The Power of Creative Musical Participation

Music making has the power to empower individuals and communities to effect change, whether in attitude or in action. Making music imbues in individuals a sense of identity and well-being. Creative musical participation can help traverse differences in our community, even where health issues might seem to threaten this possibility. Throat cancer patients face multiple challenges, from the time of diagnosis, to surgery, rehabilitation, and integration. Laryngectomy has a direct impact on patients’ ability to communicate with other people, and make themselves understood. In some of these challenging situations, greater awareness and understanding of the condition could enable laryngectomees to feel less excluded. This is why we conducted a public engagement project, raising awareness through beatboxing. Beatboxing has proven to be a great outlet for artistic expression for alaryngeal singers for two quite different reasons. First, beatboxing is a very inclusive, pluralistic, and also democratic artform. In beatboxing “every sound is valid”; this offers a wonderful opportunity to laryngectomees to produce sounds that are not necessarily going to be mapped onto an elitist conventional ‘aesthetic chart’. Second, many of the popular beatboxing sounds are not ‘voiced’ anyway (i.e. coming from the vibration of the vocal folds). This means that laryngectomees can produce similar sounds as non alaryngeal singers. There is a growing body of research that clearly demonstrates the importance of musical and other artistic activity in rehabilitation, mental health, palliative care, development, pain management, but also healing. Arts, Health and Wellbeing research centres across the world are making remarkable progress in carving a more promising future of synergies between the Arts and Sciences by conducting systematic research that interrogates this relationship. Music educators are part of an ecological environment that can support or inhibit growth. Our creative capacities can be strengthened with an appreciation of differences and the possibilities afforded by the intersections of knowledge. We are left to mull over two questions: How are we as music teachers encouraging our students and our community to appreciate differences and diversity through the curriculum we plan, the music we use, the other resources we use, and the day-to-day interactions with students? What intersections can we explore with other knowledge and disciplines that could enrich the possibilities of creative musical participation

Narcissism, Romanticism, and Technology

This chapter rehearses the possibility of drawing parallels between trends in music education globally and known behaviors (or even conditions) such as romanticism and narcissism. The chapter attempts to view technology’s role under this novel “lens.” Finally, the chapter argues that technology is often viewed as a tool or sets of tools that are being used not particularly creatively in order to “enable,” “facilitate,” or “enhance” curricular aims and objectives that might have remained unchanged for over a century, a view that might be counterproductive. The chapter suggests that it is through technology that a new “music education” can be envisaged, celebrated, and experienced

Perceived quality of a singing performance: The importance of context

The chapter summarizes the author’s work developing a theoretical framework in relation to perceived quality in a singing performance. This work focused on singing performances rather than singing performance related effects, such as visual feedback, audience dynamics, live listening logistics, and other factors that might be part of a general “experience” but not necessarily part of the voiced/sung product. In addition to discussing CReMA, a technological solution the author devised for increasing the specificity of response measurement to musical performances, two examples are offered of unpublished empirical research as vignettes of the context-sensitive and context-specific nature of the singing voice in performance. The outcomes support that although assessments of singing and the perception of quality or beauty in a singing performance are not something that can be made using a deterministic rule-system, there is value in systematically acquiring more evidence specific—and also sensitive—to various singing contexts

Gender and the performance of music

This study evaluates propositions that have appeared in the literature that music phenomena are gendered. Were they present in the musical "message," gendered qualities might be imparted at any of three stages of the music-communication interchange: the process of composition, its realization into sound by the performer, or imposed by the listener in the process of perception. The research was designed to obtain empirical evidence to enable evaluation of claims of the presence of gendering at these three stages. Three research hypotheses were identified and relevant literature of music behaviors and perception reviewed. New instruments of measurement were constructed to test the three hypotheses: (i) two listening sequences each containing 35 extracts from published recordings of compositions of the classical music repertoire, (ii) four "music characteristics" scales, with polarities defined by verbal descriptors designed to assess the dynamic and emotional valence of the musical extracts featured in the listening sequences. 69 musically-trained listeners listened to the two sequences and were asked to identify the sex of the performing artist of each musical extract; a second group of 23 listeners evaluated the extracts applying the four music characteristics scales. Results did not support claims that music structures are inherently gendered, nor proposals that performers impart their own-sex-specific qualities to the music. It is concluded that gendered properties are imposed subjectively by the listener, and these are primarily related to the tempo of the music

Acquiring skills in music technology

This chapter explores how individuals acquire music technology skills in various settings. We consider this acquisition with reference to the psychological theories of behaviourism, constructivism and metacognition/metalearning. We also discuss what it means to learn, be creative and pursue a musical career within a fast-moving, technology-driven world. What do professional musicians, sound engineers and educators regard as key skills and competencies in music technology, how have priorities changed over time and what attributes are considered as essential for the future? We illustrate our key findings using a wide range of examples drawn from varied cultures, musical and educational settings

Performing sex: The representation of male and female musicians in three genres of music performance

In this article, the representation of male and female musicians is compared between three major genres of music performance and across three geographical regions: the United Kingdom, Europe, and the United States. Relevant data of artists from 40 world-class orchestras, 40 competition brass bands, and 40 top-selling recorded popular music groups were obtained from the websites of the respective organizations and from other authenticated sources. Information collected included the instruments played by each artist, the artist’s status in the ensemble (e.g., principal/section leader/rank and file player). The membership of each instrumental section was then analyzed for balance of sex representation. Overall, across all three genres, male musicians considerably outnumbered females, but this imbalance was moderated by genre and regional differences. The lowest level of imbalance of sexes was observed in orchestras, with males occupying 60% of orchestral chairs compared with females 40%, but principal chairs/section leaders were found to be predominantly male. In brass bands, males predominated by a ratio of 76% males to 24% females, and section leader chairs were almost invariably occupied by males. In the genre of popular music, male performers massively outnumbered females by 85%–15% in every aspect of performers and group leader roles by 90% to 10%. Possible causes of these imbalances are explored for each genre. In all three genres representation of males and females was found to be closely related to the instruments played, for example, many more females than males were harpists, and many more males were trombonists and tuba players than were females. Reasons for these differences are explored with particular reference to differential patterns of education and musical training and to underlying historical and sociological issues

Music Teachers’ Perceptions of, and approaches to,Creativity in the Greek-Cypriot Primary Education

TThe purpose of this study was to explore music teachers' perceptions of, and approaches to, creativity in Primary education. Even though teachers' perceptions on creativity have been investigated broadly and extensively, qualitative research on music teachers' beliefs nurturing the students' creativity in Primary education are less common. In the present paper, data were collected through in-depth interviews with 10 individuals in the Greek-Cypriot Primary Education. The results of this exploratory study indicated that activities should include the promotion of the students' self-action and autonomy, and the pedagogical initiatives that enable students to come up with original outputs in order to be creative. This understanding, in turn, provided the researchers with access to the teacher participants' perceptions of creativity: a multifaceted concept related to students' autonomy, initiative, and the application of imagination and unrestrained thinking to any musical activity. These findings offer some initial insights and are discussed with respect to their implications for policy and practice. Suggestions for future research are also made

Music Technology and Response Measurement

In this chapter, a brief review of related literatures in the general field of response measurement is presented. Following the short rehearsal of the evidence base is an introduction of the history of the development of the Continuous Response Measurement Apparatus (CReMA) by Himonides (2011), a creative integration of traditional analog synthesiser technology with a biomedical data acquisition system that was originally developed as part of a doctoral research investigation that was centred on the understanding and/or construction of beauty in a vocal performance (Himonides, 2009; Himonides and Welch, 2005). The main focus is then placed on the development of a novel software tool, inspired by the CReMA, that has been designed upon request by members of the research community who had expressed an interest in identifying a simple way to capture, process and analyse affective response data. This new software tool, CReMA MIDI, enables any researcher that has access to any MIDI information generator (i.e. a controller and/or instrument) and any MIDI stream-capturing software (i.e. any modern digital audio workstation (DAW) or MIDI-enabled mobile device) to process automatically captured MIDI files and extract information components automatically for further analyses using any preferred statistical analysis package

A natureza do feedback no ensino e na aprendizagem de piano com o uso de tecnologia digital no ensino superior [The nature of feedback in higher education studio-based piano learning and teaching with the use of digital technology]

The aim of the current research was to investigate the nature of feedback when a digital technology system was introduced in the higher education (HE) piano studio alongside three teacher and student pairs in Brazil. Data were collected by using video- recorded observations of lessons, participant interviews, and also data related to the use of a specific technology. A thematic analysis of the resultant data suggests that participants used verbal and non-verbal feedback in three areas of lesson focus: music (score), performance (e.g., dynamics, articulation), and technology (Musical Instrument Digital Interface [MIDI] parameters). The application of technology seems to allow the focus of the lesson to become clearer, making students more aware of their performances and their learning processes. Data suggest that the engagement with technology varied across the three observed cases. There seems to be a valuable use for technology-mediated feedback; this could, in turn, optimize more traditional pedagogical approaches in HE piano learning and teaching, and also enrich private practice

Playing, Constructionism, and Music in Early-Stage Software Engineering Education

[EN] Understanding that design involves trade-offs, thinking at multiple levels of abstraction, and considering the cohesion and coupling between sub-components of a larger whole is an important part of software (and other) engineering. It can be challenging to convey such abstract design concepts to novice engineers, especially for materials that are themselves abstract (e.g. software). Such challenges are compounded when teaching at the secondary school stage where students have limited experience of large-scale design problems that motivate the need for abstraction at all. In this paper, we describe a method for introducing these concepts to secondary school students using LEGO® and Raspberry Pi computers, asking them to build musical instruments as an entertaining way of motivating engagement with learning about design through play. The method has been successfully piloted in a series of three classroom sessions and key observations and experiences of using the method are presented.This project received no external funding but was funded by the UCL Department of Computer Science Strategic Research FundGold, NE.; Purves, R.; Himonides, E. (2022). Playing, Constructionism, and Music in Early-Stage Software Engineering Education. Multidisciplinary Journal for Education, Social and Technological Sciences. 9(1):14-38. https://doi.org/10.4995/muse.2022.1645314389