By Wade Coggeshall
March 28, 2008 05:52 pm
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INDIANAPOLIS — Annie Boehning isn’t a musician herself, but her interest in the medium was kindled as a fund-raising manager for Purdue University.
She wondered why the school has a nationally-ranked marching band but no music program. Statistics from the university show almost half of its engineering students participate in the band. The reason is because the activity is both analytical and creative.
“It’s analogous to algebra for your brain,” Boehning said. “Many say ‘when would I ever use algebra?’ But it’s just like gym class. Are we ever going to use that as a consumer good? No. But it’s the longevity of the person. The same is true of the brain when you’re doing something like music.”
It’s why Boehning took the job of director of development for Music for All, a non-profit music education organization.
“We work to keep the performance arts in public education,” the Avon resident said. “We genuinely feel a well-rounded person should be, if nothing else, exposed to the arts, and have a choice in whether or not they partake.”
Boehning has seen the benefits firsthand. Her daughter plays piano and clarinet. She said her math grades have skyrocketed since she started, to the point she was invited to take the SAT as a seventh-grader.
Part of Music for All’s mission is research into the performance arts’ reach in public school curriculums. States are studied individually. Preliminary research on Indiana shows music education is up in some places, down in others. But many educators are beginning to see the correlation between academics and the arts. Even with budget shortfalls, Boehning says Indianapolis Public Schools have shown a commitment to music education because it’s resulted in higher graduation rates.
“It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy for everyone,” she said.
The problem has always been cost. Arts programs are notoriously expensive. Participants and their boosters often have to subsidize them through various fund-raisers.
“I would argue the benefits far exceed the costs,” Boehning said.
Besides research and advocacy, Music for All also has an events component. The calendar includes 32 annual events for marching bands and orchestras from all over the country. The Grand Nationals in November feature the best marching bands.
“In the band world, it’s considered the creme de la creme of recognition,” Boehning said.
It also makes Indianapolis ground zero for the pinnacle in student music performance.
“We literally bring tens of thousands of people to the city,” Boehning said. “It’s a huge economic impact.”
It’s precipitated into other national music organizations moving to the Circle City and pooling their resources under the initiative MusicCrossroads. Bands of America was lured to Indianapolis from suburban Chicago in 2003 because the Grand Nationals were already being conducted here.
“They’re working to make Indianapolis a music mecca,” Boehning said of groups like the Progressive Arts Society. “They want the city to be known as that.”
Boehning, for her part, will keep advocating arts education so “everyone can turn on their radios and still hear music. Music really is a universal language. It really does break down all barriers. It’s the one thing where the language is the same.”
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Online:
www.musicforall.org
wade.coggeshall@flyergroup.com
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