Spring is a busy time at Wilsonville High School. Students are involved in AP exams, spring sports, drama productions, robotics events, and more. However, Wilsonville’s music students are preparing independently for district and state competitions during April and May.

In Oregon, band and orchestra festivals are run by OSAA, and the structure for these events has been developed over the years to provide students and educators with a well-rounded experience to learn and grow as musicians.

Wilsonville symphonic band competes in the Northwest Oregon Conference (NWOC) with nine schools during their district festival, including rivals Rex Putnam, Milwaukie, LaSalle, and Canby. Music festivals have 3 judges, and each judge gives the performing group a score out of 100, with a lengthy rubric that schools can use to better their performances. 

The school with the highest score wins its league and automatically qualifies for state, while the remaining ensembles are put into a tape pool. Judges listen and select schools to go to the state competition.

On the orchestra side, things look very similar. A 100-point rubric, 3 judges, and a rotating host school with a clinician who comes to work with each ensemble after their stage performance. However the district model looks slightly different; since orchestra numbers are lower, OSAA grouped schools by “special districts (SDs),” which each contain roughly 7 schools and are not limited by school size. Wilsonville is placed in “SD 5” with 6 other regional schools. Four of the seven SD 5 schools are classified at the 6A level, including West Linn, Tigard, Lakeridge, and others.

The idea of a score-based competition where schools receive grades for their performance surfaces an intriguing question in music philosophy: How ethical is competition in a music setting? Wilsonville’s band and orchestra director Chad Davies believes that there are better ways to foster a learning environment with a competitive aspect.

Oregon is one of the only states in the nation that uses a grade-based ranking system to recognize high-school music ensembles at the district and state levels. Other states have adopted a proficiency model, where anyone with state-qualifying scores gets the chance to perform on the state stage. 

The festival ratings for state also look different; instead of a ranked system where one school wins first place and four losers are recognized, the model uses a 3-point scale to recognize a school’s effort, with a 1 being “superior,” and so forth. 

Davies explained the logic, saying, “[These other music competition models] don’t crown a champion; instead, they award every group a festival rating… You may have seven superior ensembles rather than ‘First place, first loser, second loser, third loser.’”

That ‘loser’ mindset tends to foster a cold and negative environment, which Davies argues is against the spirit of music. “[The OSAA model] create[s] a lot of cold environments to work, teach, and learn in… there are better ways to foster… excellence in music… [without] pitting music groups against each other.”

However, there are aspects of OSAA’s philosophy that have grown Oregon’s music program in many valuable ways; The clinicians give students increased depth in improving their music skills beyond their school teacher, and the scoring rubric is a tool that has been vital in getting many Oregon music programs to where it is today. 

Chad Davies agrees with the “progress that has been made” since music became competitive. The opposing philosophy argues that the competition gives music groups a drive to get better, and there is evidence to support this claim. Music opportunities in this state have grown substantially over the last few decades, and many other states don’t have the same programs and resources that Oregon offers.

Furthermore, Davies articulated how the rubric sums up “all of the proficiencies that we teach in our room,” and provides an avenue for educators to develop teaching skills and work with their students in understanding the meaning of music, both technically and musically.

Nonetheless, more can be done to develop a better music environment for Oregon students at the high school level, and Davies is a crucial leader in the Oregon Band Directors Association (OBDA) as they work to improve fairness in the competition. New this year, OBDA developed a rubric for the sightreading room, where previously, scores were simply at the judge’s discretion.

Although Oregon’s high school music competition model may not shift drastically in the short term, Davies insists that “we [as leaders in music] have to change that mindset” for meaningful change to take place in high school music classrooms.

Currently completing his 19th year as a music educator, Chad Davies continues to define the role of a model band and orchestra director, fighting for his students’ rights to fair, quality music competition.

Competition in music is an intriguing conversation; while there are various philosophies and beliefs around what that should look like, everyone involved in music can find ways to improve existing models that show the world what music is all about.