BandQuest
Program Description:
BandQuest®, an exciting series of new music and accompanying curricula for band, is a program published by the American Composers Forum. The series was started as a response to feedback from music educators that there is a pressing need for new, fresh band music. The heart of this program is new works written by a diverse group of leading American composers who have created challenging pieces that are a true departure from standard middle school repertoire.
Five of the compositions are accompanied by an interactive CD-ROM curriculum designed to assist students to learn the music and to integrate each piece with non-music studies. New downloadable curriculum materials are currently being developed for the other pieces in the series.
The BandQuest series is representative of the immense range and richness of American musical traditions. It gives students tools with which to create music, encouraging them to explore and to appreciate historical and cultural contexts.
The national standards for arts education make it even more imperative that teachers have access to curriculum materials that link music with other subjects. Through the BandQuest curriculum, students will gain a richer and deeper understanding of the music they rehearse and perform.
The BandQuest Series:
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The BandQuest Advanced Series:
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Exclusively distributed by Hal Leonard Corporation
Click here to order a piece in the series
Click here to request a complimentary CD of the pieces in the series
FAQs
The BandQuest Advisory Committee
- Dr. Frank L. Battisti, conductor emeritus of the New England Conservatory of Music;
- Thomas C. Duffy, BandQuest composer and Director of Bands at Yale School of Music;
- Craig Kirchhoff, Director of Bands at the University of Minnesota;
- Jerry Luckhardt, Associate Director of Bands at the University of Minnesota;
- P. Brett Smith, Band Director at Anderson Elementary School;
- Michael Hiatt, Music Resource Coordinator at Perpich Center for Arts Education;
- John Paulson, Founder and former President of MakeMusic!/Coda Music Technologies;
- Elizabeth Jackson, Band Director at Eden Prairie High School; and
- Laura Sindberg, Assistant Professor of Instrumental Music Education at the University of Minnesota
The BandQuest Curriculum
The national standards for arts education make it even more imperative that teachers have access to curriculum materials that link music with other subjects. Through the BandQuest curriculum, students will gain a richer and deeper understanding of the music they rehearse and perform. Five BandQuest pieces (A+, Hambone, Grandmother Song, Old Churches, and Spring Festival) are accompanied by an innovative, interdisciplinary CD-ROM curriculum designed to facilitate the learning process and enhance their understanding of the music, its basic elements, its context and how it relates to other aspects of life and learning. Free downloadable curriculum is currently in development for these and other pieces in the series.
BandQuest curriculum is based on use of the Facets Model. To learn more about the Facets Model, you may download the PDF below.
The BandQuest Curriculum Team
Joanna Cortright, music and arts education consultant based in the Twin Cities. She works with school districts, teachers, education, and arts organizations, providing expertise in professional development for educators, music education, arts integration, arts coaching, and planning and developing arts curriculum and programs. She served as the state of Minnesota Music Education Specialist at the Perpich Center for Arts Education until January of 2006. Prior to that, she was the arts coordinator and music specialist for St. Paul’s Linwood A+ Elementary School, an arts magnet school.
Cortright provides arts training workshops for the Minnesota Orchestra’s Young Persons Concerts; The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra’s Start the Music and CONNECT programs, the American Composers Forum, and the Duluth/Superior Symphony Orchestra. From 1996 to 2005 she developed and directed the Arts-Infused Teaching and Learning Institute, a joint project of the University of Minnesota and the Perpich Center for Arts Education.
Cortright taught music in the Minneapolis public schools and at MacPhail Center for Music, where she also held the position of Assistant Director. A frequent speaker and presenter, she has appeared at numerous arts education conferences, seminars, and workshops throughout the region. In 1995 the Minnesota Music Educators Association presented her with the Classroom Music Educator of the Year Award.
Herb Dick, band director at Rosemount Middle School. Herbert Dick has taught instrumental music, music theory and music history for Independent School District 196 in Minnesota for 23 years. Mr. Dick has served as a member of committees for which he has written a state model performance assessment for music composition and evaluated college music programs for the MN Department of Children, Families & Learning; assisted in collecting and editing materials for the MENC publication, Composing And Arranging - Standard 4 Benchmarks; and helped to revise the music licensure criteria for the MN State Board of Teaching. In 1999, the Minnesota Music Educators Association named Herbert Dick a Music Educator of the Year.
For more information contact:
Suzanna Altman
Email Suzanna
(651) 251-2840
