Infinite Improvisation Podcast

School Rock Bands and Creative Musicking: an Interview with Steve Giddings

Infinite Improvisation Podcast: adventures in music and creativity with Steve Treseler and Lauren Best.
 
Canadian music educator and author Steve Giddings joins us to talk about sparking creativity in high school music programs on Prince Edward Island. He reveals what it was like to stretch from being a classically trained orchestral player to jamming in blues bars and playing in a ska brass section, and what ignited him to self-publish his first practical guide to teaching rock bands in schools.
Steve’s work to innovate and inspire “creative musicking” in the classroom has most recently resulted in his newest book from Oxford University Press “Technology for Unleashing Creativity: Practical Tips and Tools for Music Educators”. He shares some spicy thoughts and why they get pushback, and explains why he wants to electrify music education and create change for more fun and functional learning.
 
https://www.stevesmusicroom.com/@StevesMusicRoom
facebook.com/stevesmusicroominstagram.com/stevesmusicroomtwitter.com/stevesmusicroom
 
 
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Theme Song: “Cold Hammered” by Steve Treseler

Improvising (Pencil) Tips: props and prompts inspired by W.A. Mathieu

Infinite Improvisation Podcast: adventures in music and creativity with Steve Treseler and Lauren Best.
 
Steve and Lauren discuss how to mix things up with some unusual improvising tricks and tips- including playing piano with eraser tips! Featuring inspiration from the audiobook, "W.A. Mathieu reads from The Listening Book and The Musical Life", the episode is packed with unconventional yet easy methods for tapping into creativity.
 
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Theme Song: “Cold Hammered” by Steve Treseler
 
 
audiobook "W.A. Mathieu reads from The Listening Book and The Musical Life":
https://coldmountainmusic.com/downloads/the-listening-book-and-the-musical-life/
 
print: https://www.amazon.com/Listening-Book-Discovering-Your-Music/dp/159030831X
 
streaming:
https://open.spotify.com/album/31yOnWgSqu1GoxvTsJn4nf

Teaching Improvisation

Infinite Improvisation Podcast: adventures in music and creativity with Steve Treseler and Lauren Best.
In this episode, we talk about emphasizing creativity in music education for young people, from leading bands for Seattle’s JazzEd to Lauren’s approach to improvisation in small-town Ontario, Canada. We discuss program design with a focus on improvisation, how Lauren changed her approach to teaching piano, online group music lessons, and mixed instrument improvisation ensembles. 
 
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Download a free digital copy of Steve’s book, “Creativity Triggers for Musicians”. https://www.infiniteimprovisation.com/books
 
Check out Lauren’s online music classes: https://www.bestpracticearts.com/kaleidoscope-music-kids.html
 
Check out Seattle JazzEd: https://www.seattlejazzed.org/
 
Executive Producers: Lauren Best and Steve TreselerProducer: Sam BlakeTheme Song: “Cold Hammered” by Steve Treseler

Creativity and Indigenous Music: An Interview with Ed Littlefield

Infinite Improvisation Podcast: adventures in music and creativity with Steve Treseler and Lauren Best. The first episode of our interview series, a conversation with Ed Littlefield. We discuss Ed's journey studying Native Lingít music alongside jazz, community music making, composing a song for Betty White (first 10 seconds: https://youtu.be/yp0yf5PpqkA), and much more!
Ed Littlefield is a freelance percussionist, educator, and composer based out of Seattle, WA. He is Lingít from Sitka, Alaska and has released three albums featuring traditional native melodies, which he also arranged into the jazz idiom with the Native Jazz Quartet. This quartet represented the United States in South America as “Jazz Ambassadors” through the American Music Abroad program.
For film he composed a song for the 2009 Disney movie The Proposal for Betty White’s character and played the percussion score and consulted on indigenous music for the 2022 documentary Exposing Muybridge.
Ed has played K’alyaan in the world-premiere of Battles of Fire and Water by Dave Hunsaker and written and performed an original musical score for Eurydice by Sara Ruhl for Perseverance Theater in Juneau, Alaska. He has done sound design and composition for the world premieres of Our Voices Will Be Heard by Vera Starbard, and was the composer and cultural advisor for They Don’t Talk Back by Frank Katasse at Native voices at the Autry, La Jolla Playhouse and Perseverance Theater. He also did sound design for Off the Rails by Randy Reinholz at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and Sovereignty by Mary Kathryn Nagle at Arena Stage. Most recently he composed the songs for a new play produced by the University of Illinois – Urbana-Champaign called The Neverland by Madeline Sayet. Currently he is working on a three-year project to create the first ever Lingít opera. This project will combine traditional contemporary Lingít melodies inside the western opera genre and will also include an all-indigenous cast.
Ed is an active educator around the country, facilitating artist residencies for students and teachers to help them learn more about Lingít culture and music and traditional ways of knowing.
Contact Ed at edwardlittlefield@hotmail.com
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Executive Producers: Lauren Best and Steve TreselerProducer: Sam BlakeTheme Song: “Cold Hammered” by Steve Treseler

How to Improvise Part 5: Reflection

Infinite Improvisation Podcast: adventures in music and creativity with Steve Treseler and Lauren Best. The fifth episode of a five-part series on how to improvise, exploring each of Infinite Improvisation's creative practices: Experimentation, Play, Limitations, Deep Listening, and Reflection. In this episode, we reflect about reflection and discuss how to be an ally to ourselves in the process of infinite improvisation.
 
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Download a free digital copy of Steve’s book, “Creativity Triggers for Musicians”: Download free creative limitation menus.
 
Executive Producers: Lauren Best and Steve TreselerProducer: Sam BlakeTheme Song: “Cold Hammered” by Steve Treseler

How to Improvise Part 4: Deep Listening

Infinite Improvisation Podcast: adventures in music and creativity with Steve Treseler and Lauren Best.
The fourth episode of a five-part series on how to improvise, exploring each of Infinite Improvisation's creative practices: Experimentation, Play, Limitations, Deep Listening, and Reflection. In this episode, we experiment live with listening activities. We discuss our potential for deep listening and how to develop our deep listening skills.
 
“Are you listening now?
Are you listening to what you are now hearing?
Are you hearing while you listen?
Are you listening while you are hearing?
Do you remember the last sound you heard before this question?
What will you hear in the near future?”
 
From Ear Piece
PAULINE OLIVEROS   November 1971
 
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Download a free digital copy of Steve’s book, “Creativity Triggers for Musicians”: Download free creative limitation menus.

How to Improvise Part 3: Limitations

Infinite Improvisation Podcast: adventures in music and creativity with Steve Treseler and Lauren Best.
 
The third of a five-part series on how to improvise, exploring each of Infinite Improvisation's creative practices: Experimentation, Play, Limitations, Deep Listening, and Reflection. In this episode, we discuss the surprisingly expansive results of using, learning from, and embracing limitations. Featuring live musical experiments.
 
Subscribe to our YouTube channel
 
Get updates and exclusive community content by signing up for our email newsletter at:
www.infiniteimprovisation.com/podcast
 
Download a free digital copy of Steve’s book, “Creativity Triggers for Musicians”.Download free creative limitation menus.

How to Improvise Part 2: Play

Infinite Improvisation Podcast: adventures in music and creativity with Steve Treseler and Lauren Best.
The second of a five-part series on how to improvise, exploring each of Infinite Improvisation's creative practices: Experimentation, Play, Limitations, Deep Listening, and Reflection. In this episode, we dive into play—embracing the unknown, taking the scenic route while learning through exploration, and being kind to ourselves.
Subscribe to our YouTube channel
 
Get updates and exclusive community content by signing up for our email newsletter at:
www.infiniteimprovisation.com/podcast
 
Download a free digital copy of Steve’s book, “Creativity Triggers for Musicians”.Download free creative limitation menus.