Episode 9 - Dr. Elizabeth Peterson
Episode 9 features Dr. Elizabeth Peterson, Associate Director of Bands at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. We talk with Beth about her advice to young teachers, generational changes she has seen, and how her programming has changed over the years.
To learn more about Beth and the resources she recommended during the podcast, check out the links below!
Dr. Elizabeth Peterson - UIUC
The Music Teachers First Year: Tales of Challenge Joy and Triumph
The Music Teacher’s Later Years: Reflection with Wisdom
NPR Article: Why This High School Band Is Buying Music From Composers Of Color This Year
ColorFULL Music
... And We Were Heard
Midwest Clinic
College Band Directors National Association
Full Transcript
Carrie Blosser 0:01
Welcome to Diversify the Stand. The resource centered around listening, learning and promoting diverse musical voices in music, through our podcast, website, commissioning projects, and more. I'm Carrie Blosser.
Ashley Killam 0:15
And I'm Ashley Killam. Join us on our journey as we speak with composers, creators, performers, historians and music educators about the topics important to them, and musics betterment.
Our next guest is a former professor of mine and one of my biggest role models in music. Dr. Elizabeth Peterson is the Associate Director of bands at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She's actually written two books! The first is The Music Teacher's First Years: Tales of Challenge, Joy and Triumph. And the second is The Music Teacher's Later Years: Reflections with Wisdom. Beth is an active guest conductor, adjudicator and school music consultant in the United States and Canada. We are so excited to have you here, Dr. Mrs. And we can't wait to hear all of the advice you have to give.
Beth Peterson 1:19
Thank you. It's great to be here. Thanks for having me on your podcast.
Carrie Blosser 1:22
Thank you so much for joining us today. We wanted to jump right in and talk a little bit about the two books that you have written and you've done a lot of work with kind of emerging teachers and that started professional careers. We'd love to hear your advice for new teachers on successful classroom management.
Beth Peterson 1:41
Great, well, we'll jump right in. And yes, I did write two books. But I would also like to, I guess, quantify that those two books are really a collection of interviews. So I feel like I'm really using other people's words for these books. So yes, I compiled their thoughts. And as I compiled thoughts of first year teachers, in this, in the book, The Music Teacher's First Year, there were sort of three themes that emerged. And those three themes are: One - troubles with classroom management, that being a challenge, challenges with establishing relationships with older adults, mostly older adults, you know, principals, administrators, other faculty, colleagues, and parents. And then curriculum development or music selection in terms of band, of course, I think it's in my field, it's music selection, which becomes our curriculum. And I actually believe that all those three things are tied together really well. So I think classroom management is based on developing relationships, and setting clear communication, goals, expectations, and engaging our students, developing that good report. And I think that's also where music selection is tied into that. We have to be programming music that students enjoy, are connected to emotionally, are connected to musically, are challenged by but not too challenged. And I also think that if you have good relationships with the adults in your community, and with the other faculty in your building, you'll be able to, to carry that into the relationships you have with those students, because they'll see that respect and that ability that you have to engage with, with the community. So it's understanding who your students are. I also think one more thing, you know, a lot of times that's a question on new teacher interviews is, you know, what is your classroom management philosophy? And while I don't think we teach classroom management very well, in the undergraduate years, we address it, maybe. I think one of the answers tends to be well, I'm going to be so engaging with my students we're going to do such cool things that they're not going to have time to mess around. And, and I think that's one part of it, yes, being being prepared and planning. But I think the other part of it is engaging with each of them as individuals and getting to know your students and the community you're in, and that's going to help a lot. Eventually, it becomes a collaboration with students to make great music, right? It's not about me telling you how to behave in class. Now. That's, that's an easy answer. And I know that takes some time to develop, but I believe that's the that's the best way to get started.
Carrie Blosser 4:07
I was reading something recently about how some professors are actually really grateful for this time to like, do Zoom lessons and do Google Meets just because they get a better insight into their students. And if they don't use like a green screen background or, you know, something to hide what's behind them, they teachers are getting a better look into their students lives.
Beth Peterson 4:27
Yeah, and I, I think maybe the whole Zoom thing is something we'll we'll use in the future. You know, I have students now who want to meet with me and instead of emailing or just talking on the phone, they want to zoom and so we think we're able to still see each other and and maybe that's a way we'll engage with, with community in the future where a teacher can meet with a parent or guardian or a student, if possible, via Zoom. And, and and have you know, start to have that that community connection when, when possible.
Ashley Killam 4:58
And we were wondering how you advise, another advice question, how you advise your students and colleagues on just building relationships, especially around conflict with, you know, generational gaps, how you balance those gaps, while advocating for yourself and your standards.
Beth Peterson 5:19
Yeah, you know, I think some of that stems from our academia and students coming out of college programs, and they're, they're pretty smart, and they're pretty well educated, and they are very well aware of social justice issues and needs. And they're going to go out and try to change the world. And that's what their philosophy is, I don't want to temper that or change that, or have them pull back on that at all. But I think that they have to also be able to put themselves in someone else's shoes. I think it's harder to do, I think it's hard to put yourself in someone else's shoes, especially as we learn more about people who've had privilege. So you know, you maybe you can't exactly see how someone else feels or lives and as much as you try. But I don't think we're going to be able to make change if young people come at older people, that generational thing, with this sort of gotcha mentality, I'm going to try to find when you say something that's incorrect, or do something that's wrong, I think there needs to be a little bit of understanding. And I think more change will occur if there's patience with an older person to say, wow, I appreciate that you're on that committee, and that you're trying to figure things out, and you're reading that book, let's talk about the thing you just said that insulted me, or maybe insulted the students in the room. And so I try to ask my student teachers to just be really, to also be kind, and they might be offended. I hope they're not hurt by something someone says or does. But I think that, that, you know, there's, there's got to be a middle ground of where we can work together, or it's not, things aren't going to change.
I think it was Barack Obama, who said, and I know, he was talking about the politics of it in an interview, he was I think it was he was interviewing about his new book Promised Land. But I thought this was a really important thing. He said, and I think it applies to all of us in all of our situations, he said, we need to find the truth, first, and then move on to how to solve the problem. And we may disagree on how to solve the problem. But we need to find that basic place. And I think, I think that's the same thing with human relationships, find out where people are, and accept them how they are, and then work together to to make some change. And I guess, you know, even with working with adults and establishing rapport with colleagues, it's, it's, it's talking, it's being interested in something they're interested in. For young teachers, it's as simple as you know, if you can have a drink with someone, or do something social with someone or be interested in their subject matter, or something that they're interested in, you'll become friends, hopefully, and that will, that will go a longer way than then, you know, having your head down and your blinders on in your own office, just you know, working on your own thing.
Carrie Blosser 8:00
How many times have we seen the blinders down in your own world?
Beth Peterson 8:04
Yeah, and I think, you know, music teachers get accused of that, right, because we're super focused, especially on directors, we're super focused on like, getting our music together and studying our scores. And, of course, that's important, and you have to be prepared for that. But, but that reaching out to your neighbor, is, is important. Well, who was the senator who said this, and I'm not sure I agree with his politics, but I think he said something about, you know, go shovel your neighbor's driveway, you won't, you can't hate your neighbor, if they shovel your driveway. So you know, go to your colleagues thing, or ask them about their class and get to know them a little bit.
Carrie Blosser 8:40
We would love for you to talk just a little bit about programming repertoire for your groups that you conduct, how that might have changed over your career and things that you'd like to share with other educators that you've learned during your journey and looking to the future as well.
Beth Peterson 8:56
Yeah, I think this comes back to my original points about, you know, selecting repertoire or selecting music. curriculum development for ensembles is a struggle for new teachers, for them, often it's finding the right level for their new ensemble. But I think for me, it's changed over my 30 years of teaching, you know, I was a high school band director in the 90s. I was trying at the time to learn all the bands classics, which frankly, were mostly dead white men, music by dead white men. So I had to learn all that music and programmed all that music. And then, shortly after I started my career, the National Standards became a thing. So they were teaching us how to teach that music more comprehensively. A few years later, we had the trend of multicultural music, where we were using music to teach about another culture. And I think that's a little bit out of favor now, especially if it's not done correctly, right. So those are some of the big changes or things that I saw during my career.
In the last five years. I think things have changed even more quickly and more drastically and in a good way. I was aware of the need to diversify our curriculum in the last five years, especially in terms of programming more women composers. CBDNA, the College Band Directors National Association has been really good at this. And there were several conferences, maybe starting back in 2000. I think 2015 or 2017? About just about this, and how do we, how do we do more? How do we commission more women to write more music for band, for example. So I've worked hard, I think in the last five years to, to program more women composers, it's not been great. Like, I don't always have a female composer on every concert. But I've been more aware, and I'm trying. But I, I can't imagine now after COVID when we get back to it, not having women and persons of color on my concert program. So the last year, I think it's just been in the reading I've done and in the webinars I've attended and in the the things I've seen online, it's just that's the way it's going to be you have to, you have to do that. And you have to invite those living persons into your rehearsal room and have them talk about their music from their point of view, and what was their inspiration behind that piece. So I think that's completely for me, it's completely changed. And it's not just like, I'm gonna check that box of having a person of color on my program or a woman but it's, it's to model and to teach and to help my students make sure those things are happening.
Two summers ago, I listened to a lot of the music on the Institute for Composer Diversity website, I filtered that so that I could listen to all band music, grades two through five by living composers. I tried to find new people and new pieces. And I would recommend doing this, I didn't I didn't listen to every piece completely. But I made a list for myself of pieces that, that I liked, that were new to me, that I would go back to and program. It's amazing to me that if people aren't doing this, right, if they're not, if they're not programming, with more color in mind, women, persons of color, and so on. And there's just so much great new music out there that I think kids are going to be more attracted to playing because and that's the other thing. I'm really reflecting and thinking about how the students who are going into music education right now who are 18 years old, are really different from the 18 year olds that I taught 20 years ago when I started teaching college. And so I'm really trying to figure out like, they they're not attracted to that music anymore. Some of the pieces that were the classic standards, it's just not interesting to them. The sounds are not interesting to them, the color, the instrumentation, it's like and so, you know, when I pull out a piece by a living composer, most of the time, they're like, oh, that's so cool. Even, even like really weird stuff that's like really hard to grasp the first time, ah, that's so awesome. Many of them, you know, so the world's changing and, and we got to, we got to change with it a little bit. And that's some of my grad students would laugh at me hearing me say that, because like, I'm so bad at technology. And like, every time everything's on a Google Doc, I freak out. But you know, I'm trying
Kind of in that repertoire, question and my career, I taught a class for many years called Materials and Band, and it was about like, the first thing we had to do in the class was determine what is quality music? And that was so hard for me, like, how would, I have music I like and you have music you like and so we would try to get rid of like what we liked and come to like, Well, here are the well crafted elements of music, right? But now we're all trying to talk about music that is like, let's get rid of the I mean, yes, we have to do good music. But can we try all of it? Like can't we can't we be more open and and maybe the elements of music or the things we used in the past to judge music needs to be need to be put aside or expanded. Right? And so that's another thing that I'm trying to learn like, how do I, how do I make that leap into, Well, it wasn't it's not a classic piece, but I like it. So maybe it's quality. Let's try it. Let's see what the students like. Let's see what we get out of that music. We'll get something out of it, right?
Carrie Blosser 14:11
Yeah, I definitely think so. Just having that option for connection, I think is really important.
Ashley Killam 14:17
So we were wondering, what projects are you working on? Currently.
Beth Peterson 14:24
Several, I guess, small projects. And I'm, I started working with my colleagues in Illinois, choir and band directors on a project called Encore Illinois Ensembles. And Encore just in that it's, it's the next thing. It's something extra. We are we are hosting 14 different discussions on a range of topics and it's really to satisfy the students who are required to take our ensembles and want to do it virtually. So that's how we're doing our virtual ensemble. This year, but it's really exciting. You know, I'm a session on teaching large ensemble in the urban setting. So I have a band director from Los Angeles, a band director from Brooklyn, and a choir director from Chicago, that just talk about what that is like. One of the topics is from music major to arts administrator. So what is that kind of career path like. One of the topics is commissioning the commissioning process. And we are, this is one place where I'm really looking, are we diverse and the panelists we're, we're selecting, and I think we're, we're doing an okay job at getting more diversity on those on those panels. So that's one project.
I'm on several, I'll call them idea committees, inclusion, diversity, equity committees, one for the National Band Association, and one for the School of Music at Illinois. So, you know, that it's teaching me a lot, trying to think about how change can happen in those places. I'm on the Midwest Clinic Board of Directors. And, you know, I know, one of your questions is about what organizations am I passionate about, that's certainly one of them. We just did a virtual clinic and, again, I think the diversity in that was, was a step in the right direction, you know, we're really trying to, to, to change and, and move forward that, that whole idea. So those are some of the things I do. And some of the work I've been doing moving forward
Carrie Blosser 16:31
And then Are there any groups or organizations that you are passionate about that you would like to share with our listeners?
Beth Peterson 16:39
Um, you know, I don't I don't think there's just one. Like I mentioned before, I'm very passionate and deeply connected to the Midwest Clinic. I'm involved with the National Band Association and the College Band Directors National Association. And I think these band organizations are trying to find our way and make a positive change and diversifying the stand. My there are challenges, but I think the the heart of the people in those groups is really there. And is trying to make this more part of the agenda. And I'm proud of that, again, just some work, but I think that's happening.
Ashley Killam 17:16
Definitely. And then the final question for you, is what's on your music stand this week? And how are you diversifying your stand?
Beth Peterson 17:25
I actually made a list of the books that I'm reading, that are on my actually my nightstand in terms of what I'm going to read this semester or try to read. So I've started Obama's Promised Land. I have started White Fragility. I started the Uninhabitable Earth, which is about climate change, and very scary. And I also have, No More Heroes, Challenges to the Savior Mentality, The horizon leans forward, a book from GIA publications, and then I always have what my mother would call a cheap, trashy novel. So I'm usually reading like a cheap, trashy novel. And I'm trying to like slog through one of these books that just takes a little more brain space and power. So that's my stand for this semester is reading.
Musically. I'm looking at Giovanni Santos's Miniatures. It was recently commissioned and composed, it's 10 movements, I think about 20 minutes of music. Really cool sound and piece and for chamber groups, so that'll be done this semester, or one of my grad students will do it with one of our chamber groups. I am looking at studying a couple pieces by Kevin Day. I think it's Fireworks Fanfare that I'll be doing with brass choir. I've got Omar Thomas's Shenandoah here that I'm doing with California All-State I'm doing it virtually, the California All-State, so that's been interesting. But that's one of the pieces we're doing along with David Biedenbender's Luminescence. Valerie Coleman's, Umoja, and then I got a piece by Schubert and a piece by Brahms. Those are all in preparation for the different chamber groups we're doing in Illinois this spring.
Carrie Blosser 19:05
Well, thank you so much for joining us.
Beth Peterson 19:07
Thank you so much for having me and including me in this wonderful project. You all are doing! It's great.
Carrie Blosser 19:13
To learn more about Dr. Peterson, her books, and the resources recommended to check out the links in the podcast description.
Ashley Killam 19:44
Thank you so much for listening to Diversify the Stand. I am Ashley.
Carrie Blosser 19:49
And I'm Carrie. If you'd like to support us and our projects, check out our Patreon www.patreon.com/diversify_the_stand. Also the link is in our podcast description.
Ashley Killam 20:04
And a huge thank you to Trevor Weston and Whitney George, for allowing us to use their compositions in our podcast. The musical introduction is Trevor's trumpet duet Fanfare for Changes, and the ending music is Whitney's Incantations for trumpet and piano. Both composers websites are also listed in the description.
Carrie Blosser 20:23
Until next time, what's on your stand?