Stories from an Online Music Ed Major

Now that spring break is over and we are back to the reality of the world right now, it has come to my attention that online classes will in no way be easier than face-to-face classes. Some might come close to being normal, but for a music education major like myself, this semester just got interesting.

I had my very first Aural Skills class at 8:30 a.m. MST on a beautiful, sunny Tuesday and for those of you who are not music majors, this is a class that teaches ear training. It teaches how to identify a pitch, a melody, an interval and so much more. We usually break this class into two parts: dictation and singing. Believe me when I say the singing got interesting. I’m sure you have seen videos floating around of orchestras performing together over video chat, but ours was nothing like that. Luckily, we all muted ourselves while our professor played the notes because the lag was awful, and I am sure I wasn’t the only one neve singing the right pitches. We made it through the class, thank goodness, but this is a pretty good example of how much this pandemic has affected my education.

As for the rest of my classes, things remain business as usual. With the time difference, I drag myself out of bed at 7 in the Monday through Friday (after staying up until 3 a.m. to watch Disney+) to get to my Zoom meetings. I am excited that I can finally go to class in my pajamas without people giving me weird looks and now if I get cold in class, I don’t have to muffle my shivers, I can just grab a blanket!

The biggest difference from being a music major on campus to a music major online is my ensembles. I no longer get to walk into the band room to hear the other trumpets playing as loud as they can to warm up or perform my favorite songs with the amazing musicians we have at Fort Hays State University.

As boring and different as it may be, this hasn’t completely ruined and stopped my life. I am home with my family where I do most of my schoolwork outside on the hammock at my house in the middle of nowhere. I also had the pleasure of coming home right at the start of calving season, so I’ve made my rounds to see all the spring babies jumping and playing around. Long horse rides through the pasture give me the perfect reason to go outside and get fresh air, because by now we all realize how terrible it is being trapped inside all the time.

Even though classes may be getting hard, I still have not given up hope. Next semester we will be back on campus where I can use a practice room to practice my trumpet instead of my bedroom and everything will be close to normal. You know what they say, “Every storm runs out of rain” and the only thing that comes after rain is flowers and rainbows!