Teaching Music in Secondary Schools

A Reader

Gary Spruce

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2001
• ISBN:
  9781134504732
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Teaching Music in Secondary Schools is the accompaniment to its practical-based counterpart Aspects of Teaching Secondary Music. Together they form a comprehensive resource for those engaged with Initial Teacher Training and Continuing Professional Development in Music.

Through this reader, student-teachers and practising teachers will be introduced to the big issues and ideas abounding in music teaching today.

Section 1
What is music and
music education?

1 Ways of thinking about music
Political dimensions and
educational consequences

Gary Spruce

More important than economic benefits were the social improvements which reformers believed could be achieved through education. Schooling would bring a sober morality to the destitute and ‘godless’ urban poor and impose a social authority over the working-class child where the working-class family had failed… their desire was to counteract the spread of radical ideas through education of working-class children and later adults in the benefits of middle-class morality and bourgeois political economy.

(Green 1990: 52–3)

Introduction

Government education policy over the last twenty years has significantly reduced teachers’ and schools’ autonomy over curriculum structure, lesson content and, by implication, teaching methodology. The Education Reform Act (1988) through the National Curriculum established ‘the first statutory curriculum in the history of British education’ (Docking 1996: 1). For the first time, the subjects to be taught in maintained schools and, in many cases their overall content, were determined at national government level.

The National Curriculum Council (a quasi-government body) was established to consult and make recommendations as to the broad style and content of each subject. Many of their initial recommendations were controversial, running counter to prevailing educational orthodoxies. Moreover, they were perceived by many as an attempt to impose upon schools a narrow, politicized and nationalistic subject perspective, the purpose of which was to return education to its traditional role as a means of constructing a ‘political discourse through which the authority of the state and traditional social values can be restored’ (Quicke 1988).

In music, the debate focused upon whether the Programmes of Study should reflect and support the music classroom as a place where children engage with music experientially as performers and composers, or signal a return to music education as ‘music appreciation’ of a European canon of high art music. The former view prevailed. The music Programmes of Study prescribed two Attainment Targets, performing and composing, and listening and appraising, with the proportion of time to be spent on each weighted 2:1 in favour of performing and composing. Within these broad boundaries, the content of the Programmes of Study was relatively non-prescriptive.

The autonomy which music seemingly enjoys was not granted to most other subjects. The ‘content free’ nature of the music National Curriculum allows music teachers much greater flexibility over subject content and pedagogical style than that enjoyed by colleagues in other subject areas. Music teachers’ primary obligation is to provide a context in which children engage with a wide range of music as performers, composers and critical listeners. Within these broad boundaries, the content of the Programmes of Study is relatively non-prescriptive.

Such freedom has potentially many positive aspects. It allows music teachers to devise a curriculum that reflects the interests, aspirations and social and cultural backgrounds of their pupils. The diversification of teaching styles that naturally proceeds from such freedom is promoted by what Government agencies identify as examples of good practice. For example, both the Ofsted publication The Arts Inspected (1998) and the late School Curriculum and Assessment Authority’s (SCAA) Optional Tests and Tasks (1996) reflect the varied nature of much contemporary music classroom practice. Consequently, children’s experience of ‘school music’ can vary significantly both within departments and, particularly, between schools.

However, it is clear that autonomy and diversity have not resulted in universal quality music teaching and learning. Even The Arts Inspected (1998), whose essential purpose is to celebrate and extend good practice, warns against complacency:
‘It would be wrong to suggest that all is well with music in schools … for every lesson or school that is above average, roughly one falls below’ (Ofsted 1998: 60).
Recent research from The National Federation for Education Research (Kinder et al. 1995 and 2000) suggests that many pupils are dissatisfied with their school music education – at least that part of it which takes place in the classroom. It is evident therefore that musical activity and diverse repertoire are not sufficient to guarantee quality music teaching and pupil satisfaction. As Shulman says, we need to give ‘careful attention … to the management of ideas within classroom discourse’ (Shulman 1987: 919) and in considering these ideas to take account of the historical, philosophical and, particularly, the political and cultural legacy that we take into the classroom.

What I will argue in this chapter is that the way in which music is perceived – the understanding of its nature and purpose – is critical to the way in which it impacts upon curriculum design, what we teach and the way we teach it. Consequently, this determines whether children receive a purposeful and rich musical experience that ‘puts the child at the centre of the experience, engaging with music from the inside’ (Pitts 1998: 32).

I will suggest that, despite radical developments in musical classroom pedagogy and increased diversity of repertoire, our understanding of what music is and what constitutes worthwhile music has remained significantly unchanged over the last hundred years; furthermore, that this understanding is rooted in a conception of music that has its genesis in the late eighteenth century and which is fundamentally politically constructed; finally, that the main aim of this political ‘construction’ has been to maintain social and cultural hegemonies through low art/high art distinctions that are assumed to articulate and reflect class divisions. Music, I shall argue, has operated as a tool of social stratification with western art music identified with the upper and middle classes – the bourgeoisie – whilst popular musical forms are typically associated with the working class. Consequently, the bourgeoisie, by virtue of their identification with art music, confirm their higher social status whilst, circularly, art music is perceived of as being inherently superior through its identification with the higher social status of its consumers. The traditional role of music in the curriculum has been to reflect and reinforce the social stratification articulated by this musical hierarchy, reflecting Brian Simon’s argument that since its inception, English state education has served to ‘preserve social stability and reinforce emerging social hierarchies’ (Simon 1987: 106).

Traditional authority and music stratification

The sociologist Max Weber (1864–1920) argues that there are three ideal types (pure forms) of authority. Firstly, charismatic authority which is fundamentally leader-based and depends upon the power of personality. Secondly, traditional authority, which ‘rests upon a belief in the “rightness” of established customs and traditions’ (Haralambos and Holborn: 502). Finally, rational–legal authority which is established through law and operates conditionally upon society’s acceptance of that law as being legitimate.

Of these three types, traditional authority is arguably the most effective, being rooted in the consent of the ‘silent majority’. Moreover, consent that is derived from an acceptance of such authority as self-evident, pre-ordained, universal in application and, consequently, not open to question or debate. In a musical context, tonal music has acquired the mantle of traditional authority, in that:

established rules and conventions, however arbitrary, come to seem right and proper, not to be tampered with or lightly disregarded. People who know nothing of formal music theory can instantly identify a ‘wrong’ note, and they often react to one just as they would if some other sort of social rule had been violated. The rules themselves are simply taken for granted, known but not noticed, and often they only become objects of our attention only when they are violated.

(Martin 1995: 9)

Traditionally, there has been similar unquestioned acceptance of the superior status of western art music as the highest form of tonal music and, by implication, those musical procedures and values which it is perceived as exemplifying. Fundamental to these procedures and values is the notion of art music shaping itself ‘in accordance with self-constrained abstract principles that are unrelated to the outside world’ (Leppert and McClary 1987: xii). Music’s meaning is understood as being expressed entirely in terms of the relationships of musical elements to each other rather than through mediation with the (social) context of its performance.
High status music is autonomous music.

The ideology of musical autonomy

The ideology of musical autonomy is deeply rooted in the aesthetic of western art music. High art music is understood as being exemplified through musical ‘works’ – music as ‘object’. Music thought of as ‘object’ is perceived as being essentially ‘complete’ like a painting or sculpture. It does not require an external justification for its existence. A contemporary expression of this view is made by Roger Scruton (1997) when he writes: ‘the experience of art is available only if we forget the use. We must consider the work of art as an end in itself’ (Scruton 1997: 375).

The ideological hegemony exerted by the notion of music as autonomous works, fully concords with Weber’s notion of traditional authority as authority perceived of as self-evident, timeless and universal. However, ‘musical autonomy’ is none of these things. It is in fact a concept that has its roots in the late eighteenth century and developed primarily as a means by which the emerging bourgeoisie could identify with the old aristocracy and draw a clear distinction between themselves and the working classes.

Prior to the late eighteenth century, a musical ‘product’ (inasmuch as that term is appropriate) was deemed to have been achieved at the point of performance, not through its notation. Musical production being defined by performance has implications for the way in which the relationship between composer and performer is conceptualized. First, given that production is defined as being ‘performance’, the composer would typically be responsible for the entire process from composition to realization. Consequently, the distinctive roles of composer and performer, which we now tend to take for granted, were much less clearly defined. As late as 1802 ‘Prince Nicholas II of Esterhazy had to agree with Haydn that “it would be very difficult – especially in the case of new works – to perform music without the personal direction of the composer”’ (Goehr 1992: 191).

Second, as music was not considered as an object but as an event, musical ownership did not exist in the way we now understand it. What was marketable was not an ‘object’ but the skills that enabled a music event to take place.

Third, given that the musical product was defined by its performance and not the production of an object, musical performance would be motivated primarily by external exigency. Music was composed and performed for church, state or entertainment occasions. Composers were part of the fabric of society and were employed to produce music to order. There was no rationale for the production of music for its own sake, for any value music had was purely in terms of fulfilling a particular social function.

Musical production prior to the late eighteenth century was inextricably linked to social context. The notion of going to a particular place specifically and exclusively to listen to a musical performance was contrary to the way in which music was conceived of as functioning within society. This is not to suggest that music was not listened to attentively. Rather, that such attentiveness would result from the context in which it was being performed (for example a religious service) and the text that was set, rather than in order to construe an inner meaning from the relationship and interplay of the musical parts. Indeed, the sublimation of music to the setting of morally and spiritually uplifting texts was considered to be the highest function to which music could aspire:

it was believed that the words of a text captured music’s meaning much more adequately than sounds by themselves; sound and dance movements were usually relegated to the status of accompaniment either to a text or an ‘occasion’ which would provide them by association with meaning. The use of words, however, was often considered essential to any musical occasion if that occasion was to be regarded as edifying, truthful, and thereby respectable. The immediate implication of this belief was that music without words … [had] insufficient moral import and, therefore, was probably of very little import at all.

(Goehr: 128)

Instrumental music was thus considered to be of lower status, suitable only as prelude or interlude to vocal performances or as accompaniment to dancing and eating.

Finally, as music was understood as existing only in performance and not as autonomous ‘object’, the perception of the function of notation was significantly different from the way in which it has been perceived since the end of the eighteenth century. Notation simply provided the broad parameters that enabled a performance to take place – indeed primitive printing techniques allowed only such limited uses. The realization of the notation through performance would be informed by stylistic understanding, tradition and, frequently, the involvement of the composer–performer. Notation did not, for example, in many instances specify tempo, dynamics or even instrumentation. It was not, as it became in the nineteenth century, a means of attempting to codify every aspect of music in order to create an objectified and definitive version.

So what then happened to so dramatic...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Illustrations
• Abbreviations
• Sources
• Foreword
• Introduction
• Section 1: What Is Music and Music Education?
• Section 2: Music Learning and Musical Development
• Section 3: Musical Contexts