The Master Class

I went to a Minnesota Orchestra concert this past weekend. The next day I attended a master class on conducting by the Minnesota Orchestra music director Thomas Sondergard. Sondergard was born and raised in Denmark, is a trained percussionist, and directs the Royal Scottish National Orchestra.

As I was watching Sondergard’s master class, I noticed familiarities between how he was training two conducting students from the University of Iowa and how a learning coach might lead learning for a group of young learners.

First, Sondergard was quick to define the outcomes the young conductors were after during the master class. Sondergard first asked clarifying questions to the Iowa students to make sure he understood the general expectations each conductor was after. Then, Sondergard probed each young conductor to make sure both were going to be satisfied with what work they did together at the end of the class.

Second, Sondergard sat quietly to listen and observe each young conductor. Sondergard allowed the Iowa music students to conduct uninterrupted for a good 15 minutes or so. It was clear Sondergard believed that it was important for the young conductors to have the opportunity to demonstrate their talents for a considerable time without Sondergard jumping in with corrective feedback.

Then Sondergard stopped the young conductor’s performance and started to provide suggestions and corrections – suggestions being small pieces of feedback while corrections were more serious.

The more important correction coming from Sondergard toward both student conductors was how important it was for the conductor to make the orchestra’s musicians to feel “large and important.” According to Sondergard, making musicians feel “large and important” required the conductor to establish and build a relationship with each orchestra member – from the lead violinist to the first-year trombonist. According to Sondergard, one never knows when a musical conductor will need to rely on one member of the orchestra to “step up” and deliver a concert-saving performance.

Close behind the importance of building strong relationships with orchestra members was building confidence within the conductor themselves as performers on the podium. In the beginning of the master class, both student conductors were technically correct in their gestured movements, but both exhibited a hesitancy to conduct in “big strokes,” to use a phrase from Sondergard himself. Sondergard believes that it is the conductor’s presence on the podium that sets the tone for a great performance. And it was clear that Sondergard was only interested in great performances.

The final observation from Sondergard’s master class was the immediate transformation by the two student conductors from nervous performers to confident leaders. It seemed that was what Sondergard was most proud of after his nearly 90-minute course in conducting.

So what does Sondergard’s master class suggest to adult learning leaders and their work with a group of young learners?

Outcomes matter – they matter a lot. Adult learning leaders would be wise to establish learning expectations with their young learners from the outset of the work they do together.

Observation, without interruption, is a key to the learning process. Everyone has had the experience of a teacher who interrupts a presentation, a speech, an explanation, a performance, before the young learner really had the opportunity to explain, to persuade, to summarize, to celebrate. Adult learning leaders would be smart to allow their young learners performance time, without interruption.

After observation, feedback is essential. Learning is contextual and doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Positive feedback is as important as constructive. Feedback from the adult learning leader is important, but so is feedback from the young learner’s peers. Peer feedback builds capacity within the learning cohort, and convinces young learners that, someday, they can learn without the support of the adult learning leader.

It was clear that Sondergard believed he was nothing as a conductor without the right type of relationships with his musicians. It should be this way with an adult learning coach and their young learners. Too many teachers within our traditional K-12 system believe that relationships are built around content – like Algebra, World History, or French. That would be wrong. Relationships are built between human beings – old and young. Time spent on building personal relationships will pay huge dividends when the learning process becomes difficult.

Finally, coaching and learner confidence make all the difference when it comes to delivering strong performances. Both on the adult and young learner level, confidence is something that leads to both learning leader and young learner empowerment.

I left the Sondergard’s master class thinking about how thousands of young learners could have benefited from the 90 minutes the Minnesota Orchestra conductor spent with two University of Iowa conductors, how thousands of young learners could have been transformed a bit by interacting with such an expert in the field.

Til tomorrow. SVB