AU music programs look to new technologies to play online in sync
Internet connectivity issues and workspace environment pose challenges for students
OWAIN JAIMES/THE EAGLE
By Olivia Higgins | Feb. 18, 2021
Though moving online presents unique challenges for music programs across the country in the face of the coronavirus pandemic, American University’s Music Program worked to move the entire program online with complete course offerings this current and past semester.
Sean Doyle, the director of AU’s Music Program, said trying to find ways to instruct, rehearse and perform music virtually was difficult, but found ways to overcome these challenges, and was able to move the full program online.
“Our faculty came together at the beginning of this crisis, especially after we did that half of the last spring semester like a year ago,” Doyle said. “But then over the summer, we realized that this would be a thing for the coming year. We just have to figure out how we’re going to do it in a way that’s meaningful and exciting and is still educationally vibrant.”
Doyle and Nancy Jo Snider, director of AU’s Applied Music Program, said that the program is currently holding classes, rehearsals and performances virtually. With the fall 2021 semester approaching, the music programs are hoping to have in-person performances available. To do this, a number of factors need to be considered including, but not limited to, social distancing measures and airflow in the rooms.
Most ensembles have been putting together asynchronous recording projects that allow them to “come together” and perform a piece. This process requires each member of the ensemble to individually record their part. The videos are then arranged into “Brady Bunch squares,” creating the larger and final piece.
AU Chamber Singers, a select choral ensemble, have been using new software that reduces latency, allowing them to sing and perform in real time, Doyle said.
“We’re taking a bunch of different approaches, depending upon the nature of the ensemble, the size of the ensemble and the nature of the music-making,” Doyle said.
The Applied Music Program is using the software as well, according to Snider.
“All of this stuff is stuff I don’t think any of us bargained for pre-pandemic, but I think what it speaks to is the resiliency and the creativity of creative people,” Snider said.
Doyle said that in addition to the typical challenges that come with online instruction are issues of time and sound and creating a communal aspect to music-making.
“The biggest challenge to music instruction when you’re fully online is that the standard tools that we use, like Zoom, for example, don’t allow for very sensitive real-time interaction,” Doyle said.
Latency poses a problem for online music instruction because this delay prevents parts from moving together in real-time. Along with this are issues pertaining to sound. Because sound is being transferred through the computer microphone, it is difficult to gauge sound quality, Doyle said.
“The challenges I think that everyone has to deal with in educational circumstances, those certainly apply,” Doyle said, “but then on top of that, we have these issues of sound and time, which are important in music learning that are not really facilitated very well with online platforms and so, we have to find ways to kind of work around that.”
Snider said that, in addition to latency, workspace and environment, WiFi connectivity and speed present challenges to music instruction online.
“What I think and what they’ve shared with me is just you know the connectivity issues, you know the being tethered. I mean they have the same issues that I have,” Snider said. “They’re musicians too. And so, when you’re making music, you want to be free, you want to be in an acoustic, you want to be able to play in real-time with people.”
According to some students, another challenge they face is missing a sense of community.
“I definitely think a challenge would be the community feeling of an ensemble because it’s really not there,” said Caroline Cascio, a sophomore in the Music Program involved with instrumental ensembles at AU. “We’re on Zoom with each other and we see each other, but that sense of community while we’re playing our instruments together is not there in a virtual form.”
In terms of how this experience may change music going forward, Doyle said that he hopes it doesn’t change much but thinks that this move to online instruction allows performers to gain technological experience and skills that may prove valuable in the future.
“What I think is good about this is if for some reason you need to rely on technology for some kind of rehearsal or performance experience, we are giving our students the tools to do that,” Doyle said. “And it's likely that some of these things may be used in the future even as we move out of the COVID reality.”