Cary Stewart is bringing music education to the 21st century as is his blog Third-Stream Music Education which inspires music educators to keep music classes related to modern society by using popular music and culture to teach and equipping them with the resources to do so.  

Cary seems the perfect man for the job!  As the Director of Bands and Middle School Fine Arts Team Leader an American international school in Asia, where he does everything from direct the Jazz Ensemble and Concert Band to conducting a faculty band ensemble, he has the  determination, and the stellar experience to see music education moving forwards and modernizing as the world changes.  

Oh yeah, and did we mention he plays guitar too? He may not be an accomplished guitarist, but he has dabbled in the area so much so that his school has come up with a guitar curriculum where he teaches students how to hold and care for the guitar, how to work left and right hand technique, read pitches, play basic chords, and work with a partner. 

Not bad for a man who has put his music appreciation and education to good use!

Tell me about your background in music and how you got to where you are today.

After quitting piano and guitar lessons, I signed up for Band in 6th grade. The teacher tested everyone for instruments and assigned me percussion—and by 7th grade I knew what my career would be. I started teaching percussion by age 15 and gigging by 18. I earned an undergraduate degree in Music Performance, took every gig in every style of music I could find, and by the age of 24 my resume included performances with Christian McBride, Turtle Island String Quartet, Jerry Goldsmith, Ernie Watts, Tom Scott, symphony orchestras, etc...

But while paying the bills by performing and coaching high school drumlines, I decided to become a wind band conductor and work in the classroom full time. I got a teaching certificate, and I earned a Master of Music Education degree in which I learned about concept like music psychology, neurology, assessment, standards and scientific research methodology. I went on to work at some very strong schools, in which I learned about concepts including curriculum design, Problem-Based Learning, backwards design, and the International Baccalaureate program. Now I am a conductor, composer, clinician, jazz arranger, curriculum designer, and concert promoter.

You currently teach Beginning Guitar classes in school.  What do you teach exactly, especially considering you say you only have a repertoire of about 6 major chords?

My guitar repertoire may be larger than six chords, but I am still not a guitarist. Neither was the band director who started that class at that school. But she felt, as I do, that music is not a spectator sport and that every school should provide an inroads into music for every child.

The guitar curriculum for that class requires that by the end of one semester, every student will demonstrate that they can: hold and care for a guitar; tune a guitar; work correct left-hand technique; work both right-hand classical technique and use a pick; read pitches between the low E and high G; read rhythms including whole, half, quarter and eighth notes and rests; read basic tablature; play a melody alone and with a duet partner; play basic major chords alone and accompany a melody; play power chords; compose an original power chord riff; use simple multitrack recording software; and create an arrangement of a song using all of the tools in their toolbox.

What’s the difference between “training” and “education?” Do you think teaching music education is more important than being an actual performer?

“Education” differs from “training” in a small but important aspect: process is more important than product. In a training scenario the student learns how to do one thing one way, whereas in an education scenario the student learns the concepts that operate that thing and therefore can apply the knowledge to new situations. A burger flipper in a fast food joint gets trained to toast the buns the same every time, but a chef in a Michelin-rated restaurant should educated in how flour combines with yeast and therefore can create new kinds of breads or adapt to different ovens. In a guitar lesson, a teacher can take one of two strategies: teach the E minor chord and the A minor chord so that the student knows two chords, or teach how minor chords are built so that the student knows every minor chord. Unfortunately, most guitar teachers in the world pander to the lowest common denominator, and teach the student how to play the song (for example, “Today we’re going to play ‘Foxy Lady’. Play this note, then play this note, then play this note…”) rather than teaching the student how to play guitar (for example, “Check out these crazy notes….they are called tri-tones. Here’s how they work, here’s why they sound strange, here’s how to make them yourself. Let’s practice some tri-tones in this song ‘Foxy Lady’.”)

“Music education” isn’t something a guitar teacher would teach. Rather, it is the philosophy with which the guitar teacher approaches the lesson. Surely every guitar student wants to be a performer. The question is, does the student want to perform a limited selection of songs in their bedroom, or does the student want to perform a wide variety of songs, including their own original tunes, on a stage in front of an audience?

You direct the Wind Ensemble, Jazz Ensemble, Concert Band and Rock Band Workshop for an international school in Asia.  How are guitar classes currently being integrated into school band/choir programs?

Most schools in the U.S. don’t offer guitar. With easy availability of guitar teachers and private guitar lessons outside of school, most districts feel no pressure to add the faculty or spend money on a class set of instruments. Schools that do offer guitar mostly offer it as a one-semester elective, with no opportunity for student to continue after the final exam. This scenario is better than the old-fashioned Music Appreciation class in which student memorized the birth and death dates of Mozart. Some schools with beginning guitar also have an advanced guitar ensemble class so that students can continue indefinitely, gaining more skill and becoming mentors to younger guitar students. Because most music classes in middle and high schools are Band and Choir classes, student who have studied guitar on their own find opportunities to participate in the school Jazz Band. Often these are students who are also singers or wind instrument players who play or sing classical music in the Band or Choir while taking guitar lessons after school.

Do you believe the guitar is a worthwhile instrument amongst school musical performances? Why?

Any instrument, and any style of music, is worthy of school music concerts. The point of teaching music in schools is that music (1) is valuable just because it is music, (2) teaches personal and social skills that are critical to young peoples’ success in real life, (3) builds school spirit and community identity, and (4) is fun. Guitar meets these criteria just as well as clarinet, violin and voice do.

Tell me about your Jazz Ensemble and Rock Band Workshops and how guitar comes into play there.

I usually have one or two guitar players plus a bass player every year in the Jazz Ensemble. These are typical numbers for a big band (think Count Basie, Duke Ellington, and Gordon Goodwin). In fact, my Beginning Guitar class has been an important recruiting tool for the Jazz Band.

Rock Band Workshop is an open-door program, like open-mic afternoon. We have had between two and twelve guitarists show up to any given session. Anyone can come play, whether alone or with a group. We have had singer-guitarists cover Jack Johnson, and we have had six-piece rock bands play Iron Maiden. We even had a solo bassist perform just the bass part of a Slipknot song because she was new to our school and didn’t know any other musicians. At the Workshop that day, she met a metal band who was performing without a bassist. By the next workshop she was in that band, and by the following school year she was in the Jazz Band and the Wind Orchestra. At Workshop, each person/group plays their song and then gets feedback from the guest experts (our school has a shocking number of faculty with serious gig experience) on everything from how to play in time together to how to get the best sound out of their distortion pedal/amplifier combo.

How important is music education in school in determining how a child does in other areas of learning?

Research on this question has been huge but inconclusive. We are sure that students who excel in music also excel in other subjects. However, researchers have not been able to show whether this relationship is a cause-effect situation or merely a coincidence caused by another factor. For every study that shows cause-effect, there is another that shows no cause-effect. However, wouldn’t you rather your own child have it than not?

Tell me about your blog Third-Stream Music Education.

Third-Stream is about bringing a modern approach to the music classes that are emphasized in most high schools, those being Band, Choir and Orchestra. The two main concepts at work in Third-Stream are achieving (a) balance between classical music and pop music, using each to improve the way students learn to perform the other, and (b) a balance between knowledge learning (ala Music Appreciation class) and performance learning (ala band winning trophies at contests). I think it is very important that music teachers create an emotional bond between each student and the music they play. The blog also covers topics specific to teaching wind and percussion instruments, creating better assessments of students’ musical performances, and designing better music curriculum to achieve all of the aforementioned goals.

What is the future of music education?

The future of music education is in technology, student compositions, and self-directed learning. Guitar and piano will play an increasing role in school music classes as Web 2.0 tools become more commonplace in the classroom. Within the next 30 years, Band class as I know it will lose precedence in school curricula. Chamber music will be more common. The new music class will be more about students recording their own music (on any instrument—guitar, woodwind, brass or otherwise) and distributing it digitally than about large ensembles. Band, Choir and Orchestra will not be forgotten; their excitement, energy, inclusiveness and community ties (not to mention their relationship to sporting events) will keep them active in schools, but as extra-curricular activities rather than as graded classes.

Students’ technical performance skills on their chosen instrument will be increasingly measured by computer, giving music teachers more tools for grading technique objectively and for coaching students to more fully create the emotional effects that make classical music so powerful. And finally, within the next 50 years, music will become mandatory in every year of school for every student as new research in neuroscience and cognitive psychology will convince school administrators and politicians that music makes definite, measurable improvements in students’ ability to solve problems, mature emotionally, relate to others and generally be successful in life.