Music Education and Playing Shows

Our students could be earning more money with a little bit of guidance

by Rich Willey
March 24, 2017


I WAS TALKING with an old buddy of mine earlier today (I’ll call him John) about his dismay at the lack of students who are able to play shows.

He’s doing a show for a high school at the moment, and said there’s not a single high school student in the pit orchestra. When he asked the conductor why that was, the conductor said that the students couldn’t read in key signatures with more than three flats or three sharps.

Having played in many pit orchestras (not my very favorite kind of gig, though always challenging), I understood why that poses a problem.

John said that most of these kids come up through the school system playing out of their Standard of Excellence books, and their scale knowledge and key fluency rank among the weakest of their weak points.

Add the fact that shows tend to have some bright tempo markings at times with alla breve passages that require the player to be competent readers as well as having sufficient technical prowess to negotiate quick passages at those brisk metronome markings.

Again, that brings us right back to that lack of scale knowledge as well as lack of key fluency. A bright number in the key of B will fall flat if the performers aren’t fluent in that key (C# or Db for trumpet/clarinet/tenor sax, Ab for alto sax/baritone sax, etc.).

Students (as a result of many of their teachers) are losing money by not focusing on this area of performance in their formative years.

Rather than point a finger of blame, how about letting students know about pieces of music or practice books that have scales and/or passages presented in all twelve keys?

About ten years ago, one of my students told me that I should put every single passage of my learn-to-improvise-jazz book into all twelve keys. It was a 22-page book. At first I told him that it was a preposterous idea that would be scoffed by the jazz education community, but I finally gave in and did it. Interestingly, we sold more of those books (it came out to 168 pages) than just about any of our other publications.

From that point on, most of the books I have written and published have everything in all twelve keys: 1) Jazz Improv Materials Handbook Complete (treble clef or bass clef), 2) Trumpeter’s Guide to II-V7-I’s in twelve major keys, 3) Trumpeter’s Guide to II-V7-I’s in twelve minor keys, 4) We’re Talkin’ Bebop, 5) Rhythm Madness, 6) First Book of Practical Studies for Jazz Players, and then of course my scale books 7) Upside-Down Scales, 8) Scale Force, and 9&10) Variations on Clarke’s Second Study both on the modes of the major scale (172 pages) and on the modes of the ascending melodic minor scale (also 172 pages).

Dan Haerle told me 40 years ago that there are no difficult keys. There are only less-familiar keys. The best way I have found to be fluent in all my keys is by playing in all of them often, not just scales, but phrases and melodies.

We all probably know a student who could benefit from more intensive scale practice in all twelve keys. Maybe we could start a trend by suggesting that learning scales is the key to unlocking one’s potential. They might appreciate the opportunity to earn some extra money doing fun stuff like playing in a pit-orchestra for their local high school plays. Some time and effort could pay off better than working a minimum wage job like many of their classmates must do. It’s worth a try, right?