The Power of One Note in Music Education

Bill Swick currently chairs the music department for the twelve-time GRAMMY award-winning Las Vegas Academy of the Arts and is the guitar task force chair for CCSD, the nation’s fifth-largest public school district. Swick discussed his own origins in the music industry and how one fateful day changed his life forever.

Swick is nationally known for his guitar curriculum. The guitar curriculum developed by Mr. Swick includes over 20 volumes of edited repertoire tailored for beginning students and college music majors, and over 400 guitar ensemble arrangements. The lessons in his classroom guitar editions have been developed with the intent to take remedial beginners to advanced stages of music reading and improvisation. He is also the inventor of the “Swickster,” a guitar with a specially developed fingerboard and teaching system designed to introduce and make guitar playing fun and practical.

Many of his graduates from the Las Vegas Academy have been placed in major conservatories and music colleges receiving full scholarships. The program he has developed at the Academy is arguably one of the leading public high school programs in the United States.

The Music Educator Award was established to recognize current educators who have made a significant and lasting contribution to the field of music education. The winner receives a $10,000 honorarium and a $10,000 grant for his or her school, and is flown to Los Angeles to receive the award and attend the Grammy award ceremony. The ten finalists, as well as their schools, each receive a $1,000 honorarium.

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