Every instrumental teacher has a bag. Or a case. Or, in some unfortunate circumstances, several bags, a carrier bag full of books and an instrument case that keeps falling off their shoulder.
Mine is currently a silver aluminium flight case. It’s reasonably sturdy, looks quite professional and gives the impression that I’m transporting something terribly important. Which I am, of course. Although quite how important a half-eaten packet of Polos and a collection of ancient paperwork might be is open to debate.
For seven glorious years, I used a Protection Racket Deluxe Utility Case. It was magnificent. Plenty of compartments, comfortable to carry and seemingly designed by somebody who understood that musicians accumulate an extraordinary amount of miscellaneous equipment. Eventually, after years of being dragged around schools, it wore out. A sad day. I really must get another one.
In the meantime, the flight case does the job. And here’s what’s inside.
The Things I Actually Teach With
Despite the amount of technology available these days, I still carry four physical teaching books, three of which I’ve written myself.
There’s something rather lovely about having actual music printed on paper. You can open a book, put it on a music stand and get on with the lesson. No batteries, no notifications, no waiting for something to load. And unlike my iPad, the page doesn’t suddenly disappear because somebody has accidentally touched the screen.
My iPad isn’t a Pro model, either, so the screen isn’t always quite big enough for displaying music comfortably. A full page of notation can be rather small, particularly when you’re trying to share it with a pupil sitting a few feet away.
So the books stay. I suspect they always will.
I also carry three pairs of drumsticks. Three might seem excessive, but experience suggests otherwise. Sticks break, get forgotten, disappear behind furniture or somehow end up belonging to somebody else. Having spares is considerably easier than spending half a lesson searching for a missing pair.
Then there’s the usual collection of pens, pencils and a notebook. Nothing particularly exciting, although one of the pens deserves its own paragraph.
It’s enormous, fluffy and was given to me by my daughter. It’s also spectacularly uncomfortable to write with, so it rarely gets used. Nevertheless, it’s one of the most important things in the case, and I wouldn’t dream of leaving it behind.
The Technology Department
My iPad is probably the single most useful piece of teaching equipment I own.
It handles lesson notes, timetables, resources, audio, video and all sorts of other things that once required separate bits of equipment or substantial amounts of paper. The Apple Pencil makes it particularly useful for annotating music, jotting down exercises and demonstrating things without needing to print another worksheet.
Of course, technology doesn’t have to be complicated or expensive to be useful. I’ve written before about how the best app for music teachers might not actually be a music app. Sometimes the simplest tools turn out to be the most useful ones.
I also carry two pairs of headphones and an audio splitter. This allows a pupil and me to listen to the same audio source simultaneously, which is enormously useful when working with recordings, backing tracks or particular details in a piece of music.
Then there are the chargers. One for the iPad, one for the iPhone, and a power bank for those occasions when I’ve forgotten to charge something the night before. Which, naturally, never happens.
There’s also a selection of audio adaptors. These are the sort of things you rarely think about until you desperately need one. Different headphones, different connections, different bits of school equipment. Having a few adaptors available can save an enormous amount of faffing about.
None of this is especially glamorous, but it’s all genuinely useful. The combination of a few carefully chosen bits of technology and some traditional teaching materials works rather well.
The Emergency Repair Department
This is where things become a little more specialised.
Somewhere in the case is a collection of spare wing nuts, drum keys, springs and felts. Individually, they’re tiny and fairly unremarkable. Collectively, they’ve rescued more lessons than I care to remember.
School instruments lead hard lives. Things come loose, disappear, break or get adjusted by enthusiastic pupils who aren’t entirely sure what they’re adjusting.
A missing wing nut can render part of a drum kit surprisingly irritating to use. A drum key can solve a problem in seconds. A spare felt can stop a cymbal rattling around like a dustbin lid.
It’s much easier to carry a few spares than spend half a lesson attempting to improvise a repair.
And then there’s the Blu Tack.
Not an entire packet, just a blob that has taken up permanent residence in the case.
It’s surprisingly useful. Need to stick a note to the teaching room door? Blu Tack. Got a piece of folded sheet music that insists on closing itself every time you turn your back? Blu Tack.
That last one is a particular irritation of mine. There’s something uniquely infuriating about a piece of music that behaves perfectly well until the precise moment somebody starts playing, at which point it folds itself shut and launches off the stand.
I think there’s a peg in the case somewhere too, for much the same reason.
The Blu Tack has even been pressed into service to help stabilise a particularly uncooperative music stand. Not necessarily an engineering solution I’d recommend for permanent installation, but sometimes you have to work with what you’ve got.
The Administrative Department
I currently have four school lanyards and access cards. Each belongs to a different school, and each has its own particular arrangement for getting through doors, signing in or proving that I’m supposed to be there.
They’re essential, of course, although they do have a habit of becoming tangled together. There’s also the occasional moment of standing outside a door wondering why the card isn’t working, before realising I’m attempting to gain access to the wrong school.
The notebook and pens come in handy here too, although much of my administration now happens digitally. For teachers who don’t want to spend money on specialist software, I’ve also put together a no-cost management system for instrumental teachers using tools that are freely available.
And then there’s the paperwork.
At the bottom of the case, beneath the useful things, are several pieces of paper that have apparently been accompanying me for a very long time.
I’m fairly certain there’s a timetable from about fifteen years ago. There’s also a handwritten list of things that were evidently extremely important at some point over a decade ago.
I have absolutely no idea what they refer to now.
Naturally, I haven’t thrown them away. They might be important.
The Personal Survival Department
Finally, we come to the items that have very little to do with teaching but are nevertheless useful to have around.
There’s a half-finished packet of Polos, which may or may not still be entirely edible. A few painkillers for the occasional headache. And probably several other small objects that have disappeared into the corners of the case.
The Polos are particularly useful when you’ve spent the morning talking to pupils at close quarters and realise that your coffee consumption has perhaps exceeded sensible limits.
The painkillers are self-explanatory.
And somewhere among all this sits that enormous fluffy pen, patiently waiting for the day when somebody invents a comfortable way of holding it.
Could I Manage With Less?
Almost certainly.
I could probably remove half the contents of the case without seriously affecting my ability to teach. The ancient paperwork could go, for a start. I might even be able to reduce the number of adaptors and miscellaneous bits of hardware.
But there’s a reason most of these things have found their way into the case. At some point, I’ve needed them.
That’s the thing about being an instrumental teacher who works in different schools. You can’t always rely on finding everything you need when you arrive. Sometimes the equipment is excellent. Sometimes it’s held together by optimism and a wing nut that doesn’t quite fit.
Having a few useful things with you can make the difference between a lesson that runs smoothly and one spent trying to solve an entirely avoidable problem.
The iPad has certainly reduced the amount of equipment I need to carry, but it hasn’t replaced everything. Physical books still have their place, spare parts are occasionally invaluable, and no amount of sophisticated technology has yet improved upon a blob of Blu Tack for keeping a particularly stubborn piece of sheet music open.
As for the fifteen-year-old timetable, I suppose I could finally throw it away.
Although you never know. I might need it.