Music class goes digital

Palm Coast Observer
Opinion

The work being put out by students in the art classes never ceases to amaze me. But more amazing than the end product is the technology they are using to get there and the adaptions teachers have made to embrace and prepare their students for a digital world.

Wednesday night, the stage at the Pirate Theater was not the familiar scene for a concert. Then again, it wasn’t the typical concert. Everything on stage was electronic, from the computers and iPads to electronic drums, drum pads and wind instruments.

The Matanzas High School digital music production class was holding its first concert; the first of its kind performed by students in Flagler County. Their six-measure projects were broken down from the end product of a recording to show each element happening in unison, with fellow classmates helping to play the different layers on stage.

One student who was pointed out as going above and beyond this school year was James Stup. The concert ended with his original song, but he was a fixture on the stage for most of the concert, playing the EWI and keyboard on his classmates’ pieces.

Although the crowd scattered throughout the theater was thin, they were given not only a one-of-a-kind performance, but also a bird's eye-view of the performers and their instruments through a live video feeds projected on a large screen above the stage. The video helped the audience connect with what was happening on stage.

Many thanks were thrown around for making the concert possible, the biggest thanks of all to the Flagler Schools technology department.

“We owe big thanks to technology for allowing money to be allocated to us,” said Bruce Scott, music technology teacher. “School systems are funny because sometimes there is money there, but it’s allocated to certain things and they can’t be used for anything but that. In our case, we found some technology money at just the right time.”

Not only did that money allow for the concert, but it also provided the class, which is in its second year, with the equipment needed to create music on a daily basis.