The Cappella School of Music
The Cappella School of Music

Montgomery County's #1 Choice For Music Lessons

News

Music is a hobby, a passion, a lifestyle, a profession and an expression of our very humanity.  From time to time, we'll post items of interest here about the many ways in which music serves our lives and our souls.

Food For The Growing Mind

5/26/15 - How Popular Music's Lyrics Perpetuate American Idiocy

This is an interesting article equating the decline in the "Lyric Intelligence" of Pop songs over the past ten years with the corresponding rise in "American Idiocy."  Simply stated, our popular culture reflects, reinforces and informs the knowledge base or intellectual activity of those people who are consumers of it.  And, of course, most pop culture is aimed squarely at our children.  A recent study of pop music lyrics has shown that most are written for readers functioning at a second to third grade reading level.  That is not much of a challenge!  As a musician and songwriter, I am appalled at what passes for "Art" in this day and age.  And, as a parent, I know that it is my responsibility to see that my sons meet with a better example.  We listen to music meant to lift and challenge their emotional and intellectual development.  I would encourage all parents to take a much more active role in shaping their kids' choices in popular culture, so that those same kids demand better of the purveyors of pop (by voting with their feet and dollars).  To read the article, follow this link: 

 

http://theantimedia.org/how-popular-musics-lyrics-perpetuate-american-idiocy/

1/29/15 - The Value of a Music Education

I had to move this one right up to the top of the list!  This is a wonderful "Ted Talk" by Richard Gill, director of the Victorian Opera Company of Sydney, Australia, on the value of a music education.  Specifically, it speaks to what making music does to the developing mind of a child.  So many times, we become fixated on the specific goal of having our kids learn to play an instrument or a specific piece thereon, when we need to step back and look at the larger picture of what role the wonderfully abstract world of music plays in freeing the creativity in our kids.  And it is that function of freeing their creative mind that is at the heart of all learning and development to come.

1/29/15 - Music As A Language / Victor Wooten

In this wonderful TedTalk, Grammy Award winning Bassist and Composer Victor Wooten gives his insights into how we can take the primarily experimental and expieriential way in which we learn language and incorporate that process into how we learn music (and just about everything else).  His understanding not just of music, but of human nature, speaks to the freedom we feel when we make our own music, and how we sound best when we listen to each other and play together (words of wisdom to the leaders of nations everywhere).  Another in the brilliant series of TedTalks!

3/30/14 - Amazing! This is why we make music!

A young girl steps up to put a tip into a street musician's hat.  See what happens next.  Music has been with us as long as we have been human and we might argue that we can't really be human without it.

7/25/14 - How Playing an Instrument Benefits Your Brain!!

We play music for so many different reasons, chief among them the unbridled joy it brings us to do so.  But, watch the video below and see what science is learning about the impact on our brains of learning to play an instrument.  Every study of school age kids ever done has demonstrated conclusively that kids who study music tend to do better in school.  Now, we are beginning to know why!

10/7/14 - Birds On A Wire Become Music

There are so many ways to think about this video.  One could say that "Music is all around us" or we could marvel at the sources of musical inspiration.  I'm inclined to see it as a validation of the idea that music is a way of understanding our world and in that way, becomes a sense unto itself, just like sight, hearing, taste, smell and touch.

11/12/14 - When Will I Master My Instrument?

This is a very often asked question by beginning and intermediate level music students.  It is a difficult question in a way, until you understand it in different terms.  The question could be, "When will I have taken this instrument as far as it can go?"  Understood that way, the answer now depends  not on the instrument or the student's development of specific skill sets, but rather on the imagination of the student.  And, the greater your imagination about what you could do with your instrument, the less likelihood that you will ever master it.  At that point, it becomes a glass that is either half full or half empty.  If the student sees the glass as half empty, he or she may become discouraged and give up at the prospect that the instrument will never be mastered.  If the student sees the glass as half full, he or she can look forward to a lifetime of new experiences and revelations in the process of making music.  Next time you are in, ask your teachers if they have mastered their instruments!  Here is a fascinating little video from a vocalist from Germany, whose imagination for the possibilities of her own voice knows no bounds.

12/21/14 - Another Study on the Benefits of Making Music

Here is another great little video report on the benefits to kids of making music, this one based on research from Northwestern University.  Humanity has been making music since its very beginnings, and we continue to find that we do so at least in part because it is essential to our cognitive development.  Check it out!

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You can find us here:

Cappella School of Music
c/o Geoff Hansplant, Inc. 2118 Maplewood Ave., Abington, Pa. 19001


Phone:  215 852-1570

info@cappellaschoolofmusic.com

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    Featured Students

Congratulations to Erin Jolly, who will be appearing as Mrs MacAfee in Gwynedd Mercy Academy High School's staging of Bye, Bye Birdie.  The show will be staged in November on the 9th, 10th, 11th, 16th, 17th and 18th.  Well done, Erin!

Congratulations to Corrine and Olivia Smith, who have landed the roles of Gigi and Lisa in Gwynedd Mercy Academy High School's production of Bye Bye Birdie, which will be performed on November 9th, 10th, 11th, 16th, 17th & 18th.  Up with the curtain!

Congratulations to Cappella's Samantha Klein, who will be starring as Amahl in the Delaware Valley Opera Company's production of Amahl and the Night Visitors, Saturday, January 6th, in two shows, at 4:00 and 7:00p.m.  The performance will be staged at the Venice Island Performing Arts and Recreation Center, 7 Lock Street, Philadelphia, Pa. 19127.  Great job, Samantha!

Congratulations to Cappella's Grace Stancavage on her winning of the role of Morticia in the Abington Junior High School production of The Addams Family!  Just another day of living the dream, for Grace.

And Congratulations go out as well to Gwen Nolan, who has won the role of Wednesday Addams in the Abington Junior High School production of The Addams Family.  Gwen is yet another of our outstanding young vocalists, poised for much bigger things with each new adventure.  Well done, Gwen!

Photo Gallery

Pictures from our last event are now online! Check them out.



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