For those interested, my column on Nathaniel Braddock’s great Beck Song Reader class at the Old Town School of Folk Music is now out. Here’s a link to a free version (draft, pre-press), and there’s a version behind a Sage paywall here (free for NAfME members and people at most universities).

My summer music education technology class took on collaboratively recording, arranging, and mixing “Why Did You Make Me Care?” from Beck’s Song Reader.

A brief explanation: Beck’s latest release is not a recording, but sheet music designed for amateurs and professionals to realize in any way they choose, without any canonic recording by Beck getting in the way. The Reader is beautiful, and getting involved in the project is a wonderful way to enjoy and appreciate Beck’s invitation for musicians to work playfully within his compositions. We took the piano + vocals sheet music and arranged it for the instruments we had, and we had more fun than we imagined and are pleased with the result.

Here’s our contribution:

Our group chose the name #fourfortyseven:
Vocals: Brandon Washington and Leigh Wiedelman
Trumpets: Allissa Carter, Nicholas Loafman, Daniel Morrion
Saxophones: Cody Halberstadt, Elizabeth Schurman
Guitars: Philip Meyer and Brandon Washington
Viola: Erica Charous
Clarinet: Jaime Faulhaber
Bass: Matthew Thibeault

Here are two other versions that get at the diversity of interpretations to be found diving into YouTube/Soundclound/etc.