Meetings held upstairs at Heid Music, 308 E College Ave. in Appleton. Enter through the blue door in the back of the building. Heid has a few parking places, or you can park in the First United Methodist Church lot on Washington Street.
Meeting Schedule:
9:15am - 10:15am: Business Meeting
10:15am - 11:15am: Social Gathering and Program
Children are welcomed!
Meeting Schedule:
9:15am - 10:15am: Business Meeting
10:15am - 11:15am: Social Gathering and Program
Children are welcomed!
FVMTA 2024 - 2025 Programming
September 13, 2024
Social Gathering, WMTA Audition News
Speaker: Catherine Walby
Come join us for our first gathering of the season, and find out more about WMTA district and regional auditions! You'll learn the basics of auditions as well as recent additions. If you aren't involved in auditions, you can still learn about ideas for your students' repertoire and theory work. Fall is a great time to check out FVMTA, meet colleagues and learn about programs and opportuities for your students. New and interested music teachers in the Fox Valley are always welcomed.
Friday, October 11, 2024
Making Connections: Relating the Piano to the Rest of the World
Speaker: Catherine Kautsky
Catherine Kautsky will introduce her Great Courses videos, "Great Piano Works Explained", a series of 24 lecture-recitals completed in 2022. Dr. Kautsky will also describe how her book on Debussy's Paris and her current work on "Vienna, the Intersections of Music and Politics" have emerged from her performing interests.
Friday, November 8, 2024
A Composer's Life: Music Entrepreneurship. A guide for stratospheric success
Speaker: Theresa Martin
Topic: In today’s world, musicians must learn to be entrepreneurs. Every musician’s career is different, but they all share one goal of finding balance. Dr. Martin will discuss, from a composer’s perspective, how she juggles between composing, teaching, performing, and publishing her music, and she will share the five simple principles for stratospheric success in music that have guided her career path.
Friday February 14, 2025
Leveraging Technology and AI for Music Studio Success: Marketing, Recruiting, and Soft Skill Development
Speaker: Michael Clayville
In today's digital world, music educators encounter new challenges and opportunities in expanding their studios, connecting with broader audiences, and preparing their students for diverse futures. This presentation will explore the technology that supports private music studios—covering tools for marketing, student recruitment, studio management, and the emerging role of AI. We will examine how AI-driven solutions can streamline studio operations, enhance teaching methods, and help musicians market themselves more effectively. Additionally, we’ll explore the often-overlooked area of soft skills and how musicians can harness technology to transfer these skills when navigating career transitions. Attendees will gain practical insights into utilizing technology and AI to strengthen their studios and help their students succeed both musically and professionally.
Friday March 14, 2025
About the Dalcroze Method
Speaker: Barbara Beechey
Dalcroze Eurythmics is a method of developing musicianship in which the body is the main instrument. It connects music, the mind and the body. Eurythmics, which means "good flow" was developed in the 20th century by Swiss dancer, composer and actor Émile Jacques-Dalcroze.
Eurythmics is a valuable pedagogical tool because it engages students with movement and, due to the tendency to cross the right-left brain barrier (For example: conducting in 3 in one hand while in two with the other.) it also increases focus. Using the principles of Dalcroze Eurythmics, even children as young as 5 can learn to conduct, feel beat durations, and learn to apply seemingly advanced rhythmical ideas in meaningful, musical ways.
The purpose of bringing Dalcroze Eurythmics to the FVMTA teachers meeting is to introduce educators and performers to ideas and concepts that they themselves can apply in their own classrooms and studios. It will give you new ways to motivate and engage your students, creating beneficial, enjoyable techniques of musical movement.
Previous Programs
September 8, 2023
Welcome Back! / “Preparing Outstanding Ensemble Performers”
Please join us for our first meeting of the year— A great time to check out FVMTA and meet everyone! New and interested teachers in the Fox Valley are always welcomed.
At this meeting: Learn timely tips and teaching techniques for excellent ensembles! Whether your students are preparing to perform in a duet, trio, chamber ensemble, or even if they are following a conductor for the first time in a larger group, fellow music teachers and conductors have some helpful tools to share—These tips can help your students become better listeners, better observers, and better collaborative musicians overall. A great set of resources to help our many students preparing for FVMTA's upcoming Monster Concert, Young Artists Competition and WSMA's Solo-Ensemble Festivals.
October 13, 2023
"Adjusting to a New Instrument” - Diane Shapiro
February 9, 2024
Scores! What are they good for? - Michael Rector, PhD - UWGB
Performance style has changed drastically over the last 100+ years, so much that our 21st-century ears sometimes struggle to understand how the earliest-recorded musicians’ interpretations are related to the composers’ notation. We tend to be exacting about historically appropriate style in composers who died before the age of recording: Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin. Yet when faced with early 20th-century composers performing their own music—for example, Debussy, Bartok, Rachmaninoff and Grieg—we accept performances that sound completely different from these undeniably authentic recordings.
Instead of worrying about authenticity, Michael looks at the variety of ways that scores have been realized expressively on record for inspiration. We’ll listen to some authentic but surprising recordings as well as some that are just shockingly creative. Then we’ll explore how a broad range of strategies for realizing notation might be employed in beginner and intermediate repertoire. It’s never too early to start thinking about notation as the basis for creativity!
March 8, 2024
Digitizing Your Sheet Music Library - Margaret Murray
Are you considering going paperless to better organize your music library? Would you like to rehearse and preform with a computer tablet using an app like ForScore, rather than carrying so much sheet music around? How do you turn pages on a tablet? Come join us for an introductory look at hardware and software used by many performers, and explore the advantages of entering the digital age of music reading.
April 19, 2024
Spring Luncheon
Welcome Back! / “Preparing Outstanding Ensemble Performers”
Please join us for our first meeting of the year— A great time to check out FVMTA and meet everyone! New and interested teachers in the Fox Valley are always welcomed.
At this meeting: Learn timely tips and teaching techniques for excellent ensembles! Whether your students are preparing to perform in a duet, trio, chamber ensemble, or even if they are following a conductor for the first time in a larger group, fellow music teachers and conductors have some helpful tools to share—These tips can help your students become better listeners, better observers, and better collaborative musicians overall. A great set of resources to help our many students preparing for FVMTA's upcoming Monster Concert, Young Artists Competition and WSMA's Solo-Ensemble Festivals.
October 13, 2023
"Adjusting to a New Instrument” - Diane Shapiro
February 9, 2024
Scores! What are they good for? - Michael Rector, PhD - UWGB
Performance style has changed drastically over the last 100+ years, so much that our 21st-century ears sometimes struggle to understand how the earliest-recorded musicians’ interpretations are related to the composers’ notation. We tend to be exacting about historically appropriate style in composers who died before the age of recording: Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin. Yet when faced with early 20th-century composers performing their own music—for example, Debussy, Bartok, Rachmaninoff and Grieg—we accept performances that sound completely different from these undeniably authentic recordings.
Instead of worrying about authenticity, Michael looks at the variety of ways that scores have been realized expressively on record for inspiration. We’ll listen to some authentic but surprising recordings as well as some that are just shockingly creative. Then we’ll explore how a broad range of strategies for realizing notation might be employed in beginner and intermediate repertoire. It’s never too early to start thinking about notation as the basis for creativity!
March 8, 2024
Digitizing Your Sheet Music Library - Margaret Murray
Are you considering going paperless to better organize your music library? Would you like to rehearse and preform with a computer tablet using an app like ForScore, rather than carrying so much sheet music around? How do you turn pages on a tablet? Come join us for an introductory look at hardware and software used by many performers, and explore the advantages of entering the digital age of music reading.
April 19, 2024
Spring Luncheon