John Bertles is an educational consultant, composer and instrument builder.  His experience in the music and arts education field has been extensive and varied.  Following are some of the areas in which he has worked:

Composer
Musical Instruments built from Recycled Materials
Development and Implementation of Teaching Artists
Program Development
Staff Development
Producer/Narrator of Concerts for Young People
Curriculum and Staff Development based on "Homemade" Instruments
Concert Development
Workshop Leader and Moderator
Distance Learning and the use of  New Technologies for Education
Curriculum Writer

A classically-trained Composer who has written music ranging from opera to circus music, and from symphony to punk rock, his classical compositions have been performed at Merkin Hall, Miller Theater at Columbia and Caramoor Center for the Performing Arts, among others. His music for theater and dance has been performed at New York University, The Knitting Factory, Dance Theater Workshop and other venues around New York City and beyond.  

He also builds and performs on Musical Instruments built from Recycled Materials, often with his group, Bash the Trash^®.  Founded in 1991, Bash the Trash reaches over 20,000 elementary students yearly in performances throughout the New York-New Jersey-Connecticut area, with occasional forays to other states.  "The Evils of Pots" (1994), a quartet written entirely for pots and pans, has been performed at Lincoln Center in New York City, the International Gamelan Festival in Indonesia and throughout the United States. 

He has been deeply involved in the Development and Implementation of Teaching Artists and the programs/institutions associated with them.  He originated the position of Lead Teaching Artist at Carnegie Hall in 1991 and has been instrumental in the assembly and development of an exemplary group of scholar/artists who work in Carnegie's Link-Up Program.  He has led conference workshops on teaching artist issues, most notably at the 1999 Face-to-Face conference where he was the moderator in a colloquiam for Experienced Teaching Artists.

He has extensive experience in Program Development, whether the program be Residency-based, Concert-based or Curriculum-based.  Much of this experience comes from nine years of helping Carnegie Hall create concert repertory for orchestral performances for students, as well as complementary classroom curriculum and study guides designed to help teachers and teaching artists.  He has also created programs and study guides for the Guggenheim Museum, Kennedy Center, Sullivan County BOCES, the Grammy Awards and other organizations.  He was part of team called in by the Leonard Bernstein Center to help them evaluate their existing program and make recommendations for improvements.

He has taught and created Staff Development programs for classroom teachers, teaching artists, music and visual arts specialists, conservatory students and graduate students in education.  While his staff development programs using simple student-built instruments are in great demand (see below), he has also created staff development programs for such subjects as:

    * Simple Composition Strategies for Student-written Pieces (with recorders as well as other instruments)
    * Listening to Classical Music with Children
    * Creating and using Listening Maps
    * Using the Arts to teach to the Core Curriculum
    * Best Practices for Teaching Artists in the Schools
    * Creating Assessment Mechanisms for Arts Programs
    * Incorporating the Arts Standards into Existing Programs

as well as many others.

As a Producer/Narrator of Concerts for Young People, he has worked with orchestras, salsa bands, woodwind quintets, brass ensembles and even dixieland and zydeco groups, helping them to write scripts, choose repertoire and craft concerts designed for young people.  Much of this work came as the National Creative Consultant for the "Grammy in the Schools Concert Series" from 1997-99.  During this time he chose the musical groups, narrated more than 90 concerts with 10 different ensembles in schools throughout New York City, and helped to choose, train and write scripts for other narrators in Miami and Los Angeles.  He was the narrator for concerts by the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra (during which he introduced and interviewed famed jazz drummer Max Roach in front of more than a thousand children).  He has also worked as a narrator for concerts for the Leonard Bernstein Foundation and New Jersey Chamber Ensemble as well as regularly doing pre-concert activities for Carnegie Hall and the New York Philharmonic.

Curriculum and staff development based on "homemade" instruments has proven to be a valuable link to understanding the instruments in the orchestra, and many arts institutions have taken advantage of this link.  For Yo-yo Ma's Silk Road Project he contributed instrument designs and lesson plans for their "Source Book".  He has written portions of the curriculum for Carnegie Hall, the New York Philharmonic and Manhattan School of Music. He is a regular contributor to the program for Young People's Concerts at Avery Fisher Hall.  His full or half-day staff development program "Beyond the Shaker" has been helping classroom and music teachers to use student-built instruments in a meaningful way, incorporating arts standards, core curricula and assessment tasks.

Concert Development is another area in which he has had much experience.  For nine years he been assisting the Carnegie Hall Link-Up program choose concert repertoire (The Orchestra of St. Lukes, American Composers' Orchestra) as well as collaborating with their conductors (Dennis Russell Davies, Rachel Worby, John Morris Russell).  He has created family concert programs for Caramoor Center for the Performing Arts, as well as concert programs in other musical forms (such as jazz, dixieland, zydeco, and salsa/merengue) for the Grammy in the Schools Concert Series (see above ).

He has frequently served as a Workshop Leader or Moderator for Arts Education Conferences.  He has led workshops on student-built musical instruments (see above ); incorporating core curriculum into arts programs; creating assessment tasks for arts programs; and other workshops helping educators and administrators to refine and hone their professions.  He has also been a Moderator for panel discussions as well as larger discussion groups.  As a moderator he uses a dynamic style of large-scale note-taking that is designed to keep participants moving toward deeper thinking and common goals rather than degenerating into mere reiteration of complaints and anecdotes.

Distance Learning and the use of new technologies for education has become a major thrust of his work.  He initiated the position of Program Leader, Distance Learning for Carnegie Hall, and is currently their Coordinator of Distance Learning Projects.  In these capacities he has helped create a distance learning program that currently includes staff development and student-targeted events, as well as concerts and performances.  He has written, produced and led many workshops on a variety of music and arts-based subjects.  He is also helping to create a web-based curriculum designed to extend and augment the knowledge of teachers and teaching artists involved in the Carnegie Hall education programs.

He has frequently consulted with many institutions as a Curriculum Writer.  He has written curriculum for Manhattan School of Music, the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, Yo-yo Ma's Silk Road Project, Carnegie Hall, the Leonard Bernstein Center and the Grammy Foundation, among others.  His writings range from study guides to lesson plans, and from literacy and core curricula to student-built instruments.