Pedagogic Values and Beliefs

I see music as one of the great mysteries in human civilization. It has no practical value

(at least in our culture), yet we still create and attend to it. Logically it has a limited effect on the

livelihood of human beings, yet all societies everywhere have music in some form or another.

The term music in and of itself is difficult to define. Quite honestly, something can be called

music if someone decides to call it music and there isnt a better definition than that. We can

readily identify a sonic occurrence as musical, yet we have difficulty qualifying it with words

and ascertaining its purpose and value. I value music for its very existence by all rights it

would have been bred out of the human race unless it fills a unique role in our lives.

The concept of uniqueness brings up another idea regarding music. No other curricular

subject is like music. Mathematics and science are concerned mainly with logic and deductive

reasoning if I do this then that will happen. Language, social studies, and history are designed

to build common ground between people by increasing their language skills and cultural literacy.

Music includes all of those skills and many, many more. Leadership, teamwork, creativity,

community building, social justice the list of topics and skills that music encompasses could go

on and on. To be fair, for any of those subjects or skills another activity could be found that

teaches the same things, but there is no subject that teaches all of those things (to varying

degrees, depending on the instructor) all at once. Participants in music develop academically,

athletically, personally, and socially all at the same time if music is taught correctly.

The other important quality of music is that it is more open-ended than any other core

subject. As stated earlier, anything is music if someone decides to call it music. Therefore, a

maker of music can make anything and call it music the only question is if others will

appreciate it as a musical construct. This level of possible creativity allows for the development
of critical and independent thinking. With proper instruction music students can be empowered

to critically analyze not just their music but the world around them.

The purpose of music education should be to give students a place to experiment and

perhaps refine their own natural sensibilities as musicians. Many students go through life

believing that they are unmusical because they do not appreciate or fit in to the standard

Unholy Trinity of Band, Choir, or Orchestra. I cannot agree with this. Even in my choir classes

I want to find ways for students to explore their own musicianship, whether through

group/individual projects, ensemble directed pieces, or music classes outside of the typical

Western classical vein. It is my job to facilitate the learning of the musics my students want to

learn, not simply the music I have been trained to teach.

This learning about musics includes the learning about cultural and social practices

associated with those musics. It is important to me that my students develop cultural sensibilities

along with musical sensibilities, if only to avoid being accused of cultural appropriation. If they

are passionate about a particular music tradition, learning its history will inform their future

musical work. If they are more interested in pushing musical boundaries, learning the history

will inform them of the current musical universe they exist in and consequentially, what

boundaries need to be left alone, what boundaries can be pushed, and what boundaries need

pushing.

As a choral person, the subject of text treatment is one that weighs heavily on me.

Whether in composition or performance, it is important to me that students compose and perform

with the message and words within a text always in mind. This does not mean that I expect

students to perform a text the way I think it should be performed. Instead, I want students to
avoid making mindless decisions about text treatment. Whatever they do is acceptable so long as

it has a conscious decision to back it up.

The more I study the various philosophies concerning music, the more I think the subject

of music philosophy has a place in the public school classroom, if only in small doses. I believe

music philosophy can help students unite as a community of musicians, as the study of music

philosophy can help students identify a purpose or goal for their individual music community.

Secondly, there are two philosophical questions that I have not yet found a way to resolve and

that I feel my students should always consider. The first; how much should we honor the

composer over our own musical interpretations? The second, contrasting; how much of our own

interpretations can we implement before we run the risk of cultural appropriation? I doubt that

there are hard and fast answers to these questions.

At the beginning of my study in music philosophy, I believed myself ready to teach. I

was convinced that to honor my students, it was my role to teach them music theory, vocal

technique, and artistic sensibility. Over the course of this class I learned that those goals, while

not exactly ignoble, are the result of a very narrow view of music and music education. It is now

my goal to push students to think critically about the music they create or perform in order to

help them realize their musical abilities and sensibilities.