Utah Federation of Music Clubs!!

I was approached over the summer by the directors of the Utah Federation of Music Clubs. Essentially, they have heard amazing things about my students and have asked that we participate in Federation 2019. After giving it a lot of thought, I told them we would as a studio. As this involves your students, I want to let you know what this means for you. (If you have ever participated in Piano Festival, it’s the same organization, but for strings.)

A little bit about UFMC (also known as Federation) 

United Federation of Music Clubs was founded in 1898 and is the largest nonprofit organization in America. It’s goal is to promote and support American music, performers and music education.

It is not a competitive event but an opportunity for students to perform and receive evaluation and positive feedback by other participating teachers.

Students will have the opportunity to work on and polish two pieces (unless they participate in the concerto division, in which they only play one piece). They will be able to make these pieces solid and take pride in their performance. The day of Federation they will perform their pieces for three judges (teachers) who will offer positive feedback and reinforcement. Students will also receive points for their performance and after the required points are received they will be awarded a trophy. These are not participation trophies but hard earned trophies and the pride the student feels from this accomplishment makes it all worth it! 

One of the main reasons I agreed to participate this year is that it will give us a reason, both as teacher and student, to add music pieces outside the standard Suzuki repertoire. Each student will pick a piece off the required list as well as a choice piece. That choice piece can be virtually anything! The main requirement for the choice piece is that it is level appropriate. Thus a Twinkle level student shouldn’t be picking a book 4 level piece for their choice piece. I think this will also add practice motivation for those who may be struggling a bit with that.