RAIDS Analysis

In my WRA class, a process called "RAIDS" is used to analyze a source's content. It stands for: revision (What ideas, attitudes, etc are being changed by the views of the source?),  arrangement (what in relationship with one another?), invention(what ideas, atttiudes, etc, are being suggested by the text), style (i.e. formal, scholarly, etc), and delivery (how the source is presented).

This week's post will use this process to analyze the "total technique training" (copyright Supremo 2009) chart my professor created to, well, improve technique. It has nine levels of technique training:

• Major and minor scales
• Major and Minor thirds
• I, IV, V, V7 chords in major and minor
• chromatic scales
• diminished 7th chords
• scales with neighbors
• lower neighbors to chords
• whole tone scales
• bartok exercise 

These are listed in a flow chart style on the front, and the back has a description of how to practice each of these areas.

Revision: The chart revises how to practice and improve technique. It provides ways of  scales and how these scales can be put into various patterns, all of which will improve the technical abilities of a player. Technique is a crucial element to any player, but this learning process has a very focused, exact way of learning technique to improve playing.
Arrangement: The chart puts the relationship between notes into the various musical patterns\relationships they can have and labels them accordingly.
Invention: The chart portrays that learning total technique is only a matter of learning, recognizing, and memorizing these relationships between notes in these patterns.
Delivery: This material is in chart form -- it is a laminated sheet of paper. There is a chart on the front covering the main ideas of the chart, and a list on the back describing each area.
Style: Informitive, and not formal, the chart is based a lot upon visual observation as much as reading: there is music notated to demonstrate each of the patterns, and the text takes a visually appealing form to organize the material.


Two more details may also be noted about this chart:

Purpose: To provide an organied, straight-forward guide to significantly improve the technical aspect of playing.
Audience:  Oboists -- especially those studying with my professor as the material ties in with her other teachings. 

For me, the chart is easy to read and understand. Technique is not the most exciting thing to me, but the chart puts the information in a way that's easy to grasp and not be overwhelmed by. It also provides new and focused ways to practice technique -- a lot of musicians, or at least begginers, assume all their is to practicing technique is simple scales. But this chart helps define expand the definition of technique training.

Works Cited:

Eberle, Jan "Total Technique Training". Supremo. 2009. Print.