Passion

Having a passion for what you teach is absolutely essential if you want your students to succeed.

One reason I believe why I am so passionate about choral music is because the choral program at my high school was so strong. My theory about why the program is so strong at my high school is that the directors care so much about choral music, and about the students.

The pivotal moment in my passion for choral music happened during my experience in the Minnesota All-State Women's choir the summer before my senior year of high school. At that time, I already had been in my school's top for a year, and I loved singing, but I was missing the "little something extra" that turns an interest into a passion. That little something extra came midway through the week of our All-State camp. During a rehearsal, we were running a song, "Tutto il di piango", which our conductor Vijay Singh (not the golfer) had composed. At one part near the end of the song (around 5:30 in the video below) every single person in the choir started bawling. Uncontrollably. Even after the song ended. Nobody could explain it. Even Vijay Singh was noticeably shaken up. For the rest of rehearsal then, he explained to us how he chose to compose the song as he did, why he chose that text (the part mentioned translates to "because living pity and my faithful aid see me on fire and do not help me"...and the rest of the song is almost as depressing, I promise you), and it was clear just how passionate he was about his profession.



To this day, I have never had as much of a 'musical mountain top moment' (as my director in high school says) as I did that day in rehearsal. Part of me is convinced that it was because of his personal investment. He put himself out there to be vulnerable, because of his passion for the music. My high school choir director was convinced that most of those mountain top moments should happen in rehearsal, and I didn't really believe her until that day.



One reason why Benjamin Zander is so successful in this lecture is because he's so passionate about what he's teaching his audience. He is absolutely convinced that everybody in the world loves classical music, and that most people just haven't discovered it yet.

One thing I've thought about doing in my classroom after watching this video, is have my students listen to choral music. Good choral music. Most high school students don't make a habit of listening to good choral music. They might listen to a CD of their own choir, if that option is available, but they don't go searching it out. For some, it is only a matter of not knowing where to start. There is so much choral literature out there, and I find it difficult to sift through the junk to find the gems. Giving students somewhere to start- a certain choir, or a specific composer could really help to jumpstart their passion.

Perhaps instead of looking at the classroom as a classroom and myself as a teacher, I can think of it as an arena to share my passion with students, some of who are there for the music and others there either because their friends are in choir, or because they think it will be an 'easy A'. Perhaps I'll be able to transform their lives as my teachers have transformed mine.