A Couple Classes I Wish I had Taken as an Undergrad
There are a couple courses I wish I had taken as an undergraduate–courses normally taken by music education students.
While my undergrad degree is in performance, I actually started out doing a music business degree program with the goal of becoming an instrument repairman. Part of the required coursework was the full methods sequence, as they wanted us to understand the products of the music industry. Long story short, after 1 ½ years of music business I decided to try to go all out for horn performance. But in that initial period of college I took half of the methods sequence.
The way the sequence was set up then at my undergraduate school, Emporia State University, was you started with a full semester of clarinet in the woodwinds and the brass started with a combined brass/percussion sequence. For that course since I had played trumpet into high school I played Euphonium and also percussion. Probably that is why I have always been pretty comfortable on Wagner tuba. To this day I remember some of my percussion rudiments and could certainly get back up to speed quickly on a clarinet.
I did not take trombone or tuba methods, and, looking back, I wish that I had taken them. I would be better equipped today if I had. The other woodwinds class would have been interesting too.
ASU does not offer a music business degree program and honestly, I did at the time think of repair being a fall back option if performance did not work out, knowing that there were options for learning instrument repair such as the program at Red Wing Tech. (And for sure now it makes much more sense to regular Horn Matters readers why I can get so into some of the equipment related posts). But, on the general topic of studying music education (and music therapy or business), I would return to my advice from a few posts back, where I note that to my mind
…there is one central reason to be a music education or music therapy major–because you are interested in becoming a music educator or music therapist. Don’t have either program in mind for a “fall back” career if it is not something you have an interest in actually doing. But if it is an interest, do consider these fields, remembering that there is nothing to stop you from practicing hard and being just as good a player as the best performance students out there.
Probably half of the MM and DMA students I have worked with at Arizona State hold undergraduate degrees in music education. It is an option to consider and elements of it, such as taking the methods sequence, will prepare you better for performance and teaching, even if you opt to not ultimately teach instrumental music in a public school setting.
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