A Unique Perspective: Directing Choirs at the Perkins School for the Blind

The June/July 2024 issue of Choral Journal is online and features an article titled “A Unique Perspective: Directing Choirs at the Perkins School for the Blind” by Arnold Harris. Following is a portion from the article.
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The term “siloed” is often used to reflect the individual, and rather independent, work environment that chorus directors inhabit. It certainly is accurate in describing my own situation as music director of the Perkins School for the Blind in Watertown, Massachusetts. When I attend conferences such as the 2023 Massachusetts ACDA summer conference, I am always struck by how different my setting is from the other directors I meet. None of my students look at me for any cues, gestures, or any physical manifestation of musical direction, as is completely expected from other choral directors. Even so, there are many aspects of my work with the Perkins Chorus that I feel have much practical use for any chorus director, and I am hopeful some of the techniques and approaches I have used over my thirty-eight years of directing at Perkins can be of use to other directors in their own “silos.”

Background
The Perkins School for the Blind is the oldest school for the blind in the United States. It was founded in 1829 by John Dix Fisher and some other leading Bostonians as the New England Asylum for the Blind. Fisher became interested in the possibilities of educating American blind children after visiting the world’s first school for blind children, L’Institution Nationale des Jeunes Aveugles, in Paris, France. Perkins has always been completely supportive of the music program—an acknowledgement that skill in music is not sight dependent, and understanding the many positive educational benefits as well as the great benefits of social and societal integration that participation in music affords. I once took the chorus to sing at the Massachusetts State House at an official inauguration of some state officials. Looking out at the legislators sitting at their very old wooden desks, I realized that these were the same desks, in the same hall, where at some similar event in the 1840s, legislators sat listening to the singing students from Perkins. But that was then, and I want to tell you about what is happening now.

Music Programs
For over forty years, Massachusetts has had laws mandating that all children have a legal right to a free and appropriate public education. The student population at Perkins represents a wide mixture of a variety of physical and intellectual challenges, all in conjunction with varying levels of low vision and blindness. Most of the students participate in some of the wide variety of opportunities our music program offers. These include our performing ensemble groups of beginning and advanced chorus, and handbell or instrumental ensembles. Many also take part in individual lessons on piano, voice, percussion, guitar, or any band or orchestral instrument. If performance training is not appropriate, we have an active music therapy program.

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Read the full article in the June/July 2024 issue of Choral Journal. acda.org/choraljournal