Ragazzi Attendance Policy

Demystifying the Ragazzi Attendance Policy

 

When I speak with most Ragazzi parents about their son's schedules, I hear stories about after school schedules that include boy scouts, sports practices, homework, instrument lessons, play practice, community service, chess club, karate or judo, and on top of it all—making it to every Ragazzi rehearsal and performance!  Ragazzi's music directors know that parents struggle with learning the ins and outs the organization and understanding and meeting Ragazzi's attendance policy.  I must admit that it took me quite a while to "get" the policy.  I had so many questions...  What constitutes a planned or excused absence?  What happens if a boy gets sick after he has already missed his three allotted absences for the semester?  Is he penalized for having the flu?  Are three excused absences enough for one semester?

 

We live in a culture that expects kids to be well-rounded and community oriented along with being top students.  School commitments and other important extra-curricular activities can conflict with Ragazzi rehearsals.  Most parents know that Ragazzi's policy only allows three excused absences per semester and that all performances are mandatory.  So, what do you do?  My first response as a director is: "please don't run away scared!!!!"  Instead, please take a look at the reasons for the policy and how directors will make every attempt to be flexible about it when we can.

 

The "Why" of the Attendance Policy

 

Choir is a "team sport."  Much of our rehearsal time is focused on group development and learning.  Can a football team practice without their quarterback, runningback, and defensive end?  Nope.  I asked my brother, who is a college football coach, this question and he laughed at me for implying that missing practice was even a possibility.  Singing in a choir is just like playing on a team—the director (or coach) and the team simply need everyone there to have a fully successful practice and to make steady progress.

 

When a boy misses a rehearsal, parents often assure directors that their boy will work on his music outside of Ragazzi rehearsal.  We thank you for the commitment and admirable willingness to work, but it misses one vital point: individual practice is not a substitute for group development.  When your boy misses a rehearsal, it means that he is not present when directors share information about the nuances of the music such as blend, tuning, dynamics, articulation, expressiveness and communication.  These are musical, artistic elements that need to be internalized uniformly throughout the group and they honestly cannot be communicated to the boys outside of rehearsal.  Missed rehearsals result in having to repeat information and in extra rehearsal time devoted to sections of music that shouldn't need it. This is the core issue that Ragazzi's policy tries to address.  However, we are aware that our expectations have to be realistic.  This is why the policy also allows three excused absences.

 

Excused Absences/Illness/Unexcused Absences

 

An excused absence is anything that is planned ahead of time.  This includes school concerts, trips, events, and other extra-curricular activities.  Because your sons have so many activities in addition to Ragazzi, we urge parents look at their boys' schedules for the entire semester and let us know about planned absences as early as they can.  This makes it easier to ask directors about an extra absence should special circumstances arise.

 

An unexcused absence is anything that director was not informed about or an absence exceeding the normal three excused.  So, if a child misses a rehearsal, and we later discover that he was at a boy scouts party and we had not been informed, then we would deem it "unexcused."

 

Expect a phone call in the case of an unexcused absence.

 

If a boy is sick, we do not expect (or want!) him to be at Ragazzi rehearsals.  We know that parents cannot control illness, and we definitely do not want sick boys sharing nasty colds.  We simply ask that parents inform us of their boy's illness and absence as early as they can.  A normal number of sick days doesn't count toward the three excused absences.

 

 

 

Flexibility in the Policy

 

We directors want to help each boy while maintaining the integrity and musical success of the chorus. We will always handle absences that may exceed the normal allotment on a case-by-case basis.  So, while the attendance policy in the handbook is clear and concise, it also states that a boy "may be ineligible to perform in all or part of the next concert" depending on the director's assessment of the boy's progress and the specific musical needs of the pieces being performed on the upcoming concerts. This statement does not use the words "definitely will be ineligible to perform."  We make decisions based on the each boy's situation and on the needs of the particular pieces of music being performed.  It is always best to talk with your director about conflicts ahead of time so that directors can discuss with you how extra absences may affect your boy as well as the group.  We will always try to be flexible.

 

What do we mean when we say that we will "try to be flexible?"  Let's take a normal 11-year old boy whose school goes to outdoor education in the fall as an example.  Perhaps in addition to missing two rehearsals for outdoor education, this boy's parents notice that he also has Ragazzi rehearsals conflicts with a band concert and the science fair.  Being told about this well ahead of time would give me the best chance to plan around those absences - keeping in mind the needs of our rehearsal schedule and repertoire – and find a way to accommodate this boy's conflicts.

 

Because your directors try to be flexible, we also ask parents to be flexible, too.  If your boy had already missed three rehearsals, for example, but you really wanted him to be available for a family dinner with your cousins from out of town, we might ask you to consider scheduling your dinner on a Tuesday or Thursday night.

 

Friendly Attendance Reminder Emails

 

This year, your director will email you a friendly reminder if your boy misses two rehearsals in a semester.  This email will quote the attendance policy.  We think that by sending out standard reminders, we will help you remember how many absences your son has accumulated and encourage you to look ahead.  We hope that after receiving a reminder email, you'd look at his full schedule and pinpoint any additional conflicts.  Say your son had one for a boy scouts activity and one for a dress rehearsal for the school play.  In this situation, we would ask that you consider the importance of those two events and only skip a Ragazzi rehearsal for the event that absolutely could not be missed.  If you found yourself in a situation where your son could not miss either event, we would then begin talking with you about how this extra absence could affect your son this particular semester and work towards a solution that could hopefully benefit everyone.

 

Questions?

 

Talk to your director about conflicts and possible solutions as soon as you know about them.  It gives all of us the best chance to find a win-win solution.  If you have further questions about the attendance policy, please feel free to ask any of us.  We welcome parent questions and concerns. 

 

--Jennifer Cowgill

 

--
Joyce Keil

Artistic Director

Ragazzi Boys Chorus

Music is Medicine

 Welcome backto the fall season of Ragazzi. I hope this TED talkgiven by Robert Grupta inspires you as it does me. He refers to the manfeatured in the movie, The Soloist, which you may have seen. The Ragazzi Sings blog has his full talk.

 "...Music is medicine. Music changes us... becausemusic allows [us] to take thoughts…and shape them . And I understood that this was the very essence of art. This was the very reason why we made music, that we take something that exists within all of us, at our very fundamental core, our emotions, and through our artistic lens, through ourcreativity, we're able to shape those emotions into reality. And the reality of that expression reaches all of us, and moves us, inspires and unites us."
 
 --------------------------------------------
 
 Fulltranscript follows: 

 One day LosAngeles Times columnist Steve Lopez was walking along the streets of downtown Los Angeles when he heard beautiful music. And the source was a man, an African-American man, charming, rugged,homeless, playing a violin that only had two strings.
 
And I'mtelling a story that many of you know, because Steve's columns became the basisfor a book, which was turned into a movie, with Robert Downey Jr. acting as Steve Lopez, and Jamie Foxx as Nathaniel Anthony Ayers, the Juilliard-trained double bassist whose promising career was cut short by a tragic affliction with paranoid schizophrenia. 
 
Nathaniel dropped out of Juilliard, he suffered acomplete breakdown, and 30 years later he was living homeless on the streets of Skid Row in downtown Los Angeles.I encourage all of you to read Steve's book, or to watch the movie to understand not only the beautiful bond that formed between these two men, but how music helped shape that bond, and ultimately was instrumental, if you'll pardon the pun, in helping Nathaniel get off the streets.

 I met Mr.Ayers in 2008, two years ago, at Walt Disney concert hall. He had just heard a performance of Beethoven's first and fourth symphonies, and came backstage and introduced himself. He was speaking in a very jovial and gregarious way about Yo-Yo Ma and Hillary Clinton, and how the Dodgers were never going to make the World Series, all because of the treacherous first violin passage work in the last movement in Beethoven's fourth symphony. And we got talking about music.And I got an email from Steve a few days later saying that Nathaniel was interested in a violin lesson with me.

 Now, I should mention that Nathaniel refuses treatment because when he was treated it waswith shock therapy and Thorazine and handcuffs, and that scar has stayed with him for his entire life. But, as a result now, he is prone to these schizophrenic episodes. The worst of which can manifest themselves as him exploding, and then disappearing for days, wandering the streets of Skid Row,exposed to its horrors, with the torment of his own mind unleashed upon him.

 And Nathaniel was in such a state of agitation when we started our first lesson at Walt Disney Concert Hall he had a kind of manic glint in his eyes, he was lost. And he was talking about invisible demons and smoke, and how someone was poisoning him in his sleep.
 
And I was afraid, not for myself, but I was afraid that I was going to lose him, that he was going to sink into one of his states, and that I would ruin his relationship with the violin if I started talking about scales and arpeggiosand other exciting forms of didactic violin pedagogy. (Laughter) So, I just started playing. And I played the first movement of the Beethoven violin concerto.
 
And as I played I understood that there was a profound change occurring in Nathaniel's eyes. It was as if he was in the grip of some invisible pharmaceutical, a chemical reaction, for which my playing the music was its catalyst. And Nathaniel's manic rage was transformed into understanding, a quiet curiosity,and grace. And in a miracle, he lifted his own violin, and he started playing,by ear, certain snippets of violin concertos which he then asked me to complete, Mendelssohn, Tchaikovsky, Sibelius. And we started talking about music, from Bach to Beethoven, and Brahms, Bruckner, all the B's, from Bartók,all the way up to Esa-Pekka Salonen.

 And I understood that he not only had an encyclopedic knowledge of music, but he related to this music at a personal level. He spoke about it with the kind ofpassion and understanding that I share with my colleagues in the Los Angeles Philharmonic. And through playing music and talking about music this man had transformed from the paranoid, disturbed man that had just come from walking the streets of downtown Los Angeles, to the charming, erudite, brilliant,Juilliard-trained musician.

 Music is medicine. Music changes us. And for Nathaniel, music is sanity. Because music allows him to take his thoughts and delusions, and shape them through his imagination and his creativity into reality. And that is an escape from his tormented state. And I understood that this was the very essence of art. Thiswas the very reason why we made music, that we take something that exists within all of us, at our very fundamental core, our emotions, and through our artistic lens, through our creativity, we're able to shape those emotions into reality. And the reality of that expression reaches all of us, and moves us, inspires and unites us.
 
 And for Nathaniel, music brought him back into a fold of friends. The redemptive powerof music brought him back into a family of musicians that understood him, thatrecognized his talents and respected him. And I will always make music with Nathaniel, whether we're at Walt Disney Concert Hall, or on Skid Row, becausehe reminds me why I became a musician. Thank you. (Applause)

 To hear the talk visit this link: http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/robert_gupta.html
 

--
Joyce Keil

Artistic Director

Ragazzi Boys Chorus

The power of music

Recently the following video was posted on Choral Net. This is an audition for America's Got Talent by a choral group made up of homeless veterans. 

After our tour to Cuba the boys and chaperons and I were moved by the power of the common language of music. Those of us who heard the boys speak at our "Animal Crackers" tour concert heard them marvel at how joyfully the Cuban choirs sang, even though the the singers were poor in material things. I saw our Ragazzi singers begin to sing with smiles and movement emulating the inspiring choirs they met and heard in Cuba. 

As they were inspired by the music, the boys were able to overcome great obstacles such as jet lag, stifling heat, the tension of being together day in and day out. I saw boys helping other boys and encouraging each other. I saw boys sing with a joy and abandon that was new to them.

In this story of the choir of homeless vets, we can witness again the tremendous power of choral music-something we do together, something we can invest in to aspire to excellence - together, something that lifts us out of troubles and gives us new purpose in our lives.

Ragazzi parents are wise to invest their children's lives in this powerful work!

http://www.choralnet.org/view/288623

--
Joyce Keil

Artistic Director

Ragazzi Boys Chorus