Group items tagged

This article provides ideas for small budget ensembles to make a dream of commissioning a new piece of music a reality. Commissioning music is a great way to get singers invested in music-making, yet the monetary restrictions can be huge. This article encourages the reader to not be afraid to reach out and see what opportunities are possible just from a simple conversation.

Another site with reviews of low cost or free music tech software. This is great for music teachers on a tight budget.

This article talks about defending music education in the wake of budget cuts in a school district.

This article talks about defending music education in the wake of budget cuts in a school district.

I have used this company since high school for my music purchases both personally and for school. They can get almost anything available in print for a multitude of publishers. Most importantly - they take 20% off all items purchased. This really helps me stretch my school budget and order a couple extra pieces each year.

I use Charms for keeping my financial records.  Does anyone else use it for practice records or the recordings?  I just found the recordings section.  This has been a great program for me this year and made the record keeping so much easier!

CHARMS is a great management and communication program that places all styles of databases into one central location. Is a great way to manage funds, communicate with members and parents as well as store recordings and inventory. Charms has been used by band programs and other fine arts programs as an office assistant and is proven to be effective in the testimonials section of their website.

This website facilitates organization in a music program by providing inventory and student lists, groups, and budgeting programs on one website.

This set of music books is completely free and in PDF format. In addition to that, there are videos that you can show in class or have your students view on their own at home. This is a great resource for a beginning band program that does not have a large budget. All resources are free to use, and it is based in solfege so it is easier to teach a whole room of beginners on different instruments.

This website has free arrangements of band music, written with beginning bands and band programs with low budgets in mind. Pieces can be downloaded as PDFs and you can download the condensed score, as well as individual parts for all of the instruments. Pieces are rated so it is easy to find music that will work for your students.

The purpose of the resource is to provide educators and students will an accurate and telling documentary about high school choir. Specifically, this resource covers the very real issues regarding budget, atmosphere, and choral singing. It provides keen insight to both educators and students about the possibilities that can exist in choral program. Licensing and single copy purchase information is available as well as an overview of the film.

DonorsChoose is a great place to start looking for additional aid for your classroom. You can pose a project that you need funding for, if its more instruments, books, materials, and/or other resources that you may need, but can't get your district to obtain. It is very easy to use and you create a project where people can find or search and donate their own money to fund. You can have several people donate and you can share your proposal on various forms of social media to help spread the word. The choral teacher and I did a few projects and we were able to get Orff Instruments, Drums, and even Ipods for the kids. You have to follow up with DonorsChoose and send photos and thank you letters from the students to show how you are using the materials in the classroom. It is a perfect way to receive that additional funding for your program.

DonorsChoose is a miracle for programs with little to no budget. You can create an account as an educator and create projects that go towards your classroom. You can ask for anything from Chromebooks to instruments and sheet music. Donors from all over the world can donate and support your classroom. This is the resource that helped me build my band program.

Steve Weiss is my go-to when buying percussion equipment. This page in particular is a guide to help music directors purchase high-quality percussion instruments if you don't know much or anything about percussion. The list also is split between elementary, middle school, and high school to ensure that you get appropriate instruments for the playing level and budget.

Admittedly, I'm a total geek for the "old classics", but I find this website absolutely amazing! In about 3 minutes time I was able to locate about a half dozen pieces that I've been looking for at some point or another since I started teaching. I think there are resources that every band director could use here.

Public Domain town band music library. Would be great for so many things - especially playing marches at MPA that aren't overdone.

This is another invaluable resource of Public Domain compositions for the Band World. So many of the old marches and waltzes are out of print and difficult to come by, but this website has an extensive list of great works that are all public domain. A great resource not only for finding pieces to play, but also for doing some traditional score study.

This article discusses possible uses for PBL in the music classroom.

The ChoralWiki (CPDL) is a great resource for choral teachers and choir directors. There is access to free music, texts and translations, seasonal indices, and discussion forums for questions and answers about music, rehearsal techniques, and performance. 

Choral director on a budget? This website features over 20,000 scores by over 2500 composers! An amazing resource of free music available mostly in PDF format for use and downloading.

The Choral Public Domain Library is a free and legal source for free sheet music! This site offers printable scores of public domain music, often complete with text and translations when necessary. You can search this catalog by composer, title, arrangements, voicing, accompaniments, language, and genre. Complete with over 31,000 scores by over 3,200 different composers, there's a high possibility that any choral director might find something of use here!

This is a great resource for music educators that shares thousands of free works of music. Educators can access thousands of compositions along with translations. Many of these compositions are no longer in print.

This website offers many free choral pieces that can be used in the classroom. It assists in a budget-friendly way for performance classrooms to still have repertoire available.

The purpose of this resource is to categorize and house a large quantity of choral music. As a resource this site could be used to find a range of music for performances, warm up exercise, chorales and instrumental playing. The options for voicing and parts in very broad which makes the amount of music available vast. When searching composers, it is best to know specifics as some composers share similar surnames.

This website hosts over 9,000 choral/vocal scores, texts, translations and other useful information. This is a fantastic resource for choral directors to browse and select music from.

Purpose of this resource: This webpage contains downloadable choral music that is in the public domain. Musical Content: The Choral Public Domain Library contains digital downloads (sheet music, midi files, and notation files) for choral works that are in the public domain. There is a large selection, and CPDL offers useful search features such as listing all musical settings of a text, searching by language, type of piece, and by musical era. Other information: This is a good resource for directors who do not have large music budgets, are looking to find different settings of specific texts, or are looking for music from a specific time period.

Access to FREE choral works in the public domain. Also, you can find scores, texts, translations, and information about composers.

IMSLP is on online library of music that is now held in the public domain. It is a resource that can be freely used to print copies of music for use in your classroom for free! This resource is especially useful for string orchestras, as entire catalogs of music from such great composers as Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven can be found in the archive.

Over 119,000 compositions in the public domain can be found here for free. This is a great resource for musicians and can be used for research, performing, and arranging. Some pieces include recordings.

An online resource for downloading pdf and mp3's of music scores and audio that is within the public domain for legal print and download.