Today’s podcast is a bit of a continuation of our last episode, where Steve Holley and I talked about incorporating pop music into our ensembles and classrooms. Be sure to check it out if you haven’t already.

If you’ve attended a conference anywhere in the United States recently you’ve probably seen a session being hosted by Little Kids Rock. I have to admit that, even though I teach little kids, initially I wasn’t all that interested in trying to turn my classes into 25-piece rock bands.

Then one day my Facebook feed blew up. About 100 of my friends were attending the Modern Band Summit in Ft. Collins, Colorado. I was seeing all these videos and photos and testimonials and I was like, “What on earth am I missing?” I’ve invited today’s guest, Scott Burstein, to help answer that question. He is the director of teaching and education at Little Kids Rock and the director of this year’s National Modern Band Honor Ensemble at the National Association for Music Education Conference in Florida.

Ever since I started to get to know the Little Kids Rock-trained teachers and their underlying philosophies, I have started to transform my own teaching. It really is about the students. It really is about engaging students by meeting them on their level. I really did switch the repertoire that we took to festival. Get ready for an exciting paradigm shift!