Ariel Community Academy: AW4416
BUENA PARK, CA (April 5, 2002) Chicago area recording engineer and educator Nick Jaffe has developed a program to teach song composition and recording to children in grades 3-6 at Ariel Community Academy a public school on Chicago's South Side through a special charter schools program. Charter schools create an alternative form of public schooling, lifting restraints so teachers can pursue innovative teaching methods that will improve student performance. The course was taught by Jaffe and Ariel staff member and musician Nick Michalopoulos. Using the Yamaha AW4416 Digital Audio Workstation, the six week course allows students with no formal music training or technical experience to compose an original work then arrange, record and mix a finished CD, all the while learning the fundamentals of basic acoustics, audio electronics, and digital technology.
The course uses the children's enthusiasm and interest in music production to teach useful skills, introduce general scientific and creative concepts, and give them the experience of working in a creative team. "The kids respond to being entrusted with 'real' gear with maturity and respect, and they learn real-world skills," says Jaffe. "The AW4416 allows them to hear the difference between properly and improperly recorded tracks and inspires them to get excited about their results. From day one, the kids operated the AW4416 workstation and eventually laid down harmony vocals, percussion tracks, and rap vocals." In April, Jaffe plans to work with 7th and 8th graders at the University of Chicago Laboratory School, an independent college preparatory school which enrolls 1600 students. The course will use musicians from other classes as the subject of the recordings so the students can focus entirely on audio production. "For teaching, the Yamaha AW4416 offers visual and tactile feedback that cannot be duplicated by a computer based system," Jaffe continues. "I strongly believe that teaching sound recording is an avenue to many, many good things for young people. It has an academic and creative purpose and it builds intellectual and technical confidence." The Yamaha AW4416 Professional Audio Workstation is a powerful, compact system, recording up to 16 tracks of true 24-bit digital audio, and is a true combination of digital products from Yamaha. Features include automation/snapshot capability, full 32-bit DSP, 44 fully-automated inputs, 17 motorized faders, four fader and mute groups, eight bus and eight aux sends plus stereo, stereo cue busses, 4-band full parametric EQ, direct out assignment, and a CD-RW drive.
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