School music programs have come a long way since I was a kid.Last spring, Ben announced that he wanted to take Orchestra in middle school, and he wanted to play the bass. Yes, that large instrument you see to your left.
My concern was, of course, how an eleven year old who rides the bus might transport such an instrument.
Apparently, for a measly $35 a year, Ben can rent a school-owned instrument to keep at home. He can also use another school-owned instrument in class, and in concerts. So outside of the trip home tonight, where the bass rode shotgun and was almost impaled on my dashboard, the transportation issue will not come up again until May.
Ben also has access, for a mere $25 a year, to a computer program that blew my mind. The teacher uploads music and assignments. The student downloads same. The student can have the computer play the music, and hear it played correctly. The student then plays the same song into a the computer mic. The program takes every note played correctly and turns it green, and takes every note played incorrectly and turns it red. Then student and teacher can look at what is going well, and what needs improvement. A far cry from my days playing clarinet in the band.
I always thought the bass was cool, especially when you pluck it like that bear did in the The Jungle Book. Maybe I'll take advantage and learn to play it myself....
4 comments:
Holy kaschmoly, that thing's HUGE! My kids think that they want to tackle piano lessons this year (thank you, we do not own a piano) and so I'm in debate about a lil' ole keyboard. Where do you keep that monster? Does it have its own bedroom? How much does it EAT? I hope he enjoys his new musical adventure - I've always thought a bass would be fun, too.
Awesome! $35 bucks? You know for another dollar you could have gotten a bigger one. Keep it up, Benjamin, bass is cool!
Surprisingly, it looks even larger crammed in the passenger seat of a Cutlass.
At first glance I thought "Look how tiny Ben looks beside that fiddle." Bass is cool! They bass player for Barnaked Ladies playes an upright like that. Very cool indeed.
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