„Ohne Musik, dann kannst du mich sofort in die Anstalt schicken!“ - Musizieren im Erwachsenenalter. Eine empirische Studie mit Laienmusikern zur Praxis des Kammermusizierens ab 55 Jahren

Analog der demografischen Entwicklung und ihrer öffentlichen Wahrnehmung, wurde der ältere Mensch seit den 1950er Jahren zunehmend als Weiter-Lernender betrachtet (vgl. Kehrer 1952; Veelken 2000; Arnold 2000). Auch musikalisches Lernen wurde, nachweislich seit 1980, mit Gerontologie (Davidson 1980), in der musikpädagogischen Reflexion (Grunenberg 1984 als „musikalische Späterziehung“) und schließlich seit 2005 (Hartogh) als Disziplin Musikgeragogik fokussiert. Zu den bisherigen Untersuchungen allgemeinen musikalischen Lernens im Erwachsenenalter, ergänzt die vorliegende Studie den Aspekt des spezifisch kammermusikalischen Lernens bzw. Praktizierens. Im Rahmen eines Musizier- und Begegnungswochenendes an der Hochschule für Musik Detmold Ende 2015, wurden aktive Laienmusiker und –musikerinnen (N=19) in ca. 40minütigen Leitfadeninterviews explorativ zu Musizierpraxis, Unterricht, Angebotswünschen, Bedeutungszuweisungen, Musikpräferenzen, Mitmusizierenden, Investitionsbereitschaft und Hürden befragt. Auffallend zeigte sich die enorme Individualität der Laienmusikerinnen und –musiker sowohl in ihren Motiven, als auch in ihrem Leistungsanspruch und den damit zusammenhängenden Herangehensweisen an ihr Hobby. Der Großteil der Befragten erhielt regelmäßig Unterricht (n=14; wöchentlich n=11), sowohl an einer Musikschule (n=7) als auch privat (n=7). Überrascht hat die Anzahl der Instrumente (bis zu sieben), die von manchen Laien gespielt werden. Fast ein Drittel (n=5) spielte zum Zeitpunkt der Befragung mehr als ein Instrument, fast die Hälfte (n=8) hatte bereits mit mehr als zwei zuvor erlernten Instrumenten wieder aufgehört. Die jeweilige Kammermusikpraxis, das verwendete Notenmaterial, Auftritte und Ängste, die persönliche Bedeutung des Musizierens, persönliche Ziele, die Selbsteinschätzung der Befragten und weitere Aspekte kammermusikalischen Musizierens erwachsener Laienmusiker werden in dieser Studie mit zahlreichen Interviewzitaten vorgestellt und fügen einen bisher nicht beachteten Blickwinkel der Musikgeragogik auf die mannigfaltige Szene der Kammermusikpraxis im Erwachsenenalter hinzu.In line with demographic developments and public perception of them, since the 1950s older people have increasingly been regarded as continuing learners (cf. Kehrer 1952; Veelken 2000; Arnold 2000). Musical learning has also been focused on, demonstrably since 1980, with Gerontology (Davidson 1980), in music pedagogical reflection (Grunenberg 1984 as "musical later education") and finally since 2005 (Hartogh) as the discipline of music geragogy. In addition to previous studies of general musical learning in adulthood, this study complements the aspect of specific chamber music learning and practice. During a music-making and encounter weekend at the Hochschule für Musik Detmold at the end of 2015, active amateur musicians (N=19) were interviewed in approximately 40-minute guided interviews exploring music-making practice, teaching, requests for offerings, allocation of meaning, music preferences, fellow musicians, willingness to invest and obstacles. The enormous individuality of the amateur musicians was conspicuous in their motives as well as in their performance demands and the related approaches to their hobby. The majority of the respondents received regular lessons (n=14; weekly n=11), both at a music school (n=7) and privately (n=7). The number of instruments (up to seven) played by some laypersons was surprising. Almost a third (n=5) played more than one instrument at the time of the survey, and almost half (n=8) had already stopped playing more than two previously learned instruments. The respective chamber music practice, the sheet music material used, performances and fears, the personal significance of making music, personal goals, the self-assessment of the respondents and other aspects of chamber music making by adult amateur musicians are presented in this study with numerous interview quotes and add a hitherto neglected perspective of music education on the diverse scene of chamber music practice in adulthood

Musikalische Hochbegabung - Kriterien und Maßstäbe aus der musikalischen Praxis. Eine empirische Studie

Die Frage „Was ist (musikalische) Hochbegabung?“ ist bereits mehrfach im wissenschaftlichen Diskurs gestellt und sowohl mit qualitativen als auch quantitativen Methoden erforscht worden. Bis dato wurden jedoch die Erfahrungswerte von Instrumentallehrern hochleistender Kinder- und Jugendlicher nicht genutzt. Mithilfe leitfadengestützter Experteninterviews am Musikgymnasium Schloss Belvedere, „Hochbegabtenzentrum“ der Hochschule für Musik „Franz Liszt“ Weimar, werden in der folgenden Studie Lehrende (N=11) mit jahrzehntelanger Erfahrung, sowohl im Unterrichten musikalisch Hochbegabter als auch im Einschätzen von Leistungen bei Aufnahmeprüfungen und Wettbewerben, zu konkreten Einzelparametern ihrer persönlichen Theorie musikalischer Hochbegabung befragt. Damit leistet die Studie einen Beitrag zur Versachlichung der Diskussion über Begabung in der Musik. Die Ergebnisse der qualitativen Interviews sind in fünf Hauptkategorien mit ggf. differenzierenden Unterkategorien gegliedert: außermusikalische Persönlichkeitsfaktoren (Selbstbild, Selbstpräsentation, Willenseigenschaften, Empfindsamkeit, Temperament), weitere außermusikalische Parameter (Motorik, Sozialverhalten, Intelligenz), Motivation Musik, altersüberdurchschnittliche Musikdarbietung (Instrumentaltechnik, Rhythmus, Musikalität, Ausdruck und Leidenschaft, Hörfähigkeit) sowie Begabung oder Fleiß. Die erhobenen Praxistheorien der Experten scheinen sich in manchen Details zu widersprechen, zeigen musikalische Hochbegabung aber insgesamt betrachtet durchgehend als einen multifaktoriellen Komplex, der sich in Verbindung mit den individuellen Persönlichkeiten sehr unterschiedlich ausprägt. Einzelfaktoren sind beispielsweise starke Selbstkritik, ein durch Leistung bestimmtes Selbstbild, ein hohes Präsentationsbedürfnis und „gesunder Ehrgeiz“. Zielstrebigkeit, Fleiß und Wille sowie Konzentrationsfähigkeit werden von den Experten bei als „hochbegabt“ bezeichneten Kindern und Jugendlichen sowohl beobachtet, als auch als unverzichtbar für die optimale Entwicklung des bereits gezeigten Potenzials in der Zukunft angesehen. Weiterhin nennen die Experten die Entwicklung von Gefühlstiefe, den Ausdruckswillen bzw. das Temperament, die Motorik und die Liebe bzw. Hingabe zur Musik und zum Instrument. Eine hohe soziale Flexibilität (z. B. viel alleine üben, aber mit anderen proben), Empathie, divergierendes Konkurrenzempfinden, wache Wahrnehmung, eine hohe Lerngeschwindigkeit und Intelligenz, eine umfassende Kreativität (z. B. eigene Gestaltung/Interpretation), große Motivation und einen starken Willen beobachten die Experten ebenfalls immer wieder bei solchen Schülern. Ein besonders starkes Bedürfnis nach Musik bzw. musikalischen Ausdrucksweisen sowie altersüberdurchschnittliches Interesse an Musik ist für manche Experten der entscheidende Unterschied zwischen „musikalischen“ und „musikalisch hochbegabten“ Kindern. Einen entscheidenden Hinweis und willkommene Bestätigung ihrer Prognose musikalischer Hochbegabung sehen die Experten in der altersüberdurchschnittlichen Leistung, die Kinder und Jugendliche beispielsweise bei Wettbewerben erbringen. Einzelne konkrete Erwartungen der Experten an die Instrumentaltechnik, die Werkauswahl und eine musikalische Darbietung von 10- und 16jährigen musikalisch Hochbegabten stellt die Studie in eigenen Tabellen zusammen. Dem Phänomen des sogenannten Absoluten Gehörs messen die Befragten keine große Bedeutung bei. Außerdem betont ein Großteil der Befragten die Multifaktorialität (musikalischer) Hochbegabung und die damit einhergehende Bedeutungslosigkeit von Einzelparametern. Fleiß (und die daraus folgende Expertise) wird in der Praxistheorie der meisten befragten Experten als entscheidend für die weitere musikalische Laufbahn genannt. Im musikalischen Ausdruck einer Darbietung ist nach Aussage einzelner Experten jedoch der Unterschied zwischen „reinem Fleiß“ und „(Hoch-) Begabung“ zu erkennen. Zur zahlenmäßigen Verteilung von „Hochbegabten“, „Fleißarbeitern“ und „Überforderten“ an der eigenen Institution gibt es z. T. grundverschiedene Ansichten.What exactly is giftedness in music? This question is frequently raised in scientific discourse and has been answered in part by qualitative and quantitative research. In the past, however, the empirical experience of music teachers of highly skilled children and young people has not been given its due consideration. This study involved music teachers (N=11) at the Schloss Belvedere School of Music, the centre for highly gifted children of the Franz Liszt University of Music in Weimar, who have decades of experience in teaching musically highly gifted children and evaluating performances in entrance exams and competitions. They were asked in detail about concrete aspects of their personal theories of giftedness in music. This study seeks thus to contribute to an objective debate about giftedness in music. The results of the qualitative interviews are divided into five main categories, which are in turn split into subcategories, as appropriate. The categories are non-musical personality-related factors (such as self-image, self presentation, traits of volition, sensitivity, temperament), further non-musical parameters (such as motor skills, social behavior, intelligence), music motivation, above-average musical performance for their age (technique, rhythm, musicality, expression and passion, auditory ability) as well as talent and diligence. The various personal theories of the experts gleaned from observation and recorded in this survey may seem to contradict each other in some details, but taken as a whole they show giftedness in music as multi-factor complex that develops very differently in conjunction with individual personalities. Single factors are, for example, strong self-criticism, a self-perception based on performance, a pronounced need for presentation and “healthy ambition”. Single-mindedness, diligence and will plus an ability to concentrate are qualities that are observed by experts among children and adolescents identified as “highly gifted” and indeed considered essential for the ideal ongoing development of acknowledged potential. Other significant qualities listed by the experts are the development of emotional depth, the will to express or temperament, motor skills and a love of or devotion to music and their instrument. A high degree of social flexibility (e.g. to practice alone a lot but also “know” how to rehearse with others), empathy, a diverging sense of competition, good perceptive skills, high intelligence and speed of learning, broad creativity (e.g. own expression/interpretations), a high level of motivation and a strong will are also consistently observed by the experts among such students. A particularly pronounced need for music and musical expression, plus an above-average interest in music for their age, is for some experts the crucial difference between children who are just “musical” and these who are “musically highly gifted”. The experts see children and youth performing at an above-average level for their age, such as in competitions, as crucial evidence and validation of their prognosis of giftedness in music. This research collates individual, precise expert expectations with respect to instrumental technique, level of selected works and musical performance of musically highly gifted 10- and 16-year-olds in tabular form. The phenomenon of “perfect pitch” is only marginally significant for respondents. Furthermore a majority of respondents emphasize the multiplicity of factors that make up musical giftedness and consequently the irrelevance of individual parameters. The experts name diligence (and the resulting expertise) as a crucial factor for a further career in music. According to individual experts, only aspects of musical expression of a performance let one recognize a difference between “sheer diligence” and “outstanding talent”. The experts have very different views, however, about the spread of numbers of “highly gifted talents”, “diligent hard workers” and the “overstretched” at their own school

The Toarcian Posidonia Shale at Salem (North Alpine Foreland Basin; South Germany): hydrocarbon potential and paleogeography

The Posidonia Shale in the basement of the North Alpine Foreland Basin of southwestern Germany represents an important archive for environmental changes during the Toarcian oceanic anoxic event and the associated carbon isotope excursion (T-CIE). It is also an important hydrocarbon source rock. In the Salem borehole, the Posidonia Shale is ~ 10 m thick. The lower 7.5 m (1763.5–1756.0 m) of the Posidonian Shale and the uppermost part of the underlying Amaltheenton Formation were cored and studied using a total of 62 samples. Rock–Eval, palynological, maceral, biomarker and carbon isotope data were collected to assess variations in environmental conditions and to quantify the source rock potential. In contrast to most other Toarcian sections in southwest Germany, TOC contents are high in sediments deposited during the T-CIE, but reach a peak in post-CIE sediments. Biomarker ratios suggest that this reflects strong oxygen-depletion during the T-CIE (elegantulum to lower elegans subzones), but also during the falciferum Subzone, which is also reflected by a prolonged dinoflagellate cyst blackout. While sediments of the tenuicostatum Zone to the elegans Subzone are thinner than in neighbouring sections (e.g., Dotternhausen), sediments of the falciferum Subzone are unusually thick, suggesting that increased subsidence might have contributed to anoxia. The T-CIE interval is very thin (0.75 m). δ$^{13}$C values of n-alkanes show that the maximum negative isotope shift predates the strongest basin restriction during the T-CIE and that the carbon isotope shift is recorded earlier for aquatic than for terrigenous organisms. In Salem, the Posidonia Shale is thermally mature and highly oil-prone. The residual source petroleum potential is about 0.8 tHC/m$^{2}$. Graphical Abstrac

The state of the Martian climate

60°N was +2.0°C, relative to the 1981–2010 average value (Fig. 5.1). This marks a new high for the record. The average annual surface air temperature (SAT) anomaly for 2016 for land stations north of starting in 1900, and is a significant increase over the previous highest value of +1.2°C, which was observed in 2007, 2011, and 2015. Average global annual temperatures also showed record values in 2015 and 2016. Currently, the Arctic is warming at more than twice the rate of lower latitudes

State of the climate in 2018

In 2018, the dominant greenhouse gases released into Earth’s atmosphere—carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide—continued their increase. The annual global average carbon dioxide concentration at Earth’s surface was 407.4 ± 0.1 ppm, the highest in the modern instrumental record and in ice core records dating back 800 000 years. Combined, greenhouse gases and several halogenated gases contribute just over 3 W m−2 to radiative forcing and represent a nearly 43% increase since 1990. Carbon dioxide is responsible for about 65% of this radiative forcing. With a weak La Niña in early 2018 transitioning to a weak El Niño by the year’s end, the global surface (land and ocean) temperature was the fourth highest on record, with only 2015 through 2017 being warmer. Several European countries reported record high annual temperatures. There were also more high, and fewer low, temperature extremes than in nearly all of the 68-year extremes record. Madagascar recorded a record daily temperature of 40.5°C in Morondava in March, while South Korea set its record high of 41.0°C in August in Hongcheon. Nawabshah, Pakistan, recorded its highest temperature of 50.2°C, which may be a new daily world record for April. Globally, the annual lower troposphere temperature was third to seventh highest, depending on the dataset analyzed. The lower stratospheric temperature was approximately fifth lowest. The 2018 Arctic land surface temperature was 1.2°C above the 1981–2010 average, tying for third highest in the 118-year record, following 2016 and 2017. June’s Arctic snow cover extent was almost half of what it was 35 years ago. Across Greenland, however, regional summer temperatures were generally below or near average. Additionally, a satellite survey of 47 glaciers in Greenland indicated a net increase in area for the first time since records began in 1999. Increasing permafrost temperatures were reported at most observation sites in the Arctic, with the overall increase of 0.1°–0.2°C between 2017 and 2018 being comparable to the highest rate of warming ever observed in the region. On 17 March, Arctic sea ice extent marked the second smallest annual maximum in the 38-year record, larger than only 2017. The minimum extent in 2018 was reached on 19 September and again on 23 September, tying 2008 and 2010 for the sixth lowest extent on record. The 23 September date tied 1997 as the latest sea ice minimum date on record. First-year ice now dominates the ice cover, comprising 77% of the March 2018 ice pack compared to 55% during the 1980s. Because thinner, younger ice is more vulnerable to melting out in summer, this shift in sea ice age has contributed to the decreasing trend in minimum ice extent. Regionally, Bering Sea ice extent was at record lows for almost the entire 2017/18 ice season. For the Antarctic continent as a whole, 2018 was warmer than average. On the highest points of the Antarctic Plateau, the automatic weather station Relay (74°S) broke or tied six monthly temperature records throughout the year, with August breaking its record by nearly 8°C. However, cool conditions in the western Bellingshausen Sea and Amundsen Sea sector contributed to a low melt season overall for 2017/18. High SSTs contributed to low summer sea ice extent in the Ross and Weddell Seas in 2018, underpinning the second lowest Antarctic summer minimum sea ice extent on record. Despite conducive conditions for its formation, the ozone hole at its maximum extent in September was near the 2000–18 mean, likely due to an ongoing slow decline in stratospheric chlorine monoxide concentration. Across the oceans, globally averaged SST decreased slightly since the record El Niño year of 2016 but was still far above the climatological mean. On average, SST is increasing at a rate of 0.10° ± 0.01°C decade−1 since 1950. The warming appeared largest in the tropical Indian Ocean and smallest in the North Pacific. The deeper ocean continues to warm year after year. For the seventh consecutive year, global annual mean sea level became the highest in the 26-year record, rising to 81 mm above the 1993 average. As anticipated in a warming climate, the hydrological cycle over the ocean is accelerating: dry regions are becoming drier and wet regions rainier. Closer to the equator, 95 named tropical storms were observed during 2018, well above the 1981–2010 average of 82. Eleven tropical cyclones reached Saffir–Simpson scale Category 5 intensity. North Atlantic Major Hurricane Michael’s landfall intensity of 140 kt was the fourth strongest for any continental U.S. hurricane landfall in the 168-year record. Michael caused more than 30 fatalities and $25 billion (U.S. dollars) in damages. In the western North Pacific, Super Typhoon Mangkhut led to 160 fatalities and$6 billion (U.S. dollars) in damages across the Philippines, Hong Kong, Macau, mainland China, Guam, and the Northern Mariana Islands. Tropical Storm Son-Tinh was responsible for 170 fatalities in Vietnam and Laos. Nearly all the islands of Micronesia experienced at least moderate impacts from various tropical cyclones. Across land, many areas around the globe received copious precipitation, notable at different time scales. Rodrigues and Réunion Island near southern Africa each reported their third wettest year on record. In Hawaii, 1262 mm precipitation at Waipā Gardens (Kauai) on 14–15 April set a new U.S. record for 24-h precipitation. In Brazil, the city of Belo Horizonte received nearly 75 mm of rain in just 20 minutes, nearly half its monthly average. Globally, fire activity during 2018 was the lowest since the start of the record in 1997, with a combined burned area of about 500 million hectares. This reinforced the long-term downward trend in fire emissions driven by changes in land use in frequently burning savannas. However, wildfires burned 3.5 million hectares across the United States, well above the 2000–10 average of 2.7 million hectares. Combined, U.S. wildfire damages for the 2017 and 2018 wildfire seasons exceeded $40 billion (U.S. dollars)