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2024 ACDA Western Region Conference March 6-9, 2024 Pasadena, California

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Real Talk: Show Me the Rhythm!
Getting Comfortable with Being Uncomfortable
This interactive session offers a kinesthetic system
about Race in Choral Music for building and assessing rhythmic literacy for all
ages. Like hand signs, rhythm gestures are a physical
Considering the current socio-political climate, the manifestation of pulse, pulse division, and meter. The
rise in violence against AAPI communities, and a re- instructor can visually assess individual comprehen-
ignited Black Lives Matter movement, we as choral sion within a group setting. Students are able to self-
conductor-teachers are faced with some uncomfort- correct within the context of group practice. Rhythm
able truths about choral music. We as artist-citizens gestures reinforce precision and make music literacy
can, and must, leverage coalitions to dismantle systems accessible to all. They work with any counting system,
of oppression. Utilizing Intercultural Dialogue and combined with solfege, or in multi-part score reading.
Whiteness as Property as frameworks, the presenters Rhythm gestures offer an alternative (kinesthetic) mode
will equip attendees with tools and language needed to of learning while calling upon and strengthening our
become comfortable engaging in uncomfortable con- sense of underlying pulse and rhythmic flow.
versations surrounding race and contemporary choral
culture. This uncomfortability may be seen as growing Pamela McDermott is director of cho-
pains for a choral community grappling with difficult ral activities at Longwood University in
and long-overdue conversations about equity, “inclu- Farmville, Virginia, where she directs en-
sion,” and access. sembles and teaches conducting, choral
methods, show choir techniques, and au-
Arreon A. Harley-Emerson will be a clinician for this ral skills. She is also a founding member and associate
session. His photo and bio are on page 152. artistic director of The Piedmont Singers of Central
Virginia, a professional vocal octet. McDermott earned
Joshua Palkki (he/him) is assistant pro- her DMA in choral conducting at UNC-Greensboro.
fessor of music learning and teaching/ Her dissertation offers an analysis of Brahms’s Ein
choral conducting and associate director deutsches Requiem through the lens of semiotics in an
of choral activities at Arizona State Uni- examination of the work’s relationship to the requiem
versity and co-author of Honoring Trans genre. She earned a master’s in theory/composition at
and Gender-Expansive Students in Music Education (Oxford James Madison University and a BME at East Carolina
University Press, 2021). He holds degrees from Michi- University. She is past president of Virginia ACDA.
gan State University (PhD), Northern Arizona Univer-
sity (MM), and Ball State University (BS). Palkki has
presented at national and international events includ-
ing the National ACDA Conference, NAfME National (she/her/ella) Unlocking the
Conference, and the Society for Music Teacher Educa- Music of Latina Choral Composers
tion Symposium and is a sought-after guest conductor
and scholar on equity and justice topics. His writing
appears in several scholarly choral and music educa- Dive into the music and backgrounds of female-iden-
tion publications. tified composers from across Latin America through
singing, moving, and unlocking the rhythms of works
that rarely, if ever, have been performed in the States.
Composers such as Modesta Bor of Venezuela, Eliza

182 CHORAL JOURNAL January 2024 Volume 64 Number 5