Recently, a certain organization has started to kick off in schools of America. This organization is called United Sound. While there are still only a handful of chapters in existence, the organization is still causing quite a stir. So what’s the big deal?
Western Carolina University was honored with being the first college/university to initiate a chapter. Since our school is one of the only university that supports students with special needs (what we call our University Participant, or UP program), it’s only fitting that we would start the first collegiate chapter.
United Sound has really touched my soul in particular. To see the light on these students’ faces when they figure out how to get a good buzz or when they play a perfect “donut” rhythm is absolutely astonishing.
The program works by assigning each new musician to one or two “peer mentors,” who are current musicians. So instead of having the students taught by their teacher and the band director, the new musicians are taught by their peers, giving them chances to make these new connections with people they may have never met before.
Students are taught using food terms. A quarter note is a cake, half notes are soup, and eighth notes are “do-nut.” I asked one of our students what their favorite part of United Sound was, and his answer was “the food!” Using the food helps build these connections, so when it comes to reading actual music and notes, a half note looks like a bowl of soup, whole notes look like cake, and eighth notes look like two donuts. The notes are also colored; in the trumpet book, a C is orange, Bs are green, and As are purple. This is another way the students make connections: If you see a green note, you automatically know that the note is a B. It’s proving to be a very effective way of teaching the new musicians!
In October, the new musicians were given the chance to perform with the Pride of the Mountains Marching Band. This past Tuesday (March 8), the students had their first performance in a recital setting. Getting to see these kids perform and seeing the amount of support they got from other peers (outside of our little United Sound group) was absolutely amazing. It shows just how much of a fan base these students really have!
I feel extremely honored to have been asked to be a part of this group. This group is important in so many ways; it exposes the new musicians to this fine art that we all love, and it gives us music majors a chance to experience teaching new musicians. My student decided he wanted to play trumpet. I found a connection with him, because when I started band 10 years ago, I also started on trumpet. I switched to horn shortly after, but I still love teaching the trumpet. Each of the mentors and students share a special bond between each other that is very strong, and all of us love going into the band room on Monday nights to teach or learn more about the instrument.
