The North Carolina Music Educators Association holds their state conference annually in the fall in downtown Winston-Salem for 3 ½ days. The conference offers sessions, clinics and concerts scheduled held in the Benton Convention Center, the Embassy Suites, the Marriott and Stevens Center.
More than 1,500 people attend; these music educators teach students in K-12 as well as at the college/university level. Attendees also include pre-service teachers and students who won auditions for a place in of the NCMEA Honors Ensembles.
The NCMEA Conference also offers a music industry trade show with more than 100 vendors on the state and national level as well as representatives from many North Carolina college and university music departments.
Our orchestra teacher, Mrs. Lisa Morris, and our band and music teacher, Mr. Rick Sigler, were in attendance to the conference.
Mrs. Morris enjoyed her time at the conference and learned several new techniques to use in her classes. She participated in a drumming circle class as well as learned new techniques to integrate literacy in music. She especially is excited about learning new techniques to use the musical solfege system, which is the application of the sol-fa syllables to a musical scale or melody and a singing exercise especially using sol-fa syllables to practice sight-reading.
Mr. Sigler is a member of the Elementary Board division of the NCMEA Board as a committee member at large. He was instrumental in choosing clinicians and organizing equipment for workshops for the conference. During the conference, he helped support clinicians and led a presentation that introduced new technology that will help prepare elementary school students for middle school band. Mr. Sigler was also able to participate in a ukelele jam session and a bring-your-own-instrument jam session. While at the conference, Mr. Sigler participated in workshops on multicultural music, music and technology, and cross-curricular integration. He especially focused on improving his skills in singing instruction.
For more information about the North Carolina Music Educators' Association or the NCMEA Conference, please visit their website https://www.ncmea.net/ and the conference page https://www.ncmea.net/ncmea-conference/overview/.
