Credit: NASA
Just to let you all know where I’m coming from: I grew up, and learned and taught music in the middle of the “un-lit” region in the middle of the western United States–between Salt Lake City, medicine Utah and Reno, Nevada–the Great Basin. I’m rural through and through and I’m also a music teacher and a teacher of music teachers. So, naturally, I’m interested in exploring how people experience, learn, and teach music in rural places. I’ll share my own experiences and hope that others will share theirs. We might find that our experiences are similar and we might find that they are vastly different. Here are some questions to start us off (and if noone joins in, I’ll just continue on my own): What are the unique challenges and advantages to teaching and learning music in rural schools? How might the identity of a rural music teacher be the same as or different from any other music teacher? How does rural music teaching/learning differ from place to place? How might rural music teaching and learning be transformed to better meet the needs of rural students?
Well, that’s it for my first post. And, by the way, if the title didn’t immediately bring a specific lyric and tune to your mind, here’s the Youtube link: