Ready To Inspire At Northern Arizona University -- Weekly Inspiration from Matt!
This week, we're being inspired by Fifth House Ensemble's horn player, Matt. Matt hits right at the core of what our goal is with these Weekly Inspiration Blog Posts. And he talks about one of the main reasons I truly love Fifth House Ensemble: inspiring the next generation. Check back next week for inspiration after we perform In Transit: #undercoverhero in Flagstaff, AZ at Northern Arizona University!
On Sunday, Fifth House departs for Flagstaff for four days at Northern Arizona University to give our last performance (for now) of #undercoverhero. In my short time with 5HE I’ve figured out that this group knows how to have a good time! So I know we’re all looking forward to being on the road together and getting to play this show that we’ve come to love up in the mountains for a new audience in a new venue.
In addition to performing, we will have the opportunity to work a masterclass with the students at NAU. We are also beginning several of our teaching residencies around Chicago this month. So basically, teaching and mentoring has been on my mind a lot lately.
As you regular readers know, the theme for our Friday blog posts is inspiration. As a teacher, inspiration is job one. We all have that class that sticks out in our minds from decades of schooling (some of us more decades than others) that we really loved. We found ourselves going the extra mile on assignments and looking forward to the next discussion. Most likely though it was the teacher not the subject that made us want to engage. For some reason they brought the subject alive for us. They were interesting, animated, quirky, exciting, or cute (enough said there)…maybe all of the above. In short, THEY WERE INSPIRING! They made us feel good and helped open our minds to the topic at hand in a way that made learning an adventure instead of a job.
So if you’re a teacher, go get that cup of coffee and fly into your next class or lesson on fire! You never know when you might inspire in a way that changes a student’s life. We look forward to reporting back on the wonderful musicians at NAU!