Emily Wood - Folk & Science [S.1, EP.5]
Emily talks about her research at McMaster University and contrasts learning folk music traditions with music education.
![Emily Wood - Folk & Science [S.1, EP.5]](/content/images/size/w1200/2022/02/art-feat-28.jpg)
On the Rhythm Changes Podcast, Emily Wood talks about her research with the Auditory Development Lab at McMaster University and contrasts learning folk music traditions with music education.
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We talked about
- Being a grad student in a non-musician field with a musical culture
- Growing up in fiddle groups like the Coast String Fiddlers and going to the Aberdeen International Youth Festival
- Fiddle music instruction compared with other music instruction, like a high school band
- The brain’s role in musicianship in conjunction with the body
- How music activates your motor system
- A case for teaching music much earlier to young children
- A stronger benefit-based argument for music education (better than, “it increases students’ grades”)
- A digression on my own learning timeline and how it had almost no music until high school
- Refusing to worry about nature vs. nurture
- Emily’s takes on some North Shore Celtic Ensemble observations I’ve had about teaching new tunes to students
- What to look for in a well-prepared and comfortable performing youth group (looking at each other, moving around, & more)
- How a good fiddle teacher always takes a particular amount of time between call-and-response teaching melodies by ear
- Why teachers need to watch how much information they give at a time, looking to not overload students’ working memory
- The lack Emily perceives of academic research on folk music teaching
- Body sway: how musicians communicate by moving
- Mental practice: without your instrument or when you’re injured
- Why almost everybody can carry a tune
- Emily’s own music and jazz school experience
- The threat of falling out of love with music when you have high personal standards of perfection
- Coming home to jam with Kirin Lamb, Jennifer Mauel, Jocelyn Pettit, and other folk music friends
- Emily’s next steps as a musician