Assessing Musical Performance

There are different types of music. Pop, Contemporary, HipHop, Classical and Jazz, just to name a few. This comparative essay will focus on Jazz and its subtypes.

Music should be understood, but not at the expense of the performer creating a “right result” and in turn taking away from the listeners enjoyment of the work being presented.

In order to become an expert performer Abbott and Collins (2004) suggest that talent development requires the possession of Psychological Characteristics for Developing Excellence (PCDE), which as the performer moves through the transition phases become further developed. PCDE’s are both trait characteristics and state related skills such as self-belief, dedication and discipline (Abbott and Collins, 2004). Another significant aspect of becoming an expert musician is deliberate practice. Deliberate practice requires determination with the correct motivation for the performer, and the necessary time and effort roughly equating to 10,000 hours (Ericsson et al., 1993). MacNamara, Holmes and Collins (2008) state that expert musicians require numerous aspects to reach the highest level; natural talent and/or deliberate practice combined with social context and significant others are needed to maintain performance at this high level. As talent is developed, the performer moves

When I was in the third grade and began to take an interest in musicals, my two best friends and I decided we would perform “Popular” from Wicked in our school’s talent show. I was looking forward to having fun with my friends onstage, but secretly I was wondering what I had gotten myself into. I had so many doubts about going onstage in front of my entire school. What if they thought I sang badly? Why didn’t we use backup music? Pink is definitely not my color. It was my first time singing by myself with a large audience watching me, but nonetheless, the three of us went onstage. Regardless of what others may have thought about us, we all felt exhilarated and relieved once we were done.

During a musical performance many elements to be looked are not easily recognized by the average critic. A musical performance has multiple interactions taking place between the music, text, performers, audience, and space that all can contribute to a great performance. Overwhelming majority of the audience does not realize so much can be looked at during a single performance. At a performance by the University of Maryland Marching Band I was able to analyze the Musical Sound, Contexts of the Performance, and Interpretation of the Performance.

Music Evaluation: “All About That Bass” Sitting at the top of several music charts, including Billboard’s “Hot 100,” is Meghan Trainor’s “All About That Bass.” Although it is technically in the genre of pop, this song holds a 1960’s doo-wop feel. The music itself is upbeat, positive, and is seen as “feel good” music. As said by Bennett Reimer in “Why Do Humans Value Music,” “Music creates possibilities of feeling available only from music.”

I never thought that I’d care about sports in my high school. Throughout my childhood, I accepted that I had sold my soul to the devil that is musical theatre; it wasn’t until I attended Thomas Jefferson high school that I realized the heartache that would come with that decision. The only problem I have with my high school is that it is sport focused, and could show more love towards the theatre department. Not only has the school spent money updating the sports equipment and gymnasiums, but it continues to neglect the deteriorating stage that gets used and rented out by many dance competitions, concerts, and play productions.

When I was younger, I loved to watch musicals on our small tv at home, especially The Sound of Music. I would sit for hours, watching it over and over. I learned all the songs by heart and would walk around the house singing “Doe a deer, a female deer” over and over until I was blue in the face. Finally, my parents took me out to see Hairspray on Broadway. Throughout the whole musical, I kept asking my parents where the music was coming from and after the show, they took me down to the pit to meet the orchestra. From that moment, I wanted to play one of those instruments. I realized that even though pit orchestra isn’t the most focused on the element even though it wouldn't be a musical without it.The music sets the mood, foreshadows and tells a

In a post-performance discussion, the three groups were given the opportunity compare and contrast their own performance in an engaging discussion detailing the reasons for their choice in the production, ideas and intended messages given through the performance that had been created and presented. After a second viewing of the performances through a video recording, group one was first to be asked about the creative process that was undertaken including the difference between the week 7 proposal and actual week 12 performance. A common link between each performance was viewed in the expression of everyday performance through the identification of social and cultural issues such as gender, femininity, masculinity and ethnicity. The assessment

The best teachers can do is to not allow students to see when the students have not meet the expectations they had and when students do not meet their own expectations, the teacher needs to encourage the student to try again and learn from their previous experience;

This afternoon at 12:30, I went to the listening hour, a free noontime concert, at the Music Building. The concert of the day is SJSU Saxophone Studio and Dr. Victoria Lington’s Saxophone Ensemble Concert. Since it is just a one-hour noontime concert, most of the students there just where their t-shirts and jeans to the concert. The SJSU Saxophone Studio students have played six pieces of music in one hour. They began the concert with Sonata no.3 composed by George Frideric Handel (1685-1789). The second piece is Quartett (Allegro de Convert) composed by Caryll Florio (1843-1920). Then the third piece they played is Saxophone Concerto. After that, they played Premier Quartet op. 53 that composed by Jean Baptiste Singelee and Cello Suite No.1 BVW 1007 that composed by Johann Sebastian Bach. The last piece is Rondo, composed by Zdenek Lukas (1928-2007). All of the music performed today is classical music. Only the first and third piece play by alto saxophone with piano accompaniment. And the second, fifth and sixth piece is quartet that include soprano, alto, tenor and baritone. At the concert, I think I am a referential listener. I would think of a scene when I heard the music to understand the music and its mood according to the dynamic changing. For example, in the piece of Premier Quartet op. 53, I would image that people are dancing in the ballroom. When I heard the slow tempo, I think that people just began to dance or have the rest during dancing. When I heard a

Collaboration. The use of online websites, blogs and digital audio software for musicians to collaborate on projects and disseminate new ideas throughout online communities. In this section, I will draw on the work of Jones (2011) and Lysloff (2003) to discuss how much easier it is for musicians to find others in similar genre’s to collaborate with, particularly in more obscure genres of music.

Music; Indefinable by words alone. It is not only something you can hear but what you can feel. It is something your soul is able to reach out and touch. Music also has the power to bring us as humans, together. It is one language spoken by all cultures, sexes, races, age and religions. Music also controls our emotions; it makes us happy, sad, angry, relaxed, etc. We also can express ourselves through music. It can affect our personality.. someone who listens to classical, like Mozart or Bach, all the time is going to be smarter and more intellectual than someone who listens to rap or metal, and someone who listens to more upbeat happier music, like Ska or Swing, is more likely to

Musical instruments have played many major roles in helping with the construction of many societies around the world today. Many people do not realize what musical instruments have been responsible for and how they have helped shape the world today. There have been many instruments that have helped create and sculpt the world, but one instrument that I want to inform readers about is the trumpet and where it came from, as well as how it has changed over many years. The point that I am arguing is the fact that many people do not know where the trumpet has come from and how it has affected society.

Orchestra concerts are an example of music being presented in an emotional and artistic manner. Often people, mainly think of contemporary music when they hear about orchestra concerts. Music composed in the late 1970s to 1990s. But its music extends to much further than that. Scores have been performed from many composers in grand concerts that originate from many sources. These sources include movies, television shows, and even video games. The level of emotion that these concerts express varying from excitement, sadness, intensity, and many others. As a listener, you feel absorbed in the dramatic conducting of the composer and the unity of the orchestra as a whole. Even the setting of the concert can be cinematic as other displays show the grandeur of an orchestra. Our bodies were meant to take in the sounds of music more so than the images. What we derive happens automatically as we drown in the mixture of emotions orchestra has to offer.