Teaching Music: Discussion

Dear Tracey,

Music in schools is often relegated to a specialist teacher and the focus is on learning and performing an instrument and not on composing individual pieces (Burnard & Murphy, 2013; Jeanneret & Swainston, 2012). It is common to become daunted when tasked with composing an original score (Burnard & Murphy, 2013; Jeanneret & Swainston, 2012). Therefore, when teaching it is important to provide structure where students do not only learn to play instruments and to perform, but are also encouraged to manipulate different sounds (Burnard & Murphy, 2013; Dinham, 2014; Jeanneret & Swainston, 2012).

This week I tried the N-Gage tips from the reading ‘Deep Listening to the Musical World’ by Patricia Shehan Campbell (2005). I looked at the N-Act tips too but found they were really difficult! Here is my attempt at 'N-Gage'-ing with Meera Bai Bhajan: https://sites.google.com/site/keldaunimedia/mp3
I only recorded the first 20 seconds but if you liked the song I encourage you to listen to the whole song in its entirety (without me over the top haha!) as I found it a really moving piece. You can find the original here but be warned that it seriously gets stuck in your head! It is beautiful though.

Reflecting on the experience has produced in me two seemingly irreconcilable thoughts about how to teach music. On one hand I found trying to sing a totally different style, sound and language was quite daunting. It made me realise that when using these techniques in the classroom some students might respond better to a song that is well known to them (Burnard & Murphy, 2014). This will give the students confidences that they at least in the language and what the melody will do (Burnard & Murphy, 2014).  

On the other hand though, there was something freeing about singing along random (to me anyway) sounds to a song I had no knowledge of.  After I got over being overwhelmed by the unknown, I felt more freedom to experiment with sounds and not beat myself up if I didn’t sound like the ‘real’ version. When teaching music I would therefore expose students to a variety of music styles and encourage students to experiment with new sounds, and this might in turn free their creative juices (Burnard & Murphy, 2014).

Yours,

Kelda

References:

Burnard, P., & Murphy, R. (2014). Teaching Music Creatively. Abingdon: Routledge.

Campbell, P. S. (2005). Deep Listening to the Musical World. Music Educators Journal 92(1), pp. 30-36.

Dinham, J. (2014). Delivering authentic Arts education. South Melbourne: Cengage Learning Australia.

Jeanneret, J., & Swainston, A. (2012). Making Music and Cultural Connections. In C . Sinclair, N. Jeanneret & J O’Toole (Eds.), Education in the Arts (2^nd Ed) (pp. 128- 144). South Melbourne: Oxford University Press.

mithilaconnect. (2009, February 7). Meera Bai Bhajan Aisi Lagi Lagan by Anoop Jalota [video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1sHo28g9PI&list=PL4H5923f_aLq8UDjpmd49ge_Z3tp7jrgi