Community Chat with Greg Chase (Part 1)

We are so happy to have Gregory Chase as our next community chat guest, a piano instructor and researcher from Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada. Greg maintains a piano teaching studio of around 20 students, of all ages and levels and has developed a comprehensive website to assist students in notational audiation. In this episode, he shares his musical background and how his interest in how children learn led him to discovering Music Learning Theory (with a chance encounter with our friend and last guest Janna Olson).

Books
Bright from the start, by Jill Stamm
Boy Smarts, by Barry MacDonald
The Ways Children Learn Music, by Eric Bluestine
Music Learning Theory for Newborn and Young Children, by Edwin Gordon
Learning Sequences in Music, by Edwin Gordon
Music Moves for Piano, by Marilyn Lowe

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Introduction to Audiation-based Piano Instruction and Music Moves for Piano

Ready to learn more about audiation-based piano instruction and Music Moves for Piano? Visit Music Learning Academy for online courses, webinars, and resources.

Want to dive into audiation-based piano instruction? Check out Music Moves for Piano by Marilyn Lowe.

Transcript

Hannah: 1:14

Welcome to Keys to Music Learning. I'm Krista Jadro of Music Learning Academy. And I'm Hannah Mayo of Mayo Piano.

Krista: 1:22

Join us as we discuss common goals and challenges in the piano studio, and offer research-based ideas and solutions to guide every one of your students to reach their full musical potential with audiation.

Hannah: 1:35

We are very excited today to have Greg Chase with us. Greg is from Regina, Saskatchewan in Canada. And he maintains a piano teaching studio of around 20 students of all ages and levels from beginner to advanced. And he is quite the researcher and has developed a comprehensive website to assist students in notational audiation. And I'm sure we're going to talk about that, and so much more. But first, welcome, Greg.

Greg: 2:10

Thank you. It's a real honor to be here with you this morning. And to be able to discuss and participate in discussions of Music Learning Theory, who doesn't love that?

Krista: 2:22

We definitely love that.

Greg: 2:25

Exactly. And most of our listeners, I think, love that, or they will soon enough. So let's just jump right into it. And could you start by telling us and the listeners a little bit about yourself, who you are, what you do, and about your musical background and your upbringing? Sure, yeah. As you already mentioned, I have a private studio in Regina, Saskatchewan. We're considered Western Canada or on the prairies. Just to kind of give you a geographical location. I live about 90 miles north of the Canadian US border. And we're just basically right above Montana and the North Dakota border. Or another way, if you want to go to Denver and go 800 miles north, you will arrive in Regina, Saskatchewan. Just a fun fact that I thought I would throw out there for this morning. We were dealing with temperatures of minus 24 Celsius, which is like minus 11 Fahrenheit. So with my with the windshield and ends up being, you know, minus 31 Fahrenheit that we're dealing with right now. So tomorrow is even going to be colder. So something that we live with.

Hannah: 3:39

And meanwhile, we just made it to the 50s in Louisiana Fahrenheit, and we just got here.

Greg: 3:47

Oh, wow.

Krista: 3:50

I wish this was on video right now just to see Greg's reaction to 50 degree weather.

Greg: 3:58

Yeah, that's shorts and T-shirts all the way for sure. My background in music is really a bit sporadic. I mean, there's a saying that you don't choose music, but music chooses you. And in many ways, I feel that that's kind of the case with myself. My grandfather was a self taught musician. He played tenor banjo, which I have. It actually ended up in a pawn shop. And that so that they could get gas to actually be able to do a gig in Saskatoon. And then they picked it back up on their way back once they had money. So there's a little bit of a story behind the banjo that I have. I mean, he played guitar, accordion harmonica, I don't even know what else he played. He had a band. And he also had a dance hall. And this was before I was born. And as a child we knew where he kept the banjo and his accordion. And it was under the guest bed in the guest bedroom. So we would often crawl underneath there, bring them out, and then ask him for him to play and to sing them for us, which he often did. So for myself, I think that's probably a bit of that nature aspect that we talk about when we talk about MLT and nurture versus nature, and that it's a combination of both. As a young child of four, I remember my sister going to piano lessons. And I would cry so hard. Because I wanted to go to piano lessons, I wanted to take lessons, and I couldn't. So my mum would suggest that I would just go and play the piano and that usually stopped the tears. And I'm sure that all that I did was probably what the typical banging that a four year old would do on the piano. But it seemed to be enough to console me to get me through that week until the next week came and replayed that whole scenario through again. I do remember studying lessons probably at age five or six. And I suspect it was at the end of the year because I remember biking up this huge long hill in order to go to the piano teachers house who lived out in the country. But for whatever reason, I don't remember much of the lessons except I don't think I understood a thing that she said to me. I'm sure that she was speaking in English. But for me, she could have been speaking in another language. And I just remember her pointing to the music and then I would play. And that was kind of what I remember from those very early music lessons that we had. It was probably the next year, I had a different teacher. And in this one particular lesson, her back was turned to me. And she was standing and I remember her asking if I was playing with my ear or reading the notes. And I thought, "What a ridiculous question" because I was using my fingers. And I thought, well, I realized that her back is turned. So maybe she's thinking I'm using my ear. But that would be pretty hard to play, to do that. And I just knew that the way that she asked the question that the answer was, I'm looking at the music. So the next week before my lesson, I relayed this message to my mum. And I said she asked me this really ridiculous question. And then my mum explained what she actually meant. And I suspect that I was probably playing by ear and not reading the notation. So I took lessons until about grade seven. I remember being in the Leila Fletcher book about but three or four by the time that I was there, and I'm not really sure how much I actually practice. But I did enjoy music, and I did enjoy the lessons. And I do remember that one of the things that we basically did at the end of every lesson is that we would always sing a song. And often it was a popular song that was heard on the radio, or in some cases, it was really a new song that my sister and I didn't know. But we would learn it over the course of a few lessons. Then in grade seven, we moved to a different town. And so I went to number of years without a teacher. And I still played the piano. And if I knew what the song sounded like, it was much easier to play. So I basically just played songs that I knew from the books we had, or from the pop books that we bought. Then in about grade 10, I was asked to accompany our church youth group for a song that we were going to sing in church, and I received the music ahead of time, started working on it, and then when we got together, one of the older teens who was in grade 12, who was coming to lead us commented that I needed to count and I asked, "I need to know what?" And she replied "You need to count." And I asked"What is that?" And so then she kind of replied, You know about counting. I had no idea what she was referring to in regards to rhythm and counting. Because she was in grade 12, she taught piano. I then asked her if I could take lessons. And she said sure. So which I then started. So that only lasted about two months as we no longer had a piano at home. Although we had one of those small, little two tiered pop organs, so many practicing occurred at the school during lunch breaks recess, during spares. And I got the premise of counting. And so I stopped lessons due to the practicing situation because it just wasn't consistent. And so that managed to carry me through for the next couple of years. And so I started to play hymns at church during their Sunday school time. And of course, it needs to be a hymn that I knew. So I knew how it went. Then about halfway through grade 12, I took lessons again, from this student's mum and she was actually our pastor's wife. And again, all practicing took place at school either during lunch hours, spares recess, and sometimes before school if I got there. In Canada, we're embedded into this conservatory exam type of situation, good or bad. And I know in grade 12 I was probably playing around a grade two to grade four RCM level. So you know at quite an elementary level that I was at. I went to Bible college for a couple of years and managed to take lessons regularly. And coincidentally, it was the same from the same person that I took lessons in grade 10 who commented about my needing to count in high school. So by the end of two years, I have managed to push through to the RCM grade eight piano and the theory requirements. And so I spent the next few years doing a few different things music related. This included being an organist for our church and Red Deer Alberta for 10 months. Returning back to my hometown of Robin, Manitoba to teach piano and to take lessons. While working on my grade 10 piano. I then started to look into universities to study music and auditioned for the performance degree at Brandman University and was accepted. I had no idea what I was getting myself into. Needless to say, I had lots of catching up to do while at university. And so I spent many, many, many hours in the practice studio to try and run along beside those who had a very consistent level of training throughout their school years. And then after graduating with a performance degree from Brandman University, which at that time, was really rated as being the second highest music program in Canada. So that sometimes we hear it's within the top two, sometimes the top 10. But I think at that time, it was ranked fairly high. So I stayed there for a year teaching privately. A good friend of mine had moved to Yellowknife Northwest Territories. And he said, if I was looking for students, this was the place to come. And I thought, You know what, I'm young and single, why not go. So the following year, I moved to Yellowknife to set up a private studio and to teach piano. Now Yellowknife is considered very northern Canada. It's north of the 49th parallel. So it's considered the Arctic. And it's about 250 miles south of the Arctic Circle, so very far for north. So I have to say there was a bit of a culture shock for myself going from where I would attend symphony orchestra concerts, operas, and the Winnipeg Ballet, which is world renowned, and all these classical concerts to where there was little of that occurring in Yellowknife. And Yellowknife is a unique city where you get people from all over the world. And one of the saving graces for me was that there were other classically trained musicians in Yellow Lake. So we got together for a meeting. And out of that there were three of us who formed a trio. And the trio was flute, cello and piano. And it was great to be able to perform with those two musicians. And they were really numerous performances we did, including fundraisers for their Arts and Culture Center, and really a great time of camaraderie. So I taught in Yellowknife for three years. Although it seems like 10. It was extremely isolated. The next closest urban center was Edmonton, Alberta, which was about 1000 miles south of Yellowknife. So often, I felt I might as well be on the moon. And that's how it often felt. This was also in the day where there was no internet or emails, cell phones didn't exist. So the modern day form of communication is very different now than what it was then. So in the winter, the sun would rise just above the horizon. So in the dead of winter, the sun really wouldn't rise until about

10: 13:53

30 am. And by 3 pm, you had to use your headlights in order to drive. But to counter that the summer, it was light out all the time. So it could be two or three in the morning and you're walking down the street, and there are no street lights on. You didn't need them at all. So the isolation, the darkness of winter really played a part in me moving back south, closer to my hometown. And so a friend from university called saying that they were short of teachers in their town, and this was a place where I actually taught before I went to university. So I made the decision to move south to Yorkton, Saskatchewan, which was an hour away from my parents. In Yorkton. I taught for about 15 years, got married. I then started to teach in both Yorkton and commute to Regina where I am now. So they're about two hours apart. I applied for a sessional lecturer position at the University of Regina. I received the letter that no we will go with somebody else. Then about a month later, I received a phone call asking if I was still interested in teaching the two music history courses that I had applied for. So with a leap of faith my wife, who was seven months pregnant at the time, we made the plans to move to Regina. So throughout the time of being in Yellowknife, Yorkton, and Regina, I was an examiner for the Royal Conservatory of Music examining throughout Canada, adjudicating music festivals, spoke at numerous conferences, and worked with building programs and being Vice President with another conservatory, which is the Canadian National Conservatory of Music. So all that was recurring throughout my teaching career as well. So now currently, I basically have three adventures going on. As already mentioned, one is working in creating resources for notational audiation based on Music Learning Theory, fingers crossed that this will happen and then the enrollment will occur. But another teacher and I went and talked to the conservatory at the University of Regina, and we're really hoping to start Music Play classes in January. Finally, I've been wanting to get in there for years. And so fingers crossed, that we'll get the enrollment and we've got everything in place. So I'm really excited about that. And then the last adventure is working with the local audiologist, and really providing remedial music sessions to infants and toddlers, who are at risk for auditory skill development, or who have been diagnosed with auditory processing disorders. And so we call that program

Music For Your Brain: 16:34

Retraining Your Brain How to Hear. And of course, these are all MLT based sessions. And based on the tenants of MLT.

Krista: 16:46

This is all fascinating, Greg, thank you so much for sharing this history. I had no idea, especially Yellowknife, is that what it was called Yellowknife. That must have been some experience.

Greg: 16:59

It was and and it's interesting, because then I went back after my wife and I were married, we went back to visit. And then I could see everything that it had to offer. Whereas when I moved there shortly after university, I just saw what it didn't have to offer. So I think I really missed out on a lot of the cultural I mean, the Inuit, the Dene drumming, there was just so much of that lovely enrichment. I also think if the internet existed, I could have maybe survived up there a little bit longer as well. But it was a wonderful experience. It really made me kind of stand on my own two feet. I couldn't really run down the hallway and ask my teacher questions when I was teaching, but it really kind of led me to start on my own journey of self studying and researching to find the answers for myself.

Krista: 17:58

Yeah, absolutely. And I feel like we have a lot to talk about over these next couple episodes. And you mentioned Music Play classes. And for those listening, Music Play is an MLT (Music Learning Theory) based early childhood program for infants through I don't know, what age would you say infants through five, six years old. And so that kind of leads me to asking about your audiation journey. So if you could tell us about that, even when you discovered Music Learning Theory and Music Moves for Piano. So what was that discovery process like?

Greg: 18:39

Yeah, you know, again, there's another saying. I'm using all these sayings. But there's a saying that when the student is ready, the teacher will appear. And I think that this really is the case with me and Music Learning Theory. And really, my journey to MLT began a number of years before I actually heard about Music Learning Theory. So as I mentioned previously, we moved to Regina, my wife was seven months pregnant. I came across a book called Bright From the

Start: 19:13

The Simple Science-Backed Way to Nurture Your Child's Developing Mind from Birth to Age Three. And so it's by Jill Stamm, who is the co-founder of The New Directions Institute for Infant Brain Development, and a clinical professor at Arizona State University. So of course, knowing that we were going to have a son arriving shortly, I found this book completely fascinating. Jill's daughter was actually born four months premature, and the doctor said she would never walk or talk. But Jill, through her studies, her research, dedicated herself to improving her daughter's life, which she did. And so a lot of Jill's work with her daughter was done through music. And I'll maybe come back to that in just a little bit. Then a few years later, I went to an evening talk and then a day long workshop by Barry McDonald. He's a psychologist here in Surrey BC, and his topic was on Boy Smarts, how boys learn and allow boys to learn to their fullest potential. So then there's again another link that you can probably see that will be occurring. Again, I found this topic extremely fascinating. And did further study on this, read more books on the topic, also read books and research on neuroscience and just trying to learn as much as I could. Now, my challenge came to take all this information that I had gathered from Jill Stamm's book and Barry McDonald's research and his books and apply it to learning music. And I thought there has to be a way to do this, but I felt that I was missing the connecting link. Well, that shortly changed. As mentioned earlier, we're embedded into these examination systems. And in 2013, I had a student who was doing her associate pedagogy exam. So this would be an exam for her to get her diploma. And so it was with the Canadian National Conservatory of Music. By this time I had actually stepped away or stepped back from CNCM. So wasn't as involved as I was previously, but knew that this examiner was flying in from Edmonton to examine my student, before she drove up to New York to examine. Well, guess who that examiner was?

Hannah: 21:38

Janna Olson,

Greg: 21:40

You got it. Janna Olson. Yeah, so she did the exam. She came downstairs as my studio was on the second floor of our 100 year old character home. And at the bottom of the stairs, she gave me her elevator speech. So it was probably one or two minutes of conversation if that. And she had mentioned she had a friend who wrote a piano method based on how the brain learns. Ticked that box. She told me the method was Music Moves for Piano from Marilyn Lowe. So of course, as we said, our goodbyes, I was constantly repeating Marilyn's name, and the name of Music Moves for Piano in my head, so that I wouldn't forget. So I closed the door behind Janna and ran upstairs to my studio and started googling Marilyn Lowe and Music Moves for Piano, and I wasn't long until I found Gordon's videos on YouTube and started watching those. So I emailed Marilyn about acquiring her books told her that I had just met Janna Olsen. And she told me her about her books. And it wasn't long and I got this wonderful email from Marilyn, which she was always so wonderful in doing and she CCed Janna on the email. And then later that day, I received an email from Janna, that she would be back in Regina to drop off the rental car before she flew back to Edmonton on Sunday. And would I have time for lunch, and that's exactly what happened. So I think by the time Janna returned on Sunday, a couple of days later, I had ordered Marilyn's books, watch Gordon's videos, most of his videos, and had started making a book quarter list to GIA publications.

Unknown: 23:27

And then came the wait for everything to arrive. So upon Janna's recommendation, I read Eric Bluestein's book first, The Ways Children Learn Music, and she did mention that Gordon is not the easiest to read. And so as I read Eric's book, I kept nodding my head in agreement with what he was saying. And so I really wanted to delve into Gordon's Learning Sequences in Music next, but I knew that I really should read his Music Learning Theory for Newborn and Young Children first, so I really got things in the order from birth up until older. So again, as I read, I kept nodding my head in agreement and going yep, yep, yep. And making notes in the comments in the margins. And so many things that Gordon said in the newborn, young children, and even that Eric said, really kind of resonated with me because what I read in Jill Stamm's book Bright From the Start. And then when I read Gordon's Learning sequences in Music, again, I found myself in agreement with what he was saying, and that aligned so well with what Barry MacDonald shared with how boys learn. I had found that connecting link.

Hannah: 24:46

That's the book that started it all for me, too. So if you're a little intimidated by Learning Sequences and Music, which many of us are at the start. Some of us still are, even after we've been reading it for years, Music Learning Theory for Newborn and Very Young Children is a great place to start after Eric's book. Yeah.

Greg: 25:10

Yeah, so I really I started to implement Music Moves into my teaching, and try to teach that while reading and learning as much as I could on my own. Marilyn had sent me an email about a PDLC that was happening in Buffalo at the University of Buffalo that summer. So I emailed them to see if there was a possibility of the option to take the PDLC online. Of course, there was not but in their master's program, which was offered online, there was a lot of focus on Music Learning Theory, and perhaps that is something that I would like to consider and this was actually from Beth Etopio, who had sent the email. So since UB had a revolving enrollment, and this was already June, I was able to apply and after a long drawn out process, I then started online studies at UB in the fall of 2014. And as they say, the rest is history.

Hannah: 26:11

Greg, thank you so much for telling us all about your background. A lot of that, of course, we did not know. That's why I love these episodes where we get to know our community better, because we get to hear where you're from, and what your life is like and how you came to be a part of this fantastic way of teaching. And I would like everyone to know that in our Facebook group, Introduction to Audiation-based Piano Teaching and Music Moves for Piano, Greg Chase is in that group, and he is a valuable source of information. I see him answering questions all the time. And he is one of my favorite people to answer questions because he is so knowledgeable and has done so much research and he loves to learn. And so thank you for being a part of that group. And you all should go join it and listen and read what Greg has to say in the group. I know we have so much more to talk about. We've got music aptitude, we've got our students and parents and Ars Nova, so we'd love to have you back for another episode.

Greg: 27:19

Yeah, I'd be absolutely honored.

Hannah: 27:22

And thanks so much. We'll see you soon.