By Jack Ingram

On Sat­urday 24 July, Rock­hamp­ton City Brass Band hos­ted ABODA QLD’s first ever Band and Orches­tra Con­duct­ing Clinic in the newly formed Cent­ral Queens­land Hub. Fol­low­ing on from the hugely suc­cess­ful QBOC2010 early in the month, this was a great oppor­tun­ity for ABODA QLD to bring for­ward the tech­niques, ideas and philo­sophies covered at QBOC and expose them to the music edu­cat­ors of Cent­ral Queensland.

The clinic was headed by Dr Lewes Ped­dell, who has extens­ive teach­ing and con­duct­ing exper­i­ence in south­east Queens­land and abroad, and was well atten­ded by music teach­ers and musi­cians alike from the Rock­hamp­ton region and as far out as Mor­an­bah. The clinic focused on build­ing the found­a­tions of suc­cess­ful and com­pet­ent baton tech­niques with an emphasis on fluid­ity and con­vey­ing clear and con­cise dir­ec­tions. The clinic also covered score read­ing, ana­lysis and deliv­ery with plenty of hands-on sessions.

Although the clinic delivered many neces­sary skills needed by any music edu­cator, it  was also about provid­ing those present with the chance to net­work with other people, who like them, may feel isol­ated or over­whelmed with the enorm­ity of the work needed to run a suc­cess­ful music pro­gram. These net­work­ing oppor­tun­it­ies allow the shar­ing of inform­a­tion, mater­i­als, tech­niques and ideas that will help­fully provide us all with the con­fid­ence and know how that will make our work more enjoy­able and reward­ing for ourselves and our students.

A big thankyou to Rock­hamp­ton City Brass Band for allow­ing their hall to be the venue for the day and their mem­bers for offer­ing sup­port from mak­ing cof­fee to fil­ing music. We really appre­ci­ated both. Also to Green Broth­ers Music who facil­it­ated the sup­ply of some band scores and ref­er­ence books from sev­eral pub­lish­ers for us to review.

Some com­ments from the day:

I guess the high­light for me was the entire event. I’m excited about the future pos­sib­il­it­ies and events that will come from cre­at­ing this hub. It was good to have teach­ers from the cross sec­tion of edu­ca­tion in Rock­hamp­ton and the broader region. Ed Qld, Cath Ed and the other private school sec­tors all had a music staff mem­ber in attend­ance. There was a good spread of pas­sion­ate and will­ing educators.

For me the high­light was the chat we had at the end with every­one dis­cuss­ing the future of the hub and its activities.

Hav­ing my left hand do some­thing com­pletely dif­fer­ent to my right can be rather dif­fi­cult but adding in eye con­tact and keep­ing time it all became quite a challenge.

A long time brass player I’m left with a far greater appre­ci­ation of just what a good con­ductor goes through to deliver a cohes­ive band per­form­ance. Lewes delivered a great day of inform­a­tion and tech­niques to begin and improve our con­duct­ing. With the help of stu­dents from vari­ous schools we then had the oppor­tun­ity to try out some new music and new skills. As a player, learn­ing how to bet­ter ‘read’ a conductor’s ges­ture alone was worth­while. A day spent wav­ing our bat­ons about like Hog­warts stu­dents’ wands was an equally fun and chal­len­ging way to spend the day.

It was really great on Sat­urday and I enjoyed myself. Every­one had fun I would say and I think Dr Ped­dell had a great time as well. Thank you very much for ABODA QLD and the local rep­res­ent­at­ives for organ­ising such a spe­cial day for us here in CQ. I learned so much and enjoyed play­ing with all the musi­cians who arrived in the after­noons for the score reading.

I am very excited about the energy and lively dis­cus­sion that took place dur­ing the day and espe­cially at the con­clu­sion when we put out our wish list for music ensemble edu­ca­tion and pro­fes­sional growth in the CQ region. It would appear that we have made an excel­lent start which we can now build upon to bring ensemble dir­ect­ors, instru­mental teach­ers and classroom teach­ers together to fur­ther enhance the options for our students.

It was fant­astic to see stu­dents from so many schools attend the after­noon allow­ing us to per­form some new music for many of us and exper­i­ment with our newly dis­covered baton skills.

Lewes kept the day flow­ing and inter­est­ing so much so that morn­ing, lunch, and after­noon tea were pretty much non-existent with every­one champ­ing to get back to their wands or instru­ments to make music. You can’t ask for more than that from a music workshop.

It was fant­astic to have the time to gather with fel­low teach­ers and just sound out our hopes and frus­tra­tions and know that I am not alone.

What a fant­astic oppor­tun­ity for teach­ers and stu­dents to gather inform­ally to make music.

Great day in Rocky! An ABODA event and in our own back yard so to speak. Thanks to Lewes for a great day on con­duct­ing tech­niques and rep­er­toire read­ing. It was great to see every­one get involved with the con­duct­ing class and espe­cially amus­ing to see how many of us man­aged to drop coins from our hands. At times the noise of drop­ping coins drowned out the instruc­tions we were being given. Net­work­ing between every­one was fant­astic and the sup­port net­works developed were invalu­able. Thanks to Jack and his team and the Rocky City Band for their sup­port too. — Jeanette Douglas