MusTech.Net!

I’ve been having a couple of issues with MusTech.Net so if things have been a little “different” with your experience, I apologize!

I’m still waiting for the PodPress update to be published. So you will not be able to listen to the podcasts directly from MusTech.Net until that is resolved.  I’ve also had issues with my ODEO feed in the right Sidebar.  It was causing a script error with the ODEO player.

Finally, I totally messed the site up when I was upgrading a number of plugins that I use and lost 3 of my last posts (Despite by daily backup!!!!) so I had to reconstruct those. 

Oh well!  Things are “kinda” back on track now!  Well I’m at it I might as well also state that I’m about 6 weeks behind on the ME Blogger Project.  My goal is to get that turned around very soon!  Stay tuned!

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I’d like to wish a Happy Mother’s Day to all of the women who are their kids MOMS that read MusTech.Net!  To that end, I would like to direct any reader to Espie’s About Music Education blog where she has written  a lot of great, related music/educational information about Mother’s day.: 

photo credit: klynslis

Espie is a full time MOM, a full time music educator, full time blogger, and good friend of MusTech.Net.  Some of her Mother’s Day posts and articles include:

• Songs for Mother’s Day
  A collection of songs to honor that special woman in your life - Mom!
• Heart-Warming Ideas for Mother’s Day
  A collection of ideas to celebrate Mother’s Day.
• Mother’s Day Articles - Songs for Moms
  A collection of articles meant to make Mother’s Day extra special.
• Songs About Mothers - Music Sheet, Lyrics and Music Samples
  Heart-Warming Ideas for Mother’s Day… Songs for Mother’s Day
• Famous Moms in Music
  In honor of Mother’s Day, let’s get to know some of the most famous women in music who were not only gifted composers, but also devoted moms.  

Please take the time to visit Espie (One of our ME BLOGGERS!) and take a look at her terrific site.  She truly is one of the most active Music Education Bloggers that I am aware of and, her nearly endless list of great posts are the proof!

Happy Mother’s Day to all!

Although not nearly as robust as WordPress, Tumblr is a great way to get people blogging and useful for quick informational updating.   It’s easy to use interface is the most simple that I’ve seen and you can be “tumbling” or create a “tumblog” in literally minutes.

I created a Tumblr Blog and had it integrated with WordPress (This site) in under 15 minutes.   Check it out and see what uses you might have for it.

Dr. Pisano’s MusTech.Net’s Quick News (A Tumblog):
http://mustech.tumblr.com

Get your own TUMBLR blog free @:
http:/tumblr.com

Let me know what you think of tumblr… I don’t know of anything like this that is easier to implement or use.  Maybe you all have similar sites that you use and know of like Tumblr.

Attending a music conference regularly is a must for any educator; it gives time for reflection, reinvention, relaxation, and… RECHARGING!   The PMEA convention held in Hershey PA, did just that for me and the thousands in attendance.  

While at PMEA, as always I had a chance to speak with numerous band directors, choir directors, general music education teachers, vendors, music experts, and technology experts.  There were a number of interesting conversations that I had this time around and I thought I would share them with you to see if you all had any opinions on what was purveyed to me by various folks:

1. Music education in the U.S. is predominantly performance oriented… This one has been going around a long time…are we still so focused on performances in America that we totally miss what making music is all about?   
2. Freeware music products take the food out of the mouths of people writing and supporting software for a living… This one came from a software vendor… to be honest it caught me by surprise.  While I can certainly understand the “cause and effect” that could be construed here in this context…is it a threat or a sales pitch?  What about the schools that can’t afford multi-hundred dollar software? 
3. A school principal told a band director that they were very frustrated and disappointed in the music program and was sabre-rattling about the destruction of the program AFTER giving, said band director, four straight years of GLOWING reviews and verbal approvals… What is this all about? 
4. How does an ensemble director deal with a district that will take students out of their classroom for any reason, any time, and it’s TOUGH LUCK for any time lost to the student’s music instruction.  This one strikes home to many of us.   Are we teachers? Does our class(es) matter? Is our discipline important?  Why not take them out of social studies, health, spelling…dare we say, math or reading?   While I’m sure that a student will most likely never be removed from a class for one of the three “R’s”, what does the action of removal from music really say about the, seemingly universal, underlying thoughts behind these actions?

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