absolutely. I, I, I think this stuff, my used to say 4/4 is 4/4 and I, I really took that to heart because at that time I was primarily a wind conductor, but was, was getting opportunities with the orchestra under his tutelage there at Michigan, even though he was a colleague. And so I, I took that and ran with it really. And so I think no matter what group you're standing in front of, whether it's a musical ensemble or just an audience that's listening to you speak, I think what they want to see from you is your passion, your what inspires you, why you do what you do and why what you're about to explore with that audience or that ensemble is the most important thing at that moment in life, you know, And so I try to bring that sort of passion to every rehearsal. It's it's as you both know, we can always get bogged down with the administrativeia, the things that are the non musical parts of our job. But I always found a real refuge and being able to walk in there, step on the podium and share that time, share that mutual passion about music with the people in front of me. And I think that's that. I think that's the common thread that binds all of that.
Yeah, I, you know, it's so interesting that you say that because no matter what's going wrong in my life, when I step on the podium, it ceases to matter. And it's one of the coolest spaces for me because it is a complete escape from all that stuff, because now I'm focused on sharing with the, you know, the individuals in front of me and collaborating with them. So I, I, I'm right there with you on that. And I have a question. I think possibly all three of us, when we started our careers many years ago, the, the persona on the podium was less collaborative. It was there was more control, if you will, to use that word. I'm curious if you experience the same as I did and how do you give your musicians more ownership now since we've kind of slipped, slipped, we've changed to, you know, this is about collaboration. So how does that work for you?
Well, I think it is probably true that I've changed in that way. Although I think just given my personality, I, I think I, I've always tried to avoid the, the maestro tyrant sort of approach to things. And I, I think that's one of the things that I owe Gustav Meyer so much in regard to, particularly with conducting, because he was all about facilitating. His whole concept of conducting technique was about facilitating the group to play Better Together. And how can you do that? And so I think fairly early on, I realized that really, chamber music is the best way for musical training to occur at his highest level. And the more we can make our large ensembles, chamber music alike, the faster our students are going to grow or the musicians are going to grow and the better the ensemble's going to be in rather short in rather short order. So, yeah, I do think it's true though, that musicians are even less tolerant of, of something that is all controlling, both from a psychological point of view and also an artistic point of view. And having realized that the group is going to play better, they're going to grow faster. If I, in Gustav's words, give up a certain kind of control to gain a more sophisticated kind of control. That's that's where the magic happens. And so I, I do think that's true. We need to enlist, inspire, engage in power the musicians to contribute to this, as you mentioned, a collaborative thing and we're guiding it in ways that are maybe not as controlling but are more nurturing.
Right. Absolutely. I would argue that's going to be true for all levels. I mean, we're talking beginners through professional players, right?
Absolutely. It's absolutely true and it's the more, the more we give. I remember reading Stephen Covey's book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People many, many years ago when it first came out and he had interesting take on the word responsibility. He noticed that it was response hyphen ability and respelled it, recast it that way. And I think the, the more responsibility we give our students, the more ability to respond that we give to our musicians and empower them with, then the better able they're going to engage us. Younger students may not understand what's happening at the time, but they grow faster. Older musicians, professional musicians appreciate the, the collaborative nature of that and appreciate being given a voice and what's going on, both musical and otherwise. So I really do think that's the only way to go about it.
You know, I have to say, I, I, I, I can't, I mean, we all can't under score strongly enough how important chamber music is. And yeah, there is time to do it now. Our colleagues listening to this going, I have this and this and this and I get it. We've all been there, you know. However, the priority, it should be prioritized somewhere in the curriculum, in my humble opinion. I mean, it's so important.
It is so important, it's so difficult as you mentioned, I mean just from a personnel standpoint, a facility standpoint, A scheduling standpoint, all those things are, are challenges in regard to that. And that's although I do believe that we need to do everything we can to make it happen. One of the things that we do have control over is the large ensemble. And the way that we, the way that we set that up and the way that we teach and the way that we conduct and the way that we empower the students within that. The way that we direct their ears, the way that we project the score. And the all the things that would be the core experiences in a chamber music setting can often be sort of shoved to the side when one person takes charge. But the more we can, the more we can bring into our large ensemble settings those things that are more to the chamber music setting. I think we can have, in a way, the best of both worlds.
Yeah, absolutely. And you know, I, I'm just kind of thinking we, you know, at the collegiate level tend to do that more than we see in public education. And I, I mean, I would encourage our listeners to try to work that in. I know for, you know, at the wind ensemble level, I would, my top players would always have one or two chamber experiences each semester. And yes, they would might be in another room rehearsing while I was doing large ensemble with another set of players. But there was always a way to move things around where, OK, I'm going to go over there and coach them for 10 minutes while you guys are on a break. There's just ways to do it if we if we prioritize it. And you've already mentioned that. I think it's not only great for the players, it's great for the person in front of them. Like there's so much growth that can happen there. So I'm glad that you mentioned it.
Yeah. Well, and I want to just piggyback on what you said. One of the things that I admire about the circumstance you described there is that you were willing to let some of those better players go into another room and not be under your direct control. And I think a lot of people are reticent to do that. They don't want to let the best players out of their rehearsal because things won't go as well. When really in reality, the ones who remain are the ones who need that the most and the ones who are in the other room are the ones who need that the most. And so I think just yielding us, yielding control is hard for a lot of us. And I applaud that, that sort of approach.
Yeah. So, Gary, I'm going to change directions just a tad bit. The profession of music is, is challenging, right? It's and it's our job as college professors to prepare the upcoming elation to be performers, but also to patron art. I teach, the majority of my students are non music majors and I take it really, or I take the responsibility very seriously that it's my job to help them love art for the rest of their life. And they should patron the fantastic players in the School of Music or in the School of theatre, the School of dance, whatever it is, right? However, those people that are going to that are going to major in music, there's a lot that goes into that. So, so specifically as you work with your students at Colorado, So what do you think that young musicians and teachers most often misunderstand about the profession and exactly what it really demands in actuality?
Well, I think you're, you're alluding to it. I mean, we have to be conversant with and not biased against or prejudice against other musics other than the ones that are maybe central to our study. We, we really have challenged ourselves here at CU Boulder in the College of Music to help train the 21st century musician. And we've had a lot of discussions about what that entails. You can tell from my rather varied background, being the master of none and the Jack of all trades, is that I got rid of a lot of those biases early on. And so I still with my conducting post with the West TX Symphony, almost half of our performances are non classical, whatever that is. And we're we're trying to break those lines down even more. I mean, even calling one concert a masterworks concert, another pops, we're trying to trying to get rid of those silos, if you will. So I think just demonstrating to the students my appreciation for other musics and the sophistication that they can have. I mean, we might, all of us might love to sit around and geek out about the craftsmanship of Brahms and the depth of Brahms, but we can also sit around a really big tower power, you know, or whatever it is. And, and so just being able to talk to the students and share my own background and what resonates with the people that are going to be the patrons of the arts, the people who are going to support our habit, as it were. I think it's a really important, I think we need to be able to speak to audiences and we need to be able to demonstrate our passion for what we do in the way that we play, in the way that we conduct, in the way that we speak to them. Rarely does somebody come up after a concert and say, hey man, that German 6 chord at the end of the exposition was stunning tonight. Nobody's going to do that, but they often come up and say, gosh, I love the energy that you guys play with, man. It looks like you're having a great time up there and everybody can relate to that. And so just the energy with which we perform, the passion with which we perform, and the way that we embrace other musics, I think is, is the biggest key to success. And then when it comes to being a professional, I think being on time and being available, you know, there's this thing in athletics that your greatest ability is your availability. I think I think that's true in really every profession, but certainly in music, because of that, one person's not there. If that second kazoo player is not there, then the whole the whole is not, it's not complete. So just teaching them about responsibility and about commitment and about passion, I think is the best way to go about that.
I also think too, though, a part of our job is to teach them that it's OK that it, it's difficult, but there's nothing better, right?
Yeah, right. Well, if it wasn't hard, it wouldn't be fun, you know. And so that's one of the reasons why I think maybe more, maybe higher quality repertoire is not as approached as much as it might be, especially at younger ages, just because it's not an immediate gratification sort of a thing, you know? And it does. The harder the music is, the longer it's going to take to. And generally the, sorry, I should restate that the better quality the music is, the generally the harder, the longer it's going to take for it to all come together. But the, as you mentioned, that journey makes it is worth it, you know, the end result. So yeah, absolutely acknowledging that it's a very challenging thing that we do, but we couldn't live without it, you know? I am currently proving the fact that the better they a repertoire, the worse it sounds at the beginning of the rehearsal cycle, smashing my head against the podium going. Yeah, it's good. Sometimes I tell the group, I say, you know, the better this gets, the worse it's going to sound. Yeah, they, they don't. They can't really relate to that. But. But I think they finally get it, you know?
Yeah, there's so much great information in there. I love that we're prioritizing that there's other music forms out there that we should engage with as well. Because I remember having conversations with my doctorate with, you know, questions like what are the other things you're listening to? What choral works have you been listening to? What piano sonatas have you been listening to? What external music that wouldn't be considered classical are you using? And I'm actually just connecting dots. I did a conducting symposium at Michigan State and you were the guest artist and I conducted Stravinsky Octet. And I remember you saying this bassoon player is this is the rock'n'roll part in that second movement. And you use the term rock'n'roll, right? And I'm connecting like you know what you were, I didn't know you were jazz guitarist, but the experience with jazz and then I'm sure that lended itself also to rock'n'roll. You just mentioned Tower of Power like you're looking at how you're asking me to react to that classical piece in a way that's a genre that's separate and you don't get that without listening.
Right. Well, I'm grateful for my unique background and that I think it's equipped me in certain ways as a conductor, you know, that I would not have been as well equipped. And a sense of time, a sense of rhythm, a sense of pulse, a sense of groove, all those things are central to what we do as musicians. I've brought in drum set players to do the scare. So in Beethoven 5, you know, just to help the students, there's a groove there somewhere, you know. And so it's a matter of finding it. And I think it really helps to kind of tie everything together.
Yeah, I just love those connections because it seems like, well, bringing a drum set player in to do that, like there is a groove. And if you've never been in an ensemble where you feel that click in, then it's that's, you know, it's a kind of a foreign feeling, I guess.
Yeah. Absolutely, you know. Also too, for people listening, we highly encourage as the students come into the room every day play something that isn't band music. I used to do this when I taught middle school. Every single day we would listen to something and it's great. Never band — not that band's not great, you know, but they hear band sounds all day, right? We would listen through all kinds of things and actually that's really easy to do right, especially now you know, because it's all Spotify or YouTube or pick your thing right so.
Yeah, there's so many ways to do that. I remember doing that with — I love there's a recording at Chicago Symphony doing Tchaikovsky 4 with Barenboim conducting. And I just fell in love with this piece. I fell in love with the way Barenboim not only conducted it, but just his phrasing and the things that he was doing with that one piece. I probably played that thing for them 10 times. I just wanted them to be like, I'd watch what I'm seeing. I would get really lit up about it, but it would bring them into my space in a way that I could share something that I really loved. And I think it made a difference. In fact, I now tell you know, where we live sometimes like entering the band room or rehearsal hall is supposed to be like silent. Everybody's entering this like rigid structure. And although I do think it's great to meet students at the door and tell them hello or welcome them into the class, I think having something playing with a prompt on the board or on the whiteboard, whatever you have, is a great way to start every single rehearsal to get them to enter focused. We have something that's going on the board, but you have this musical like catalyst for expression, for conversation, for reflection. So I'm with you, John — I'm with all you guys. I think it's just fantastic that we should be doing more of the outside. What are we able to share with our students other than the music we're preparing right now?
And they can share with us too. I mean, what are they listening to, you know? They can be part of that mix.
That's fantastic. I want to shift a little bit to the professional world. I know as the conductor of the West Texas Symphony, that Symphony is deeply connected to the community. And I watch and I follow — Eric Baker is a former student of mine. I taught him during middle school and high school and I follow him. So I see a lot of things that are happening with the Symphony just through Eric. And I'm just curious, how has the sort of community action, that reality, shaped the way you think about education, relevance, the role of the ensemble beyond the concert hall? And you were just mentioning kind of breaking down these barriers of this is a masterworks, this is pops. But like, where are you? What are your thoughts on that now?
Yeah. It's a really great question. And I think what has brought me to focus on is how important it is, how we present ourselves to the patrons, how important it is that we create an ambience in the performance that's not off putting or not exclusive, but inviting — how we are in the community in every way. I'll tell you what made me decide to be a conductor was growing up in Oklahoma City in 3rd grade, they would take all the Oklahoma City public school students to various cultural venues, theater production, historical museum, etcetera. And one of those was the Oklahoma Symphony. And I'll never forget hearing, seeing that little gray haired man stand up there. And he'd look over here and the cellos would do something cool and he'd look over here at the violins and they were doing Mars and Jupiter from The Planets. And I thought, that's it, I want to do that. And so we bring in 5000 third graders every year into the concert hall to experience being embraced by a full orchestra. Our musicians are out into the schools constantly, both as small ensembles, which is one of the unique things about that organization — the principal players all comprise chamber ensembles. And so they're constantly teaching individually, they're teaching privately, they're teaching in the public schools, they're teaching at the university level. And so just the way that we engage the community through our educational mission, I think is really important. What I say on the podium, I think is important. I have a personally strong belief that we need to be playing music that is not all by dead white European males, you know. And so the way that I introduce that music to an otherwise rather conservative audience I've found to be very important, so that they are willing to take a chance and willing to access this music. We have a beautiful concert hall there, thanks to the fact that the people in the Permian Basin want the same things — there's a lot of civic and community pride in having a professional orchestra there. And so all those things I think come together — the way we educate, the way we collaborate with other arts organizations, the ballet, the opera, etcetera. All those things create community and our musicians are embedded in the community. And so all that together creates a really positive symbiosis.
Yeah. Quick follow up — I've noticed this in the orchestra world that the educational initiatives oftentimes focus on the elementary kind of age of children, which I think is fantastic. I'd love to get them young, like get them involved in music as quickly as we can, as early as we can. I don't see as much in middle school, high school. Do you have any ideas how we could bridge that gap? Should directors reach out to community orchestras? What's a good —
That's a great question. Well, I did leave out the fact that often when I'm in town, I'm out in the schools doing, working with those ensembles in the clinic setting and rehearsals. I left out that we do a side by side performance every season where we bring in area high school and university students to sit side by side with the West Texas Symphony in performance. And we have every performance — we have sometimes busloads of students that are coming to hear the orchestra live or coming to hear a dress rehearsal. And our doors are completely open. So we've reached out and we continue to reach out in that respect. I'll be in Lubbock next week doing a cycle with the Lubbock Symphony and their outreach that week is to high school music students. So that's an interesting take on that. And that'll be different for me than what our usual flow is, just the way that I address them and invite them into the proceeding. So yeah, I think we're trying to do all that to the best we can, given the very busy schedules that middle school and high school music programs have.
Are there things — sorry to interrupt — but are there things that middle school and high school directors could do to help create that bond where it doesn't already exist?
I'd like to think that if I was teaching in the town that had a professional orchestra, that I would want my students to hear the Eric Bakers in that orchestra. I would want them to hear the professional model on their instrument and to hear the professional model from an ensemble point of view and to hear the repertoire that is being played. Just like you said you played Tchaikovsky 4 for your students regularly. I hope that they would come in to hear that quality of repertoire that they might not be doing in their normal proceedings. So yes, I think the key is just to again encourage their students to experience things beyond their own program. And I understand that it's busy and that there are things to prepare for and there's a lot of activity surrounding public school music programs. But I think sometimes in keeping those students so focused on that one thing, we maybe don't expose them to the larger world that would help them grow.
Right. I think it's a very good point and I couldn't agree with that more. All right, so after all of these chapters in your professional life — marching band, orchestra, higher education, so on and so forth — what do you believe now about teaching that you didn't necessarily believe earlier in your career?
Yeah, that's a great question. I think I believe more in creating agency for the musician, the individual musician. I think I view them more as individual vessels into which to pour this inspiration and this passion and this knowledge so that they can grow beyond my time with them. One of my cherished colleagues and mentors, Alan Chen, who was the professor at Texas Tech University and was one of my professors when I was in grad school there, I heard him one time say, our job really is to put ourselves out of business as teachers. Our job is to grow our students beyond where we are or beyond the scope of our purview. And I really took that to heart and I think have tried to focus even more on that. It's particularly easier for me to see that now that I'm working with undergrads who are going on to prestigious graduate schools or graduate students who are winning jobs in professional orchestras or in academia. My job is — and it's not hard to get them beyond where I am, for sure — just to try to encourage them and give them the experiences because we're all a product of our experiences. And I really focus on trying to give the musicians with whom I work the most mountaintop experience possible, because I know that's going to be really formative in who they become as musicians.
So then just as a follow up to that, I was just kind of thinking, listening to you just eloquently talk about that — is there ever a time where you have performers that are playing a piece of music that they don't really love, but you have to inspire them to love it? How do you do that?
Yeah, but you know, we just experienced something like that last semester where I'd made a commitment to do a new work and it didn't go so well at first. And it was a vocabulary with which they were not familiar and not very adept. And I think just by continuing to point out, wow, isn't this cool? Did you notice this? Listen for this — and so guide their growth, I guess, or their access to the piece by pointing out the craftsmanship in it, first of all. And then understanding that until we can play this, we're not going to be able to understand it or appreciate it. The best lesson I ever got — I'll try to be brief. The best teacher I've ever had, I think, was my undergrad music theory teacher at Oklahoma, a freshman, sophomore theory teacher Alice Lanning. And she gave us an assignment to go into — for those younger folks — the Listening Lab, which was a room where all the recordings were kept, and we had to experience all these things. Some were recordings, some were tactile experiences, some were other things. We had to write down our impressions. And one of the recordings was of the Augurs of Spring from Rite of Spring, and from a young tuba player from rural Oklahoma, it made no sense. And I wrote very determinedly, I said, this is not music. I mean, it's a rhythm and it's all great, but it's certainly not music. I mean, it sounds like a herd of wild buffalo running through the room. And we turned those papers in, never got them back, forgot about it completely until the senior convocation at commencement when she went around the table and handed those back to us. And it was the most amazing lesson that I've tried to carry with me and share with my students in the years since — that I try not to say that you don't like something until you know enough about it to appreciate it, you know? And so just coming to a work like that, understanding it, having studied it, being passionate about it myself enough to be able to instill that passion in the others — that's the best way I think.
Yeah, that's a fantastic story. That's a great idea by the way. It's a great idea just to show the difference in the growth that we all go through. But that's — I'm sure that moment was like, oh yeah, these were my words just a few years earlier.
That's right. Yeah, it's interesting.
I think in the wind band world, which I've spent most of my career in, we do so much new music and my doctorate was at UMKC and we were constantly playing doctoral composition students' work. So it was — and I was hearing stuff that had crazy sounds with electronics and who knows what it is, but I would imagine that vocabulary in the orchestra world would be quite foreign like to —
It can be, you know. Certainly there's a real sophisticated group and the new music scene here at CU is fabulous with the composers that we have here. And so they are being exposed to that sort of thing. But sometimes they don't equate orchestra, especially the string players, to this stuff. And since I'm trying to provide the most varied and balanced diet possible, that's going to be part of what we do. And so yeah, it is probably more of a stretch for orchestras than certainly the typical wind band.
I do think there's — I have one. Oh, sorry. Sorry, go, John.
No, sorry to interrupt. I was just going to say anybody listening — I think there's a message here for all of us. Find something that you don't necessarily quote, like, and figure out and learn everything you can about it, right? Because there's so much good out there, right? So go ahead please.
Well, I'm just like you. There were pieces of music that when I first heard them, I wasn't — I didn't positively respond to them at all. I don't need to hear that ever again. And then a few years later, hear it again and go like, man, I love this piece of music. How did I miss this? And you just — your experiences. I just think it's fantastic that you're offering that experience to your students. And I think all of us should in the back of our minds be asking what new experiences are we providing musically for our students? What new repertoire? And especially now that we have so many great composers that we can get on the phone, we can get on YouTube, we can really bring a new perspective into our room. And this can happen at the middle school level.
Oh yeah. I did an honor band just not a couple of weeks ago. I played a piece and the composer drove down for it — shout out to David Campo. Like it was fantastic to have him in the room. And the students responded so much differently than if it had just been me trying to help them through this piece. And there were challenges that we had to overcome and he really made a huge difference. And if we can all do that, I feel like it's a win for us, for our students, for the composers.
So I do have one final question before we kind of shift into another section and that is, is there one thing that you would hope today's educators here and actually carry into rehearsals tomorrow? What would that be for you?
I, I think, I think just being passionate about what you do, not doing anything without intent, without musical intent, trying to come to the technique, whatever technique we're trying to teach through the music. One of the big disconnects I see is in, in teaching and rehearsing and in conducting is, is working on technique without a musical concept. And I found over the years that the stronger the musical concept, the better the technique becomes. I think what I've learned is beyond just being passionate about what you do, directing the ears of the musicians is, I think, the maybe the single most important thing that we do as a conductor. Where are they listening? Where are we listening? But where are we directing the ears of the ensemble? Listening is the hardest thing to teach, I think, you know, certainly from a conducting point of view, because we're juggling so many things. We're standing up there so we don't hear as much as we should. And I'm trying to constantly grow in that respect. But students also are all in their little silos, behind their little stands with their instrument. And so just opening everyone's ears, knowing where to listen at what time, to what I think is the key to the fastest key to success.
Yeah. Well, so yeah, go ahead.
And all those are just a couple of things that can come to mind, I don't think John will disagree because John and I have a book. We published a book entitled The Directed Listening Model, and it is just that. It is a way for directors. Like you said, there's a ton of stuff going on. How do we prioritize and get our students involved in the conversation about what I'm hearing? What you're hearing right, because how do we conceptualize that and share that with the vocabulary that makes sense? So we are absolutely on board with you there.
Well, I heard David do a terrific presentation at the Colorado MEA a few years back on and a lot of it had to do with continual pulse and our sense of subdivision of the pulse. One of my big evangelistic points these days is about the ends of notes. It's the ends of notes where music happens, where the magic happens. That's what determines the style and the power and the precision and elegance. All those things have to do with the end of the note. Yet we tend to focus so much on where the note starts that we lose track of what the most important thing is. I think now, and I've thought this for a long time, but the latter half of every note is where our focus must be. Even if we're talking about time, it's the latter half that gets shortened and then we compress time. It's the latter half that doesn't have the right shape. So moving to the next note isn't correct. Like the latter half changes so much about how we, whether it's together or not, whether it's the right style, whether it's in the latter half probably for 95% of what we deal with.
John, what do you think?
I love it. And just to clarify, after the articulation, we're talking about style, right?
Yeah, yeah. And yeah. And you know, ends, the ends of phrases too. I mean, you know, we, we have, we are so vertically oriented often as conductors and as musicians that we don't, we don't really help that much.
John was baiting you in a in a conversation that he and I have fought over many, many years. 20 years. For 20 years is that articulation is the full shape of a note. Articulation is Mercado is an articulation marking and that's not just the front, it's the full shape. It's how we determine that. I've fought this for a long time and I'm on the other side of that. And in the Texas world, where we articulate from articulation the front styles. Everything after. Articulation for me, and I looked up articulation and every music dictionary I found and then I went to speech therapists and they're like, articulation is how we shape the sound. So we thought about it and in the book we had to change articulation to just tonguing just to get away from like, we can't agree, we can't agree. So we changed the whole word. But anyway, but yeah, and, and, and Professor Lewis, thank you for helping me kind of prove that point.
I'm really glad that you so OK, so, so Gary, now is the time where we have a couple questions that we ask all of our guests and I'll take the first one. So do you have a soapbox topic? And it can be about anything, music, life, anything.
I think that was it. I think it's the ends. I want to do a presentation that's called the it's the ends of notes stupid, you know, because so much of what we do from that makes it sound not musical, that makes it not together, that makes it sound harsh, that with a bad sound. All those things have to do with the end of the note and as conductors, but we are all taught about here's where the note starts. And we spend most of our energy with this ictus, which is a word I don't like. And in reinforcing that, you know, it's not the fence posts that make the fence effective. It's the stuff that's strung between them. That's what keeps the cows in the pasture, so to speak. And music is the same way. We spend so much time on these vertical snapshots, moments in time that there's very little line that transcends that. Maybe the other one is that this listening thing, you know, Gunther, I'm sure you're familiar with the portion of Gunther Schuller's book, The Conductor, where he talks about listening and the seven different kinds of hearing, as he calls them. And listening not only for what we've studied derived from the score and this oral model that we created for ourselves, but also this third ear, he says, which sits well outside the body, which determines how our conducting is affecting the sound of the orchestra, or the ensemble. So there's this loop that's constantly going on. And I think for so many of us, so much of the energy is just output, output, output instead of are we really hearing what's going on in the group. And the group is never going to rise above our expectation for them and we're never going to ask them for something that we don't hear, you know, or don't determine needs to happen. So those are a couple of things that I'm zealous about. So I'm going to be doing a couple clinics at Colorado Music Educators in next January.
Oh, good, this month or next year?
Next year, this month. OK, so and so maybe if you're there, we could share one about the backside of notes.
I love it, that'd be great. That'd be great. I'd love that. Excellent. Our next question is, is there a book or particular books that have just inspired your journey? Don't have to be music again, just inspiration.
I think probably the one that I maybe quote the most often, maybe Ben Zander's The Art of Possibility. I love that just because I just think there's so many great analogies in there, you know, from the string quartet whose violist forgot to play a note, but yet the note was played by the 2nd violinist because he saw that his finger wasn't over the right string. You know, that level of awareness is something that I'm trying to build into our group. Or, you know, forgive the term, the two Beddock player, you know, who sits rigidly and can play all the notes with great virtuosity but has nothing to say because he doesn't move. And so just there's so many, so many good analogies I think in that book.
That's, that's a great one. Yeah. Go ahead.
Yeah, no, I was just going to say I've, I've come back to that book over and over again because there were things that I could apply every day in my rehearsals. Just every day there was something that I could address, and every single time it was a positive reaction.
Yep, and Bruce Adolph, What to Listen for in the World, I think is just an incredible collection of prose. It's almost impossible to capture the essence of music in words, but boy, he comes as close as anyone I think ever to that. And I share a lot of those with groups in rehearsal as well.
Yeah, those are great. Thank you for sharing. Really appreciate it. All right, Gary. So it's time for the final question and arguably the most important of the day. And that is what's your favorite time signature?
I don't know, maybe 2-4, because I think it can be in four, it can be in two, it can be in one. Often it is, especially in classical symphonies. It can, it's often all of those in the same symphony. So 2-4. I've never had that question asked, so congratulations. But off the off the top of my head, I would go with 2-4 just because of its sheer versatility.
OK. Yeah, I think you know Gary, the right answer was common time, but I do think that's a there's a connection there that maybe we can give it to you. We'll see if 2-4 can be common time.
It can be. And if you're thinking hyper common time, it can't be so.
Yeah, that's true. So maybe we should think. I don't think it would sound weird if we changed it. By the way, not many people get it, but it's because he was a marching band director, a wind ensemble conductor, an orchestral conductor, and I could see he's this.
Yeah, I will say that we are, this is our 4th season of doing the podcast. You are the first person to say 2-4.
I'm the first 2-4? OK, first 2-4. I'm aware that is a badge of honor.
It's, I think it's you should. We've got a lot of people. Most there's an 8 in the bottom whether it's 5/8 or 7/8 or they're just being pretentious.
I think so too, yeah. Like that, Gary? Yeah, that's right, professor. Think too much?
Yeah. So that's one of the things I love about 2-4 or 4-4 is I can just, I don't have to think, yeah, I just can let it just make music. Just, yeah, I can just move my arms. It's beautiful.
But Gary, thanks so much for being with us today. It's been just a pleasure to get to speak with you and all the little insights you've shared. I just, they all resonate with me and I hope that they will with our listeners as well. So thank you very much.
It's great to be with you guys. Great to see you. Thank you.
And that's a wrap on today's episode. Thanks for spending part of your day with us on the Common Time Podcast. Today's conversation gave you something to think about or something to try with your students. We'd love for you to share this episode with a colleague. And you can also follow us on social media for episode clips, behind the scenes content, and updates to our upcoming guests. And if you haven't already, please be sure to subscribe so that you never miss an episode. Until next time, keep making music and keep making a difference.