Posted by r.a. on September 04, 2003 at 08:23:42:
In Reply to: Re: Re: Becoming a professional posted by Matt G on September 04, 2003 at 07:39:16:
Great post!
Degrees, even "terminal" degrees (held by college studio teachers), do not qualify them as "professionals".
Degrees mostly indicate knowledge of a subject, though a reasonably high level of execution is expected by the universites that hire these studio teachers. The "degree", however, is the primary qualification for becoming a university studio teacher.
As another example, Medical "Doctors" who charge top prices for heart bi-pass surgery (and have them scheduled one after the other day-in and day-out) are not in this situation simply because they hold a medical degree. Anyone asking a rookie doctor straight out of medical school do perform such a procedure on them would be ill-advised. Rather, these doctors are in this situation because they are widely-known EXPERTS..."PROFESSIONALS".
The primary purpose of a university studio teacher is to push Music Education majors to become as proficient on their "major" instruments as possible, so these future band directors will know by experience what it takes to achieve excellence. Without this experience, future band directors cannot be expected to pass on this same challenge to their middle school/high school students.
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As to actually becoming a "professional", that (again) is an entirely different level, and it is best to study under a proven professional if one aspires to become one.