Jonathan Daniel Youth Music Blog

Over the last couple of months I have been able to work on different areas of my music session delivery by working on various sessions that have helped me to develop as an arts practitioner.

Throughout the summer I had the opportunity to deliver one-hour music sessions as part of the YMCA summer camp’s skill clinics. In contrast to many of the music sessions and projects that I regularly work on these sessions ran for a shorter time period and were weekly based. This meant overall less contact time with the young people taking part in the music sessions unless they had chosen music as an activity for multiple weeks.

Preparation for the music sessions at the summer camp differed in comparison to the way in which I would prepare for other sessions. Due to the shorter length and weekly nature of the sessions a final performance was expected each week from expressive arts skill clinics at the campfire on a Friday. The main advantages of this were that it gave me something to work towards with the young people in a short space of time.

This was great for me as one of my strengths is that I am a perfectionist and I like to get the best out of everyone and everything. This gave me the room to see how young people could develop the musical skill over a short space of time. This was also important to me as this would show to me that they understood what they were learning. However, at the same time my strength could often turn into a weakness when working with a wide age range and focusing on the final performances for the week. People all learn and develop at their own pace and throughout these sessions it was no different at times and this was evident with some young people in the groups. The perfectionist in me wanted them to learn quicker than they did, however part of learning music is understanding that it is an ongoing learning process.

Looking back over the summer the key points that I learned to help me develop even further as an arts practitioner are; versatility – it was important to adapt sessions to the age range being taught and also making sure that the session content was relevant to all. This meant having the relevant resources that would help all ages learn successfully.

Fun and enjoyable – music is supposed to be fun and that goes without saying but it is important that the sessions are fun and in a relaxed environment or young people are not going to enjoy them and neither will I as music leader.