Season Three
Episode 79
Marimba Ensembles with Walt Hampton
Walt Hampton Bio:
Walt Hampton received his teaching certificate as well as Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees in Percussion Performance from Central Washington University. He has served as Principal Percussionist or Timpanist with numerous symphony orchestras, and he frequently performs on drum set, providing backup for several notable jazz artists who tour the Northwest. He is also a frequent performer on the guitar and bass, and an active composer.
Walt has presented clinics and workshops on three continents, as well as national, regional, and state conventions for AOSA and MENC. He frequently tours and performs with his student marimba bands, Rugare (elementary age), 'Baduku (middle-school age), and 'Bahuru (high-school age) performing a variety of styles, including Zimbabwean-flavored marimba music from his books, Hot Marimba!, Marimba Mojo!, and Son of Hot Marimba. Walt teaches K-5 General music at White Bluffs Elementary School in Richland, Washington, and has more than a quarter-centre of public school teaching experience. Walt has received several awards for his teaching, including the Washington State Excellence in Education Award.
TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE
Jessica: Walt, it is such a treat to be able to talk to you and learn from you. Thank you so much for taking time to do this.
Walt: I'm very happy to do it. Thank you.
Jessica: Of course! Can you tell us a little bit about yourself? What you teach and maybe even a little bit about the ensembles you work with.
Walt: I teach K-5 general music at White Bluffs Elementary School in Richland, WA. I also help a little bit with the middle school jazz band. I teach some of that and then I teach two classes through a community organization and I have two ensembles through a community organization so I have - through the school I have an elementary group. An elementary marimba band and then through the community organization I have a middle school and high school marimba band.
Jessica: And do they perform locally?
Walt: They perform around the Northwest And then every four years or so I take the high schoolers. We go farther. One year we went to Hawaii. One year we went to San Diego. This year in February we go to San Antonio to play at the TMEA Convention.
Jessica: Excellent!
Walt: Yes! So my high schoolers will be playing there. I'm going to be doing a couple sessions there and the high schoolers will be helping me with those, but they'll also be playing and doing what they call a 'Showcase' there. A little informal concert. We'll play at the Elementary meeting.
Jessica: Fantastic! What do you think is valuable or what do you love about making music with students through these marimba ensembles?
Walt: I think I love that you can actually make music that sounds good to a neutral observer. That's always been the thing that I love most about it 'cause with an orchestra or with a band or whatever I love that the kids make progress and all that kind of stuff, but with a marimba band you can actually make something that people want to hear and will stay to listen to even if their kids not in the group. And so I think that's what I love the most.
Jessica: I love that too. I teach middle school so I have older students and something I really love about it is that even when it's simplistic it can sound amazing, but then how far you can take them through learning more complex parts or even improvisations and seeing what they add to it.
Walt: Yeah. I think you're right. I think even the most basic thing if you get the groove going that people respond to that even if it's simple and that's pretty cool.
Jessica: I agree. So do you have a process for teaching parts within a marimba ensemble or is there... does it change with each piece depending on, I'd say, the groove of it.
Walt: Well, yes and no. I mean the teaching of the parts is very simple rote learning, but then as I thought about this there's a lot of sorta tricks to getting them how to learn effectively by rote. And some of those tricks, if you want to call them that, are specific to that song or that rhythm or that groove. If we were to be teaching one of my songs in the studio I teach at, you know, I try when I start out to separate the rhythm from the notes. In other words, I try to teach the kids the sequence of notes and then I start pushing the rhythm. That way I can keep them separate a little bit. A lot of times I'll let them hear what the rhythm is, but I'm not going to teach that. I'm not going to emphasize that at first because what happens then is yes, well...You're just going to get more mistakes. Either the kids are going to screw up the notes 'cause they're trying to do the rhythm or they're going to screw up the rhythm because they're trying to do the notes. And sort of my emphasis is to get them to do one of them correctly and then turn your attention to the other one. I try to teach them the sequence of notes and then we try to put it in a rhythm.
Jessica: And do you do that simply by rote? Having them echo you?
Walt: Yes or I'll play on the opposite side of the keyboard from them. Sometimes I'll write the sequence of notes on the board, but it'll just be letter names. You know, ABCD. And that way they can remember it and they can work on it on their own to a certain extent.
Jessica: So then once they've learned 'cause everyone learns every part. Is that how you teach?
Walt: Ah no. That's how I teach in the classroom when we do a song in a classroom, but when I do it with a group I say 'okay, you're the bass player so you have to learn the bass part.' But I encourage the kids once they've got their part down to learn other parts especially bass parts and baritone parts and leads so that when that kid is sick or gone we can have somebody to fill in.
Jessica: How do you do that then if you're teaching one part, but only one student or two students are learning that part? What do the other students do?
Walt: Well, I just go from group to group and I tell them, 'Look you guys. I'm going to show this group their part and then I'll move to you.' I'll show them a measure or a few notes at a time. So I'll show the sopranos a few notes and then I'll move to the Altos and so you kind of have this chaotic rotating thing. And it is chaotic, but the kids get used to it. But it's kind of good because they get used to picking out what they're doing from all the noise that's around them and I think that's a good thing too. That way I keep them all busy at the same time. By the time I've taught the last group their notes then the first group is ready for more usually. Sometimes different parts are more difficult and so you have to come back to them more often or whatever. Yeah, that's kind of the way I do it. I try not to divide things up necessarily by let's learn a measure. Although often that's the unit of measure. I try to do it where a kid would think the music divides, which isn't always at the bar line. I try to put myself in their way of viewing the song and then teach it. Meet them there instead of wasting my time trying to impress upon them that this is a measure and you need to learn a measure.
Jessica: More focusing on the music and what they're hearing and how they're playing it compared to...
Walt: Compared to the structure we use to remember the music. Meaning the printed music.
Jessica: And then once your students have learned these parts, how are you - are you directing them with something?
Walt: For years I played hosho with the band. I now play drum set with the band. Both of them have distinctive advantages, but a lot of times I'll use a cowbell too or some kind of time keeper to go around. I can either keep the beat while I sing their part with them or I can bang their part at them with the cowbell. But yeah, the hosho are really good in that their local. Meaning I can stand right next to a kid and play those and that helps. Also I think the hosho do a better job of subdividing certain patterns than a drum set does even though that seems kind of weird. But a drum set is kind of cool because you can get the beat. You can get the subdivision. And then you can get the rhythm that they're supposed to be playing. So they kind of get the full deal. So it's a very good teaching tool. My only real problem with it is that it's not as local as specific as - you can't go stand next to this tenor player while you're working on this part.
Jessica: And for someone listening who doesn't know, what is a hosho?
Walt: A hosho is a Zimbabwean gourd rattle and they come in pairs. And so when you show them to a kid and show them how to play them they'll say "Oh they're maracas!" They're not. They're a lot louder and bigger and they have a different sound. A kid would most readily identify it with a maraca.
Jessica: They're slightly bigger than a maraca?
Walt: Most of them are, but I mean they're gourds. So you can harvest the gourds whenever you want at whatever size you want so you'll find some that are small, but most of them the ball end of them is about the size of a softball or something like that.
Jessica: That's what I use as well to direct my ensembles. We use a lot of hoshos or cowbells. I often will have students direct using them. Because come middle school there's some. You find that ringer who can really lead well and that helps once we've solidified really the form of the piece and where we want to go, then I start to pull them in. So how do go about arranging pieces or creating the form of pieces? Do you use student input or do you have in mind a framework and go from there?
Walt: Well, it depends on how complicated the piece is. I mean a lot of the very simple pieces that you find in the first few numbers in the books. They're just pieces where you're playing a pattern together and a group takes a solo and then you all play together. So it's kind of a standard form, but I find that a lot of times kids will have input on that. I definitely listen to their input because there are a lot of pieces that have been improved by that. Stuff I would not have thought of that a kid thinks of so it's kind of cool. They add to the form. They add to the parts. They add variations. Stuff like that. There are some pieces now that I play that are so different from what was written in the book, you know, and it's not because of me necessarily changing things because of all these little variations and stuff the kids have come up with. So the piece, well, it's very different from the original version in the book.
Jessica: Would you mind - I don't know if it's possible - to look at one of the pieces from one of your books and walk us through how you would start and how you would layer it in in a classroom setting.
Walt: I suppose the most successful simple song I think in my mind is the M'bira Jam from the first book and I'll do that. I do that song with my 3rd graders in a classroom setting. We start by learning the C-G-C-G part which goes 'C-G-C-G C-A-A' 'C-G-C-G C ...' I mean that's pretty straight ahead. Kids have less trouble with syncopation than adults do. I mean they might not get it exactly right, at least at first, eventually they do. One thing I always do with that. If you look at the measures and the way the rhythm is structured visually, it goes 1-2-3-4 eighth notes and then 1-2-3, you know that dotted rhythm, but the way kids think of it because it goes 'C-G-C-G-C AA' they think of it as five notes and then two slower ones. And so that's kind of an example of what I was talking about. When I teach it, I always teach 'okay kids it goes 1-2-3-4-5 and then it goes 1-2.' The two slower notes on the A or the B or whatever. And so that's how they learn that part. In a classroom we all learn that part and then we go on to the next part which is exactly the same only different notes. And there are a few little problems inherent with that, but it's not a big deal for them to learn that. And then finally we learn the bass parts. I tell them, "Look kids -When we get this down, we're going to be playing it. We're going to be doing things with the form and playing the song as a song. If you can learn all three parts, you're going to get to play more." Hopefully that motivates them to learn all three parts.. Although most kids learn all three parts unless they're somehow detached from what's going on, but then we start putting together the form and so we layer in starting with the C-G. When I layer in parts, I usually start (unless there's some reason not to) with the part that communicates the rhythm, the signature rhythm of the song and communicates the tonality most effectively. So if there's a part that starts with C-G I'll start with that because it's the root and the fifth. Usually. And then I add the parts that have more color tones and finally you usually save the bass for last because that's kinda the big deal. So that's what I do with that song in the classroom with that in the classroom.
It's really, like I said, to talk about it there's nothing difficult to talk about with what I just said, but there are little tricks if I were to come teach at your school or someone else's school. There are funny little tricks that make it the learning much faster or more effective. That's kind of what the effective teaching comes down to is understanding how kids learn and this sort of thing and then employing that.
When I was young, a young drummer and percussionist and that kind of stuff I taught a million drum lessons and a million snare drum lessons and timpani lessons and all those lessons. And through that I really learned how people learn percussions tuff. I mean what barriers they run into. What problems they have with their hands. What problems seem to be problems but if you just leave them alone they'll just correct themselves and stuff like that. I did that before I was ever a public school teacher and so that kind of formed the foundation of my pedagogy and I find that I'm still doing that you know. Sorting out which things are really problems and which aren't and what the most effective way to fix them is. But that was, I don't know, probably 12 years of teaching a lot of lessons before I became a public school teacher.
Jessica: Are there any tips or tricks or any things that you see that are so common that you could share ways for how to help students overcome them to become better percussionists?
Walt: Well yeah, I think what you're saying is what are the most common problems I see, is that correct?
Jessica: Probably yeah.
Walt: Well the most common problems I see is that the time of the band meaning the general steadiness of the beat is not very good and the subdivision within that time is also not really good. So you're failing to get - not you - but somebody's not getting the groove, the basic groove happening. And I think a lot of that problem is solved if you can get your kids to take full strokes with both hands because your stick is like the pendulum on a metronome. If you're interrupting that stroke, the time and the subdivision are going to suffer and so people might think this means you need to lecture them about taking full strokes or whatever. Usually it's solved by me telling them to play loud. And eventually you'll see them doing all kinds of weird things in order to play loud technique wise, but what happens is those things, those weird things that they're doing, they're not comfortable or they hurt after a while. So if you play loud eventually a kid almost all kids, will develop an efficient technique where they can play loud without a ton of effort and what that means is that they're taking full strokes and that they're using their wrist and their fingers instead of their arms and then you find that your rhythms and your time starts to happen.
Now I'm not an Orff guy, which is not to say that I hate Orff. I really appreciate what he did, but I'm not trained as an Orff person. But I know a lot of Orff people encourage their people to play gently, softly and for a lot of the music that Orff ensembles do that's exactly what you need to do, but if you're gonna play marimba music which is physically generated and physically appreciated, if you will, you have to play loud to get those grooves to happen.
Jessica: Is it the same if you're playing on xylophones compared to if you're playing on marimbas?
Walt: Yes it is, but it's a little trickier on xylophones because the bars can fly off and because you have to find the sticks that work with that kind of playing and so what I do is I run a strip of maybe 1/2 inch tape across the nodes of the bars which is the dead spot of the bar, which is where the nails come through on an Orff instrument and that holds them down. Some people have a better looking way of doing that, but it's essentially the same thing. They'll run a rubber band or some strip of some material or something over the nodes on the bars and they just hold them down that way the kids can play as loud as they want. And then with the sticks I think the best sticks by far are the American Drum. The plastic ones. The ones with the plastic heads, you know, they're blue or they're red or they're yellow. And most of what I use is the red ones, but the yellow are really good if you're playing the lower end of a bass xylophone and the blue ones are really good if you're trying to bring out a certain part or if you have a group that's, well, say your altos are having trouble getting a certain part you give the one that does get it a pair of the blue sticks so that the other students can hear it more clearly because I think and well, this is true, a lot of what I do has to do with the kids hearing and feeling and participating in correct repetitions. And so if they can't play it yet, if someone near them is playing it loud and correct, eventually they do soak it up. You'll find that it's kind of a derivative of Suzuki's method of teaching, which actually is a lot closer to my approach than anything else. And so I try to get the kids surrounded by correct repetition so if a group is having trouble with something and one of them gets it down, I will give them the hard sticks. Or if I have a helper coming in who already knows the song, I'll give them hard sticks.
And another funny thing about that, and I explain this to the kids and when I work with adults I explain it to them, I'll go to a group of people who have, you know, they're working on a part and I will spend most of my time with the person who is getting it. Which seems counterintuitive and sometimes bothers people. 'Why aren't you paying attention to me? I'm obviously struggling with this.' But the idea is to get one person in that group so that they can really play it and then they become the teacher for that group instead of me. And then of course I do help the people who are struggling too, but the goal is to get one person who can actually do it and then things work out because the people are hearing it correctly and you can move on.
Jessica: I find that works really well as well. I was teaching my 8th graders yesterday a piece and it was very similar. There were quite a few not getting it, but there were a couple of students who really had it so we divided into small groups and the students led the other students in making sure they had it and it just kind of... it just makes it easier. That peer on peer or just having them listen to someone else who has it so that it allows me to work with a specific student while they go help others. And saves you time and energy and helps the ensemble go through it quicker. Learn quicker.
Walt: Well, it's way more efficient and I find that the thing that makes an ensemble not as much fun is when they're spending a lot of time sitting around waiting. And so it's a very important thing to me to keep things moving and that's the most effective way to keep things moving. If they're waiting for me to teach them everything then we're going to have problems.
Jessica: Once your students have learned these pieces, how do you build in their ability to improvise? Because that's a whole other skill, you know, on top of learning parts. How do you help them do that?
Walt: Well, when you say improvisation, or when I say that, there are a couple different things I mean. One is the generating of variations, which is more the Shona or Zimbabwean idea of improvisation. You've got this pattern and you continue to spin out subtle variations of the pattern. And the other one is more the Western notion of improvisation. Okay we the band are going to hold down this pattern and you can go ahead and do what you want over the top of it. And so those are both things that I think of as improvisation. We do a fair amount of variations in my group so I'll address that first.
Some kids don't like varying things. And I don't try to make them, but especially in my middle school and high schools group I'll say, "Kids, you are free to make up a variation to your part, but you've got to be okay with me shutting it down. That's the deal." And I say, "Some of you guys are, you know, you have a mind that likes to do that sort of thing. And so do it! it's okay! I'm totally fine with that, but you've got to understand that I'm going to say no, you can't do that here or that variation doesn't work." As long as they're good with that and they promise not to get upset and bent out of shape, then I let them make up variations. They don't do it very often, but there's usually two or three kids in a band that really like that sort of thing. And so I let them do it. And like I said before, I've had some great stuff come up and I don't really encourage them to do it. Those kids just do it. A lot of times I'll play with the band. I'll go play with the tenors and just because I'm bored with the part and I've been playing it for 20 years, I'll start doing a variation. They'll pick it up or they'll pick up the notion that, "Oh! I can do a variation." And so that's the way I teach variations. I don't try to make a kid that doesn't feel like doing that do it, but I try to make a good way for the kids who want to do it do it. We just have to make sure that it doesn't get out of hand or it's not a bad variation. I tell 'em, "Look, you've got to be okay with me shutting it down." So I don't know. That's part of it.
And then improvisation in the more standard western sense, there are a couple of songs that we have an improviser on. And I will just say it takes a fair amount of time and confidence and fearlessness for someone to get good at improvising. I just tell that, "Look, all the notes on your marimba are good. Some of them are not quite as good in given situations especially the F and B or the E and the B...," but usually the kid that wants to do that, they're willing to experiment and they'll hear that. And what takes times is I'll say - there's a high schooler. Great kid. He's improvising on one of our songs we'll be playing at TMEA, but he's been improvising over for, I don't know, a year probably when we play it. And he's really good at it now. He really is. But he wasn't the first few times. He wasn't for the first three months, but now he is. What I'm getting at is this: nothing we do, and I 'improvise' with groups that I play with and on drums. Almost all of us when we improvise, we're not really improvising. We're just drawing from a vocabulary of things that we like to do on the instrument. You could call them licks that we're comfortable with. You could call the sonorities that we're comfortable with or things that appeal to us. So it takes time to build up that vocabulary of things that you want to do when you are 'improvising.'
So what's happened with this high schooler is he is built up several things that he likes doing and when he improvises it sounds pretty cool. Now he always does, every time he improvises, it's different, but it is the same kind of things that I've heard him do and so he's just drawing from that vocabulary. And when I improvise on guitar or drums, I'm improvising simply based on a vocabulary of licks of sonorities or ideas that I've used a hundred times and I like recombining those things. Now if you go back into the old jazz guys I think you will find, and new jazz guys, you'll find people who are genuinely improvising. I mean I've never done this before and let's experiment with this, but I've found that that's generally not what people want to hear when they come to a marimba concert. Or when they come hear the cover band that I play guitar with. They're not wanting to hear me take a ten minute solo where I'm exploring all sorts of things that's actually improvising. There are very few people who can pull that off and not a lot of audiences who will put up with it. I mean Frank Zappa did that kind of thing and it was really cool. He genuinely improvised, but not many people do that and so anyway, that's what I do with improvisation. I don't teach them a lot in that 'do this, do this, do this.' When a kid is genuinely stuck or something, I'll play some little scale pattern or I'll play my hands together on 5ths going to a 6th or whatever and they'll see that, okay, this isn't anything magical. It's just me hitting notes and Mr. Hampton just hit a bunch of notes that sounded okay so then they try stuff. You know, you can point out to them 'hey that sounded cool. That one didn't sound as good. Did you like that one?' And they'll say, 'No that one didn't really work.' But that's okay. I mean, they have to feel like and I'm sure every teacher understands this, they have to feel like they're safe improvising, but I guess what I'm saying is that if you let them improvise on that song for a couple months, you're going to have a good improviser. It just takes time.
Jessica: I like that you ask them for the feedback of what they've heard and just getting them to identify if it worked or didn't work. And then not pushing down ideas, but letting them explore and talking about, you know, like you shared, maybe you - there's no bad notes but maybe these notes aren't quite as good as the others within this scale or within ...
Walt: Within that context. Yeah. But also I mean if I teach them too much about that then they'll all start improvising like me and I don't want that because they're all different. I mean the things they hear and the things they imagine are all different. And that's kind of cool. That's what you hear everywhere. That's what you hear with all the old jazz soloists. That's what you hear with great rock players. You hear their personality coming through their instrument and that's because they've gotten past the notion of 'I have to improvise this way' and they've gotten down to what they actually like doing and like hearing. And it's kind of cool because it's kind of an expression of them instead of just being some regurgitated licks or something like that.
Jessica: Very cool. Are there other ways you extend their learning other than improvisation like for you high school students or middle school students?
Walt: I allow them more input, the high schoolers for instance, have more input on the form and the parts and stuff like that, but also with my high school group and the middle school group, we're expected to play for quite a while sometimes and so we have a lot of songs that we have to learn. So pretty much when we're done with one song we move on to the next. We learn another song. And some of the songs are very difficult. They don't want any expansion. They've got their hands full just with some of these patterns that are really difficult so that it self is an extension. I guess that's it. There's a big jump between the middle school and the high school band in terms of difficulty and some of the parts are conceptually difficult and some are just technically difficulty. Just things that are hard to do on a marimba. And sometimes we use three sticks, which isn't a big deal for a classical marimba player, but for a high school kid whose note, who maybe doesn't play another instrument or something it's a big deal. Especially if you're playing some sort of a lick that's pretty involved with those three sticks. And some of the sonorities I use with my high schoolers are kind of a little weird. I mean it's not just like I/IV/V and it's not just 3rds and 4ths. They'll be playing versions of chords where the sticks are miles apart and they'll be playing three sticks and stuff like that. And so yeah, I think with them, with the high schoolers it's just a question of taking everything we've done before and making it more difficult. And more intricate. And more dependent on precision. Because you've got most of the band is playing some sort of 16 note pattern that goes pretty fast and so there's stuff like that. Or a weird rhythm that's just not an easy rhythm to play or to get together or to get precise and so that's kind of the form that our extensions take if you will. So yeah. There's a not a lot of me saying 'Hey we're going to learn about this concept.' It's more about hey, we're playing this concept because we have to learn this song.
Jessica: And do you ever do pop music as well? Or take popular music and arrange it for marimba ensembles.
Walt: Yes. Yes. Well, I guess it depends on your definition of popular music. You mentioned ...
Jessica: Higher Ground.
Walt:... Higher Ground. We do Higher Ground. That's a... our middle school does that song and there are several other tunes that we do, but I select songs based on what I like and what lends itself for working well with it. We tend to do... I've done several songs by the Red Hot Chili Peppers and I do that because their music is a lot more polyphonic than most music that you hear on the radio. They have a great bass player and so it has a real distinctive bass line usually. And their guitar play, well they've had a few guitar players, but the best of their guitar players was very polyphonic too, meaning a lot of times he would play a line instead of just playing chords. And so there you have that bass line and the guitar line and then their singer tends to sing pretty simple almost pentatonic melodies and so their music lends itself perfectly to arranging. Not every song, but a lot of them. And so I've done a lot of their material. And I've done Higher Ground, which of course is a Stevie Wonder song, but the Red Hot Chili Peppers also did a version of that. I've done a bunch of other tunes also. And a lot of them were/are popular. But I find that I'm usually having to add some lines to it so that something doesn't just become chords accompanying a melody, which is alright too, but I like to put something more polyphonic in there. Be it more lines of roughly equal value instead of just accompaniment and melody.
I think... I don't know... I think people like hearing catchy songs. Oh I know this song and it's popular and I like it. But the fact is I think it's a lot more interesting when you emphasize the strengths of the marimba which is polyphonic music. When you get right down to it a marimba doesn't do a great job with a vocal melody, you know. And it doesn't do as well as a saxophone or an electric guitar at carrying a certain melody, but what it does really well is precise polyphonic interweaving of lines and stuff like that so if I do a popular song that's just melody and accompaniment, usually it's because I really want to please the crowd with a song they've heard, but also I have found that when I do songs that are like that - homophonic, melody with accompaniment - I tend to run into pacing problems because the accompaniment people have their part down after five minutes and the melody people are gonna spend the next three weeks learning the part and so that's another reason I tend to be real careful with that.
So the version of Higher Ground that you may have heard us do, there's all kind of stuff going on in there and that's part of the reason why is because I wanted to have each group have a challenge so that they weren't sitting there on their cell phones or wrestling around on the floor while everybody else learned the melody.
Jessica: As you write those parts are you - I'm sure you're also playing them as well - but are you putting it into some kind of software so you can hear how it goes or are you mostly fleshing it out with instruments?
Walt: I'm - well - I've never gotten fast enough at any software to use it effectively so I have a kind of a short hand that I write things down with a pencil. So I have a sort of a kind of shorthand that I write down with a pencil. Usually I don't need to hear it. I mean I can hear it in my head and it just sort of works. Almost all of my arrangements are just my sort of musical shorthand on pieces of paper with a piece of paper and a pen or a pencil. I wish I was better at Sibelius or Finale or whatever, but I'm not and it would take months for me to get good at it and that's months that I don't have.
Jessica: A lot of times if I'm doing shorthand I'll do like stick notation and then sometimes write solfege underneath or even I have a shorthand where if it's high C or low C then putting it in there to make sure the rhythms are complementary.
Walt: That's pretty much what I do too.
Jessica: Anything else you can think that might be helpful for teachers who are teaching marimba to students? Especially those who maybe don't have the percussion background. Like for me I was a vocal major, but here I am - I've gone through Orff training and I know you said you're more from a percussion background. You don't have the Orff training necessarily, but I would have found it really helpful as a vocal major to have had more experience with sticking and with percussion instruments. It would have been helpful to build my skills before attempting to build my students skills.
Walt: Well, I think the best thing a teacher can do and I know lots of teachers who have done this, is to just take up the drumset. Go on craigslist, buy yourself a horrible $200 drumset, and start playing it. You don't have to take lessons. There's so much information on YouTube now that you can really get started that way and pay attention to the drumset, but also pay attention to what drummers call rudiments. Kind of sticking exercises. What you're going to find is that your left hand or your weak hand is pretty sad compared to your strong hand and that's one of the biggest things to overcome is just getting your weak hand to a place where it can do intelligent things. Where you can lead with it and stuff like that. I've encouraged the people who have taken my classes if you have a group and you have access to a drumset, try playing drumset with them. I mean it's cool to have a kid play drumset and that really is kind of neat, but one of the things that's been great for my groups over the years is that since I'm the director and I don't have to just stand there waving a baton, I can actually lend them portions of my musicality, if you catch what I mean okay. I'm a pretty good drumset player and I have played drumset for 45 years now or something. So for me to lend them my interpretation of the beats. My interpretation of subdivisions, variations of subdivisions and rhythms, that's a huge deal. It's kind of neat when you can lend them that and for me to be able to play drums with the group helps that much more. It means that our time is going to be pretty good. Our subdivision is going to be pretty good. And you don't have to be an utterly amazing drummer to be a solid drummer. And so I don't know - I always encourage people to take up drumset. It's kind of fun. You may find that it's relaxing and if you play it fifteen minutes a day you're going to get better pretty quickly.
And if you pay attention to rudiments, I mean if you just do a search for rudiments on YouTube you'll get all sorts of things, but just the basic rudiments that will build your skills then you'll have that to lend to the kids too. I mean when I play a lead or a part for the kids, they not only hear it, but they see how my hands are moving, you know. They see what I do when I cross over and if they don't see it then I point it out, but anyway, I think that's a pretty great way to lend them your ability. And somebody would say, well shouldn't I be focusing on marimba? Well, … everything you do on marimba is derived from other stuff. Unless you get into really weird 4- or 6- mallet stuff on marimba. It's derived from what you do on snare drum. If you can play well on a snare drum or a drumset, you're going to be able to get around on the marimba given a little bit of time to get used to it. And so I think actually doing a drum thing is more effective than a person playing the marimba for that same amount of time because you're generating other skills. You're generating the ability of your right hand to play eighth notes and your left hand to play quarter notes or whatever. Or something like that. And that's kind of important so I guess that's what I would say to someone who is not a percussionist is take steps in a small sort of way to become one. You know? Or a drummer. Percussionist is kind of a high faloutin' term that implies you know how to play the triangle and the cymbals and timpani and stuff like that. Buy a crummy drumset and start teaching yourself and you'll find that it's fun, but also you'll find that after a while you have something to really give your kids that you didn't before and it's not really that way with marimba. If a kid sits there and works on a pattern on marimba they will have it just as well as I do.
Jessica: Well thank you for that. You gave us so much information. I really really truly appreciate you giving your time to share. I really enjoyed talking with you.
Walt: Yeah it was really fun. Really fun.
Episode 79
Marimba Ensembles with Walt Hampton
Walt Hampton Bio:
Walt Hampton received his teaching certificate as well as Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees in Percussion Performance from Central Washington University. He has served as Principal Percussionist or Timpanist with numerous symphony orchestras, and he frequently performs on drum set, providing backup for several notable jazz artists who tour the Northwest. He is also a frequent performer on the guitar and bass, and an active composer.
Walt has presented clinics and workshops on three continents, as well as national, regional, and state conventions for AOSA and MENC. He frequently tours and performs with his student marimba bands, Rugare (elementary age), 'Baduku (middle-school age), and 'Bahuru (high-school age) performing a variety of styles, including Zimbabwean-flavored marimba music from his books, Hot Marimba!, Marimba Mojo!, and Son of Hot Marimba. Walt teaches K-5 General music at White Bluffs Elementary School in Richland, Washington, and has more than a quarter-centre of public school teaching experience. Walt has received several awards for his teaching, including the Washington State Excellence in Education Award.
TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE
Jessica: Walt, it is such a treat to be able to talk to you and learn from you. Thank you so much for taking time to do this.
Walt: I'm very happy to do it. Thank you.
Jessica: Of course! Can you tell us a little bit about yourself? What you teach and maybe even a little bit about the ensembles you work with.
Walt: I teach K-5 general music at White Bluffs Elementary School in Richland, WA. I also help a little bit with the middle school jazz band. I teach some of that and then I teach two classes through a community organization and I have two ensembles through a community organization so I have - through the school I have an elementary group. An elementary marimba band and then through the community organization I have a middle school and high school marimba band.
Jessica: And do they perform locally?
Walt: They perform around the Northwest And then every four years or so I take the high schoolers. We go farther. One year we went to Hawaii. One year we went to San Diego. This year in February we go to San Antonio to play at the TMEA Convention.
Jessica: Excellent!
Walt: Yes! So my high schoolers will be playing there. I'm going to be doing a couple sessions there and the high schoolers will be helping me with those, but they'll also be playing and doing what they call a 'Showcase' there. A little informal concert. We'll play at the Elementary meeting.
Jessica: Fantastic! What do you think is valuable or what do you love about making music with students through these marimba ensembles?
Walt: I think I love that you can actually make music that sounds good to a neutral observer. That's always been the thing that I love most about it 'cause with an orchestra or with a band or whatever I love that the kids make progress and all that kind of stuff, but with a marimba band you can actually make something that people want to hear and will stay to listen to even if their kids not in the group. And so I think that's what I love the most.
Jessica: I love that too. I teach middle school so I have older students and something I really love about it is that even when it's simplistic it can sound amazing, but then how far you can take them through learning more complex parts or even improvisations and seeing what they add to it.
Walt: Yeah. I think you're right. I think even the most basic thing if you get the groove going that people respond to that even if it's simple and that's pretty cool.
Jessica: I agree. So do you have a process for teaching parts within a marimba ensemble or is there... does it change with each piece depending on, I'd say, the groove of it.
Walt: Well, yes and no. I mean the teaching of the parts is very simple rote learning, but then as I thought about this there's a lot of sorta tricks to getting them how to learn effectively by rote. And some of those tricks, if you want to call them that, are specific to that song or that rhythm or that groove. If we were to be teaching one of my songs in the studio I teach at, you know, I try when I start out to separate the rhythm from the notes. In other words, I try to teach the kids the sequence of notes and then I start pushing the rhythm. That way I can keep them separate a little bit. A lot of times I'll let them hear what the rhythm is, but I'm not going to teach that. I'm not going to emphasize that at first because what happens then is yes, well...You're just going to get more mistakes. Either the kids are going to screw up the notes 'cause they're trying to do the rhythm or they're going to screw up the rhythm because they're trying to do the notes. And sort of my emphasis is to get them to do one of them correctly and then turn your attention to the other one. I try to teach them the sequence of notes and then we try to put it in a rhythm.
Jessica: And do you do that simply by rote? Having them echo you?
Walt: Yes or I'll play on the opposite side of the keyboard from them. Sometimes I'll write the sequence of notes on the board, but it'll just be letter names. You know, ABCD. And that way they can remember it and they can work on it on their own to a certain extent.
Jessica: So then once they've learned 'cause everyone learns every part. Is that how you teach?
Walt: Ah no. That's how I teach in the classroom when we do a song in a classroom, but when I do it with a group I say 'okay, you're the bass player so you have to learn the bass part.' But I encourage the kids once they've got their part down to learn other parts especially bass parts and baritone parts and leads so that when that kid is sick or gone we can have somebody to fill in.
Jessica: How do you do that then if you're teaching one part, but only one student or two students are learning that part? What do the other students do?
Walt: Well, I just go from group to group and I tell them, 'Look you guys. I'm going to show this group their part and then I'll move to you.' I'll show them a measure or a few notes at a time. So I'll show the sopranos a few notes and then I'll move to the Altos and so you kind of have this chaotic rotating thing. And it is chaotic, but the kids get used to it. But it's kind of good because they get used to picking out what they're doing from all the noise that's around them and I think that's a good thing too. That way I keep them all busy at the same time. By the time I've taught the last group their notes then the first group is ready for more usually. Sometimes different parts are more difficult and so you have to come back to them more often or whatever. Yeah, that's kind of the way I do it. I try not to divide things up necessarily by let's learn a measure. Although often that's the unit of measure. I try to do it where a kid would think the music divides, which isn't always at the bar line. I try to put myself in their way of viewing the song and then teach it. Meet them there instead of wasting my time trying to impress upon them that this is a measure and you need to learn a measure.
Jessica: More focusing on the music and what they're hearing and how they're playing it compared to...
Walt: Compared to the structure we use to remember the music. Meaning the printed music.
Jessica: And then once your students have learned these parts, how are you - are you directing them with something?
Walt: For years I played hosho with the band. I now play drum set with the band. Both of them have distinctive advantages, but a lot of times I'll use a cowbell too or some kind of time keeper to go around. I can either keep the beat while I sing their part with them or I can bang their part at them with the cowbell. But yeah, the hosho are really good in that their local. Meaning I can stand right next to a kid and play those and that helps. Also I think the hosho do a better job of subdividing certain patterns than a drum set does even though that seems kind of weird. But a drum set is kind of cool because you can get the beat. You can get the subdivision. And then you can get the rhythm that they're supposed to be playing. So they kind of get the full deal. So it's a very good teaching tool. My only real problem with it is that it's not as local as specific as - you can't go stand next to this tenor player while you're working on this part.
Jessica: And for someone listening who doesn't know, what is a hosho?
Walt: A hosho is a Zimbabwean gourd rattle and they come in pairs. And so when you show them to a kid and show them how to play them they'll say "Oh they're maracas!" They're not. They're a lot louder and bigger and they have a different sound. A kid would most readily identify it with a maraca.
Jessica: They're slightly bigger than a maraca?
Walt: Most of them are, but I mean they're gourds. So you can harvest the gourds whenever you want at whatever size you want so you'll find some that are small, but most of them the ball end of them is about the size of a softball or something like that.
Jessica: That's what I use as well to direct my ensembles. We use a lot of hoshos or cowbells. I often will have students direct using them. Because come middle school there's some. You find that ringer who can really lead well and that helps once we've solidified really the form of the piece and where we want to go, then I start to pull them in. So how do go about arranging pieces or creating the form of pieces? Do you use student input or do you have in mind a framework and go from there?
Walt: Well, it depends on how complicated the piece is. I mean a lot of the very simple pieces that you find in the first few numbers in the books. They're just pieces where you're playing a pattern together and a group takes a solo and then you all play together. So it's kind of a standard form, but I find that a lot of times kids will have input on that. I definitely listen to their input because there are a lot of pieces that have been improved by that. Stuff I would not have thought of that a kid thinks of so it's kind of cool. They add to the form. They add to the parts. They add variations. Stuff like that. There are some pieces now that I play that are so different from what was written in the book, you know, and it's not because of me necessarily changing things because of all these little variations and stuff the kids have come up with. So the piece, well, it's very different from the original version in the book.
Jessica: Would you mind - I don't know if it's possible - to look at one of the pieces from one of your books and walk us through how you would start and how you would layer it in in a classroom setting.
Walt: I suppose the most successful simple song I think in my mind is the M'bira Jam from the first book and I'll do that. I do that song with my 3rd graders in a classroom setting. We start by learning the C-G-C-G part which goes 'C-G-C-G C-A-A' 'C-G-C-G C ...' I mean that's pretty straight ahead. Kids have less trouble with syncopation than adults do. I mean they might not get it exactly right, at least at first, eventually they do. One thing I always do with that. If you look at the measures and the way the rhythm is structured visually, it goes 1-2-3-4 eighth notes and then 1-2-3, you know that dotted rhythm, but the way kids think of it because it goes 'C-G-C-G-C AA' they think of it as five notes and then two slower ones. And so that's kind of an example of what I was talking about. When I teach it, I always teach 'okay kids it goes 1-2-3-4-5 and then it goes 1-2.' The two slower notes on the A or the B or whatever. And so that's how they learn that part. In a classroom we all learn that part and then we go on to the next part which is exactly the same only different notes. And there are a few little problems inherent with that, but it's not a big deal for them to learn that. And then finally we learn the bass parts. I tell them, "Look kids -When we get this down, we're going to be playing it. We're going to be doing things with the form and playing the song as a song. If you can learn all three parts, you're going to get to play more." Hopefully that motivates them to learn all three parts.. Although most kids learn all three parts unless they're somehow detached from what's going on, but then we start putting together the form and so we layer in starting with the C-G. When I layer in parts, I usually start (unless there's some reason not to) with the part that communicates the rhythm, the signature rhythm of the song and communicates the tonality most effectively. So if there's a part that starts with C-G I'll start with that because it's the root and the fifth. Usually. And then I add the parts that have more color tones and finally you usually save the bass for last because that's kinda the big deal. So that's what I do with that song in the classroom with that in the classroom.
It's really, like I said, to talk about it there's nothing difficult to talk about with what I just said, but there are little tricks if I were to come teach at your school or someone else's school. There are funny little tricks that make it the learning much faster or more effective. That's kind of what the effective teaching comes down to is understanding how kids learn and this sort of thing and then employing that.
When I was young, a young drummer and percussionist and that kind of stuff I taught a million drum lessons and a million snare drum lessons and timpani lessons and all those lessons. And through that I really learned how people learn percussions tuff. I mean what barriers they run into. What problems they have with their hands. What problems seem to be problems but if you just leave them alone they'll just correct themselves and stuff like that. I did that before I was ever a public school teacher and so that kind of formed the foundation of my pedagogy and I find that I'm still doing that you know. Sorting out which things are really problems and which aren't and what the most effective way to fix them is. But that was, I don't know, probably 12 years of teaching a lot of lessons before I became a public school teacher.
Jessica: Are there any tips or tricks or any things that you see that are so common that you could share ways for how to help students overcome them to become better percussionists?
Walt: Well yeah, I think what you're saying is what are the most common problems I see, is that correct?
Jessica: Probably yeah.
Walt: Well the most common problems I see is that the time of the band meaning the general steadiness of the beat is not very good and the subdivision within that time is also not really good. So you're failing to get - not you - but somebody's not getting the groove, the basic groove happening. And I think a lot of that problem is solved if you can get your kids to take full strokes with both hands because your stick is like the pendulum on a metronome. If you're interrupting that stroke, the time and the subdivision are going to suffer and so people might think this means you need to lecture them about taking full strokes or whatever. Usually it's solved by me telling them to play loud. And eventually you'll see them doing all kinds of weird things in order to play loud technique wise, but what happens is those things, those weird things that they're doing, they're not comfortable or they hurt after a while. So if you play loud eventually a kid almost all kids, will develop an efficient technique where they can play loud without a ton of effort and what that means is that they're taking full strokes and that they're using their wrist and their fingers instead of their arms and then you find that your rhythms and your time starts to happen.
Now I'm not an Orff guy, which is not to say that I hate Orff. I really appreciate what he did, but I'm not trained as an Orff person. But I know a lot of Orff people encourage their people to play gently, softly and for a lot of the music that Orff ensembles do that's exactly what you need to do, but if you're gonna play marimba music which is physically generated and physically appreciated, if you will, you have to play loud to get those grooves to happen.
Jessica: Is it the same if you're playing on xylophones compared to if you're playing on marimbas?
Walt: Yes it is, but it's a little trickier on xylophones because the bars can fly off and because you have to find the sticks that work with that kind of playing and so what I do is I run a strip of maybe 1/2 inch tape across the nodes of the bars which is the dead spot of the bar, which is where the nails come through on an Orff instrument and that holds them down. Some people have a better looking way of doing that, but it's essentially the same thing. They'll run a rubber band or some strip of some material or something over the nodes on the bars and they just hold them down that way the kids can play as loud as they want. And then with the sticks I think the best sticks by far are the American Drum. The plastic ones. The ones with the plastic heads, you know, they're blue or they're red or they're yellow. And most of what I use is the red ones, but the yellow are really good if you're playing the lower end of a bass xylophone and the blue ones are really good if you're trying to bring out a certain part or if you have a group that's, well, say your altos are having trouble getting a certain part you give the one that does get it a pair of the blue sticks so that the other students can hear it more clearly because I think and well, this is true, a lot of what I do has to do with the kids hearing and feeling and participating in correct repetitions. And so if they can't play it yet, if someone near them is playing it loud and correct, eventually they do soak it up. You'll find that it's kind of a derivative of Suzuki's method of teaching, which actually is a lot closer to my approach than anything else. And so I try to get the kids surrounded by correct repetition so if a group is having trouble with something and one of them gets it down, I will give them the hard sticks. Or if I have a helper coming in who already knows the song, I'll give them hard sticks.
And another funny thing about that, and I explain this to the kids and when I work with adults I explain it to them, I'll go to a group of people who have, you know, they're working on a part and I will spend most of my time with the person who is getting it. Which seems counterintuitive and sometimes bothers people. 'Why aren't you paying attention to me? I'm obviously struggling with this.' But the idea is to get one person in that group so that they can really play it and then they become the teacher for that group instead of me. And then of course I do help the people who are struggling too, but the goal is to get one person who can actually do it and then things work out because the people are hearing it correctly and you can move on.
Jessica: I find that works really well as well. I was teaching my 8th graders yesterday a piece and it was very similar. There were quite a few not getting it, but there were a couple of students who really had it so we divided into small groups and the students led the other students in making sure they had it and it just kind of... it just makes it easier. That peer on peer or just having them listen to someone else who has it so that it allows me to work with a specific student while they go help others. And saves you time and energy and helps the ensemble go through it quicker. Learn quicker.
Walt: Well, it's way more efficient and I find that the thing that makes an ensemble not as much fun is when they're spending a lot of time sitting around waiting. And so it's a very important thing to me to keep things moving and that's the most effective way to keep things moving. If they're waiting for me to teach them everything then we're going to have problems.
Jessica: Once your students have learned these pieces, how do you build in their ability to improvise? Because that's a whole other skill, you know, on top of learning parts. How do you help them do that?
Walt: Well, when you say improvisation, or when I say that, there are a couple different things I mean. One is the generating of variations, which is more the Shona or Zimbabwean idea of improvisation. You've got this pattern and you continue to spin out subtle variations of the pattern. And the other one is more the Western notion of improvisation. Okay we the band are going to hold down this pattern and you can go ahead and do what you want over the top of it. And so those are both things that I think of as improvisation. We do a fair amount of variations in my group so I'll address that first.
Some kids don't like varying things. And I don't try to make them, but especially in my middle school and high schools group I'll say, "Kids, you are free to make up a variation to your part, but you've got to be okay with me shutting it down. That's the deal." And I say, "Some of you guys are, you know, you have a mind that likes to do that sort of thing. And so do it! it's okay! I'm totally fine with that, but you've got to understand that I'm going to say no, you can't do that here or that variation doesn't work." As long as they're good with that and they promise not to get upset and bent out of shape, then I let them make up variations. They don't do it very often, but there's usually two or three kids in a band that really like that sort of thing. And so I let them do it. And like I said before, I've had some great stuff come up and I don't really encourage them to do it. Those kids just do it. A lot of times I'll play with the band. I'll go play with the tenors and just because I'm bored with the part and I've been playing it for 20 years, I'll start doing a variation. They'll pick it up or they'll pick up the notion that, "Oh! I can do a variation." And so that's the way I teach variations. I don't try to make a kid that doesn't feel like doing that do it, but I try to make a good way for the kids who want to do it do it. We just have to make sure that it doesn't get out of hand or it's not a bad variation. I tell 'em, "Look, you've got to be okay with me shutting it down." So I don't know. That's part of it.
And then improvisation in the more standard western sense, there are a couple of songs that we have an improviser on. And I will just say it takes a fair amount of time and confidence and fearlessness for someone to get good at improvising. I just tell that, "Look, all the notes on your marimba are good. Some of them are not quite as good in given situations especially the F and B or the E and the B...," but usually the kid that wants to do that, they're willing to experiment and they'll hear that. And what takes times is I'll say - there's a high schooler. Great kid. He's improvising on one of our songs we'll be playing at TMEA, but he's been improvising over for, I don't know, a year probably when we play it. And he's really good at it now. He really is. But he wasn't the first few times. He wasn't for the first three months, but now he is. What I'm getting at is this: nothing we do, and I 'improvise' with groups that I play with and on drums. Almost all of us when we improvise, we're not really improvising. We're just drawing from a vocabulary of things that we like to do on the instrument. You could call them licks that we're comfortable with. You could call the sonorities that we're comfortable with or things that appeal to us. So it takes time to build up that vocabulary of things that you want to do when you are 'improvising.'
So what's happened with this high schooler is he is built up several things that he likes doing and when he improvises it sounds pretty cool. Now he always does, every time he improvises, it's different, but it is the same kind of things that I've heard him do and so he's just drawing from that vocabulary. And when I improvise on guitar or drums, I'm improvising simply based on a vocabulary of licks of sonorities or ideas that I've used a hundred times and I like recombining those things. Now if you go back into the old jazz guys I think you will find, and new jazz guys, you'll find people who are genuinely improvising. I mean I've never done this before and let's experiment with this, but I've found that that's generally not what people want to hear when they come to a marimba concert. Or when they come hear the cover band that I play guitar with. They're not wanting to hear me take a ten minute solo where I'm exploring all sorts of things that's actually improvising. There are very few people who can pull that off and not a lot of audiences who will put up with it. I mean Frank Zappa did that kind of thing and it was really cool. He genuinely improvised, but not many people do that and so anyway, that's what I do with improvisation. I don't teach them a lot in that 'do this, do this, do this.' When a kid is genuinely stuck or something, I'll play some little scale pattern or I'll play my hands together on 5ths going to a 6th or whatever and they'll see that, okay, this isn't anything magical. It's just me hitting notes and Mr. Hampton just hit a bunch of notes that sounded okay so then they try stuff. You know, you can point out to them 'hey that sounded cool. That one didn't sound as good. Did you like that one?' And they'll say, 'No that one didn't really work.' But that's okay. I mean, they have to feel like and I'm sure every teacher understands this, they have to feel like they're safe improvising, but I guess what I'm saying is that if you let them improvise on that song for a couple months, you're going to have a good improviser. It just takes time.
Jessica: I like that you ask them for the feedback of what they've heard and just getting them to identify if it worked or didn't work. And then not pushing down ideas, but letting them explore and talking about, you know, like you shared, maybe you - there's no bad notes but maybe these notes aren't quite as good as the others within this scale or within ...
Walt: Within that context. Yeah. But also I mean if I teach them too much about that then they'll all start improvising like me and I don't want that because they're all different. I mean the things they hear and the things they imagine are all different. And that's kind of cool. That's what you hear everywhere. That's what you hear with all the old jazz soloists. That's what you hear with great rock players. You hear their personality coming through their instrument and that's because they've gotten past the notion of 'I have to improvise this way' and they've gotten down to what they actually like doing and like hearing. And it's kind of cool because it's kind of an expression of them instead of just being some regurgitated licks or something like that.
Jessica: Very cool. Are there other ways you extend their learning other than improvisation like for you high school students or middle school students?
Walt: I allow them more input, the high schoolers for instance, have more input on the form and the parts and stuff like that, but also with my high school group and the middle school group, we're expected to play for quite a while sometimes and so we have a lot of songs that we have to learn. So pretty much when we're done with one song we move on to the next. We learn another song. And some of the songs are very difficult. They don't want any expansion. They've got their hands full just with some of these patterns that are really difficult so that it self is an extension. I guess that's it. There's a big jump between the middle school and the high school band in terms of difficulty and some of the parts are conceptually difficult and some are just technically difficulty. Just things that are hard to do on a marimba. And sometimes we use three sticks, which isn't a big deal for a classical marimba player, but for a high school kid whose note, who maybe doesn't play another instrument or something it's a big deal. Especially if you're playing some sort of a lick that's pretty involved with those three sticks. And some of the sonorities I use with my high schoolers are kind of a little weird. I mean it's not just like I/IV/V and it's not just 3rds and 4ths. They'll be playing versions of chords where the sticks are miles apart and they'll be playing three sticks and stuff like that. And so yeah, I think with them, with the high schoolers it's just a question of taking everything we've done before and making it more difficult. And more intricate. And more dependent on precision. Because you've got most of the band is playing some sort of 16 note pattern that goes pretty fast and so there's stuff like that. Or a weird rhythm that's just not an easy rhythm to play or to get together or to get precise and so that's kind of the form that our extensions take if you will. So yeah. There's a not a lot of me saying 'Hey we're going to learn about this concept.' It's more about hey, we're playing this concept because we have to learn this song.
Jessica: And do you ever do pop music as well? Or take popular music and arrange it for marimba ensembles.
Walt: Yes. Yes. Well, I guess it depends on your definition of popular music. You mentioned ...
Jessica: Higher Ground.
Walt:... Higher Ground. We do Higher Ground. That's a... our middle school does that song and there are several other tunes that we do, but I select songs based on what I like and what lends itself for working well with it. We tend to do... I've done several songs by the Red Hot Chili Peppers and I do that because their music is a lot more polyphonic than most music that you hear on the radio. They have a great bass player and so it has a real distinctive bass line usually. And their guitar play, well they've had a few guitar players, but the best of their guitar players was very polyphonic too, meaning a lot of times he would play a line instead of just playing chords. And so there you have that bass line and the guitar line and then their singer tends to sing pretty simple almost pentatonic melodies and so their music lends itself perfectly to arranging. Not every song, but a lot of them. And so I've done a lot of their material. And I've done Higher Ground, which of course is a Stevie Wonder song, but the Red Hot Chili Peppers also did a version of that. I've done a bunch of other tunes also. And a lot of them were/are popular. But I find that I'm usually having to add some lines to it so that something doesn't just become chords accompanying a melody, which is alright too, but I like to put something more polyphonic in there. Be it more lines of roughly equal value instead of just accompaniment and melody.
I think... I don't know... I think people like hearing catchy songs. Oh I know this song and it's popular and I like it. But the fact is I think it's a lot more interesting when you emphasize the strengths of the marimba which is polyphonic music. When you get right down to it a marimba doesn't do a great job with a vocal melody, you know. And it doesn't do as well as a saxophone or an electric guitar at carrying a certain melody, but what it does really well is precise polyphonic interweaving of lines and stuff like that so if I do a popular song that's just melody and accompaniment, usually it's because I really want to please the crowd with a song they've heard, but also I have found that when I do songs that are like that - homophonic, melody with accompaniment - I tend to run into pacing problems because the accompaniment people have their part down after five minutes and the melody people are gonna spend the next three weeks learning the part and so that's another reason I tend to be real careful with that.
So the version of Higher Ground that you may have heard us do, there's all kind of stuff going on in there and that's part of the reason why is because I wanted to have each group have a challenge so that they weren't sitting there on their cell phones or wrestling around on the floor while everybody else learned the melody.
Jessica: As you write those parts are you - I'm sure you're also playing them as well - but are you putting it into some kind of software so you can hear how it goes or are you mostly fleshing it out with instruments?
Walt: I'm - well - I've never gotten fast enough at any software to use it effectively so I have a kind of a short hand that I write things down with a pencil. So I have a sort of a kind of shorthand that I write down with a pencil. Usually I don't need to hear it. I mean I can hear it in my head and it just sort of works. Almost all of my arrangements are just my sort of musical shorthand on pieces of paper with a piece of paper and a pen or a pencil. I wish I was better at Sibelius or Finale or whatever, but I'm not and it would take months for me to get good at it and that's months that I don't have.
Jessica: A lot of times if I'm doing shorthand I'll do like stick notation and then sometimes write solfege underneath or even I have a shorthand where if it's high C or low C then putting it in there to make sure the rhythms are complementary.
Walt: That's pretty much what I do too.
Jessica: Anything else you can think that might be helpful for teachers who are teaching marimba to students? Especially those who maybe don't have the percussion background. Like for me I was a vocal major, but here I am - I've gone through Orff training and I know you said you're more from a percussion background. You don't have the Orff training necessarily, but I would have found it really helpful as a vocal major to have had more experience with sticking and with percussion instruments. It would have been helpful to build my skills before attempting to build my students skills.
Walt: Well, I think the best thing a teacher can do and I know lots of teachers who have done this, is to just take up the drumset. Go on craigslist, buy yourself a horrible $200 drumset, and start playing it. You don't have to take lessons. There's so much information on YouTube now that you can really get started that way and pay attention to the drumset, but also pay attention to what drummers call rudiments. Kind of sticking exercises. What you're going to find is that your left hand or your weak hand is pretty sad compared to your strong hand and that's one of the biggest things to overcome is just getting your weak hand to a place where it can do intelligent things. Where you can lead with it and stuff like that. I've encouraged the people who have taken my classes if you have a group and you have access to a drumset, try playing drumset with them. I mean it's cool to have a kid play drumset and that really is kind of neat, but one of the things that's been great for my groups over the years is that since I'm the director and I don't have to just stand there waving a baton, I can actually lend them portions of my musicality, if you catch what I mean okay. I'm a pretty good drumset player and I have played drumset for 45 years now or something. So for me to lend them my interpretation of the beats. My interpretation of subdivisions, variations of subdivisions and rhythms, that's a huge deal. It's kind of neat when you can lend them that and for me to be able to play drums with the group helps that much more. It means that our time is going to be pretty good. Our subdivision is going to be pretty good. And you don't have to be an utterly amazing drummer to be a solid drummer. And so I don't know - I always encourage people to take up drumset. It's kind of fun. You may find that it's relaxing and if you play it fifteen minutes a day you're going to get better pretty quickly. And if you pay attention to rudiments, I mean if you just do a search for rudiments on YouTube you'll get all sorts of things, but just the basic rudiments that will build your skills then you'll have that to lend to the kids too. I mean when I play a lead or a part for the kids, they not only hear it, but they see how my hands are moving, you know. They see what I do when I cross over and if they don't see it then I point it out, but anyway, I think that's a pretty great way to lend them your ability. And somebody would say, well shouldn't I be focusing on marimba? Well, … everything you do on marimba is derived from other stuff. Unless you get into really weird 4- or 6- mallet stuff on marimba. It's derived from what you do on snare drum. If you can play well on a snare drum or a drumset, you're going to be able to get around on the marimba given a little bit of time to get used to it. And so I think actually doing a drum thing is more effective than a person playing the marimba for that same amount of time because you're generating other skills. You're generating the ability of your right hand to play eighth notes and your left hand to play quarter notes or whatever. Or something like that. And that's kind of important so I guess that's what I would say to someone who is not a percussionist is take steps in a small sort of way to become one. You know? Or a drummer. Percussionist is kind of a high faloutin' term that implies you know how to play the triangle and the cymbals and timpani and stuff like that. Buy a crummy drumset and start teaching yourself and you'll find that it's fun, but also you'll find that after a while you have something to really give your kids that you didn't before and it's not really that way with marimba. If a kid sits there and works on a pattern on marimba they will have it just as well as I do.
Jessica: Well thank you for that. You gave us so much information. I really really truly appreciate you giving your time to share. I really enjoyed talking with you.
Walt: Yeah it was really fun. Really fun.
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