Berke McKelvey is an associate professor at Berklee College of Music,in Boston, Massachusetts. A multi-instrumentalist who plays Baritone & Tenor Sax, Clarinet, Guitar, Bass, Piano and is also a fine vocalist, Berke has performed with Gladys Knight & the Pips, The Temptations, The Glenn Miller Orchestra, Boston Pops Orchestra, Boston Opera Orchestra, St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and San Diego Symphony Orchestra. He has recorded music tracks for the "Fame and Quincy" TV shows along with Sesame Street and Captain Kangaroo (no jive!). Berklee College of Music was founded on the revolutionary principle that the best way to prepare students for careers in music is through the study and practice of contemporary music. For more than half a century, the college has evolved to reflect the state of the art of music and the music business. With more than a dozen performance and nonperformance majors, a diverse and talented student body representing more than 70 countries, and a music industry "who's who" of alumni, Berklee claims with some justification to be the world's premier learning lab for the music of today—and tomorrow.
Berklee was founded by Lawrence Berk, an engineer trained at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and veteran arranger with the CBS and NBC radio orchestras, who wanted to teach contemporary music and provide practical career preparation for the working musician. His idea caught fire, and the small teaching studio grew into a sizable school, then college, in just over two decades.
Berke McKelvey describes his work in the Ear Training Department :
“In the ear training classes in particular I talk about the way in which I learn songs. If a bride or groom wants a specific song, I'll put the recording in my car and just start solfèging along with the bass chords or arpeggiating the chords locally that I'm hearing, so by the time that I get to the band rehearsal or the gig I can play the song, even though I haven't actually played the song with my instrument yet. The tool set you learn by learning solfège is one that is applicable every day.
"If you really love music, it's like you would love somebody else in a personal relationship; you want to find out everything there is to know about them. You want to find all their likes and dislikes. So when a student says 'I don't really need to know where Charlie Christian came from, because I'm into Eddie Van Halen, and he uses electric grills to get sounds out of his guitar,' you want to encourage that student to have some sense that they can completely love Eddie Van Halen's music, but if they love it that much they probably want to know who he listens to. And then they want to know who the people Eddie Van Halen listened to listened to.
"I think it was Branford Marsalis, when he came here to talk to the faculty, who said he had a student in New York who wanted some tapes to listen to so he could play like Coltrane. So the next lesson Branford had made up a CD of Lester Young and Ben Webster and Coleman Hawkins, all the classic tenor soloists from the twenties and thirties through the early forties. And the student says 'What the hell is this stuff? This isn't Coltrane.' And Branford says,
"Well, you know, when Coltrane was 18, Coltrane was not listening to Coltrane at 45. He was listening to these guys.' These guys did not spring fully formed from the head of Zeus like Athena. These guys grew up just like they did, had problems in high school and middle school just like they did, had parents that didn't understand them just like they did, and listened to music from the previous generation.
"It may be a little sacrilegious, but I don't really care if students never use solfège again after they get out of here. But I do care that they have an increased depth of understanding about the music-making process and are sensitive enough to be able to hear details in music that they're listening to. Although, at a party it's nice every now and then to be able to scat Donna Lee in solfège. That's always fun. To really impress the person you're trying to go home with, play a few pop solos in solfège; you'll knock 'em right off their feet."
Music partner with Larry Groce during the 70's when he had the #9 hit "Junk Food Junkie" and was Grammy nominated for best children's song for "Pooh for President" (it was fun going to the awards ceremony) with appearances on the Merv Griffin Show, Johnny Carson Show, Don Kirshner's "In Concert" and American Bandstand.
In addition to his duties with "Pocketfull of Soul” he also plays with the Chandler Travis Philharmonic, the Cape Cod Conservatory Jazz Band, and the Brewster Town Band (summers) and is available for private instruction.
http://www.berklee.edu/
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