Do you think that it is important for our childen to learn music?
It dont just mean trad, although I am biased, but any form of music.
My daughter seems to get alot from it, and not just by learning how to play the instrument, but also in terms of concentration span, attention to detail, new skills, an understanding of patterns and a social life that she wouldnt have if not for playing music.
When I asked her teacher about the frequency of participation for the pupils in the arts and how (in my opinion) it may help my daughters development, she looked at me as though I had grown a flute out the top of my head!
Am I the only mad parent that thinks it important that her child has access to learn music for various reasons and not JUST for the sake of learning an instrument?
There are those that think that learning without the written is just as important - see the Kathryn Tickell programme that was on tv the other week, she was running a group of children learning to play by ear - thinking without the written aid can be even more important - I know a musician who is dyslexic, finds learning anything written a serious chore, but his playing is spot-on and superb - couldn't get him for St Pats' because he was in NYNY, instead of London, playing.
Your kids' teacher may have lost sight of what she is giving her pupils - it happens.
Nope. Sorry. Only need math and reading. Eveything else is just fluff and might lead children into a dangerous open-mindedness. Next thing you know, they’ll be thinking for themselves. Nope, can’t have it.
I think the most important thing is that children hear live music coming from people they know especially their parents, ideally you should sing to them from an early age; at 5 months or so the child’s neocortex starts to analyse and assimilate anything that you can throw at it and once they’ve sussed out that music is important stuff they'll develop an understanding of it.
I raised 3 children and the all played music. I always thought it helpful that I did - Dad practiced every day so it was just a normal part of life in our house. Non of them has stuck with it, but I know it's "in there" as it was with me.
Oh, and Bob's warning is correct - learning music can lead to evil things like think for themselves and worse - having fun.
Music is one of those things that gives life meaning--I can't imagine life without it--whether it is in a pub, on a radio, in church, in a community concert, or a paid performance, whether participating or just listening.
As always, with any kind of activity, you have to gauge as best you can how formally and to what extent you help your kids develop their music potential.
We exposed our kids to music from the get-go, whether by playing it in our parlor or by taking them to festivals, concerts or house jam sessions. But for a variety of reasons, we didn't pursue formal music lessons for either of them in elementary school; some of it was financial, but it also had to do with their temperaments, frankly -- not every kid is necessarily cut out for the kind of music instruction you're most likely to encounter.
But our kids always enjoyed music throughout school, and participated in the choral group programs, so they at least had that kind of involvement.
A few years ago, our oldest decided to teach herself guitar, and we wound up buying her a used Epiphone. She is able to play enough chords so she can learn songs by her favorite writers, e.g. Ani DiFranco, Liz Phair, Joni Mitchell, Simon & Garfunkel. Maybe she'll end up taking lessons some day, but at least she is able to wrap herself in music when she wants, or needs to -- to decompress after a tough day at school, for example.
Our younger one actually took voice lessons for several months when she was 14, just to help her think about projecting, articulating, moderating tone, and so on. She sang plenty before she took lessons, and she continues to do so, even for her own pleasure.
There's a suggestion in some of the posts here that the shortage of music in the curriculum is somehow the fault of the teachers. Is there anyone here who lives in a place where the teachers control the curriculum anymore? In most of the situations I'm familiar with, the role of music in the curriculum is determined by a complicated political game played by government officials, local school administrators, and the voters. Money, teachers, and students are the game pieces that the players use.
More and more, in the US anyway, teachers are under the tyranny of high-stakes testing. Teach-to-the-test is not the teachers’ idea. Their jobs depend on it. Not just music and art, but social studies, history, science, health, etc. are being sacrificed on the altar of standardized testing.
Is music education important? I think music is as important as literature.
[cue internal monologue]
......must fight urge to mention "No Child Left Behind".........must fight urge to mention the President and his policies........must fight urge to make this discussion political..............if I don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything.......................aaaaaargh.............
I have found that, at music festivals in Ireland, all the musician kids seem to have respect for older musicians - not just the for the 'respected' musicians, but even for me and others like me. Perhaps I'm just used to the *attitude* of city kids, being from London. But many of the kids at these festivals *are* city kids - and I don't think this kind of respect is by any means universal among kids in Ireland, in the cities or in the country. This probably has something to do with the social mechanism by which the Traditional Music is propagated in Ireland - perhaps more so than the music itself. But I do think that an early start at music introduces kids to the possibility of enjoying a (largely)peaceful pursuit.
If you have instruments lying about the house, the kids will either lift them or not. My brat plays all sorts of instruments, self taught, never had a teacher. I mean, what could I teach him?
I totally agree. And learning music allows you to work with people who are different from you, and a lot of times older than you. In my experience, I have had the opportunity to listen to many amazing musicians, and I think this makes me respect my elders and their cultures. I was never taught music in school, or as a kid, but I wish I would have because I think it helps you in all aspects of life.
A few years back I came out of O'Connell's Galway sat on a bench just in time to witness 5 kids put fire to an old man sleeping in the park. Ive yet to see anything as shocking.
I doubt these kids were offered a chance to play an instument.
Now, Dowzer, since when does needing an answer have anything to do with whether we fulminate, elaborate, pontificate, obfuscate or master the craft of vapid discourse?
Oh my. I haven't seen the word "fulminate" (well, maybe once or twice) since college, in the late 70s, when there was some grafitti (a grafitus?) on the walls of the tunnels under the dormitories that I remember after 30 years:
Any more of this egregious balderdash and I shall fulminate!
But I see by the autobiography that Bob himself wrote himself about himself that he's probably too old to have grafted that grafitus to the wall.
i think the national curriculum could devote 1 hr per week to every child learning an instrument as it demonstrates the value of being able to use ones hands, which is a priceless skill for adult life
I have actually tried really hard to find out what percentage of arts to 'normal' subjects there are on the curriculum. Let me tell it could be a full time job!
Yes absolutely. I think Music is treated very shabbily in the UK. Wherever you live, pursue it with your school. Keep pushing and someone will have to start thinking about it!!
Unfortunately, in most schools music is an afterthought. In our local school, a "music" session is held to occupy the children so the rest of the teachers can go off and do their planning stuff. I wonder what would happen if we treated other subjects like that? "Oh, we'll do some maths to keep them quiet"
It's worse in New Zealand, few children learn to play an instrument unless their parents are very wealthy and learning an instrument is a must to keep up with the other parents; or the parents are musical. For many people admitting you play something other than a guitar is an embarrassment and there will always be someone riduculing a musician. Music is taught from ages 5-14 as group singing and occasionally alto recorder taught by repetition and fingering, never actually learning to read music. About 15 years ago there was a scheme where music teachers would be paid to come into high schools and teach wind, string, brass and piano. But this is no longer the case, its now strictly user pays. At $60 a hour plus the cost of an instrument, not many can afford it.
Music is now a rich mans sport in New Zealand.
Finding musicians to session play with who arent advanced or advanced snobs is a difficult find. There just isnt the willingness or the money to try.
Even when it comes to rock music the musicians have the same technique and I am sure all the producers were taught by the same person. Personally I think that 90% of the commercial music out of New Zealand is total rubbish and instead of spending money funding music videos for bad hip-hop wannabes that the arts council should be spending money employing music teachers to teach in schools.
Sorry, but I think it is a world wide phenomenon. It has to do with the availability of sanitised studio produced music with all the ruff! polished off it. So the average Joe Bloggs is used to stars and hearing perfectly produced music, not the beautiful live warts and all stuff. Therefore, you really have to be a star to get listened to. Hard to compete with it.
There are some kids who only go to school for what they call 'music', and, yes, it is guitar rap noisy idol stuff, but its a way out of a life destined to less than mediocrasy, so I say they should go for it. They play what they do because it nourishes them. Don't kid yourself, their compulsion is at least as great as ours. They enjoy it, and fair play to them, it gives them a voice, but I recon they do come away sounding exactly the same 'just another brick in the wall'. And they might say the same of us.
"Music is now a rich mans sport in New Zealand.
Finding musicians to session play with who arent advanced or advanced snobs is a difficult find"
a worldwide trend perhaps?
Disclaimer: Not that anyone on here, on anyone I've ever played with who might remember me, would fall into that category
Geoff, music education is wasting away in Scotland. Luckily my kids went to a school where it's well-supported - a "rough" school that had funding thrown at it and established a good music department
I think it is a mistake to go put values on creativity. Teach the kids what they want to learn. By all means leave instruments laying about. Expose them tactfully to an eclectic mix. Let them find their own way. Too much rigidity spoils the enjoyment, and why should any kid's dreams, musical or otherwise, be stifled?
"there is no music on the EOG testing..if there were, then the teachers would teach to it...
very sad state...that's one of the reasons we home-school"
Ditto here. I was unable to have private music lessons as a child, but in elementary school, we had music class every week, and PE often involved folk dancing. After elementary school, one could join school band or orchestra for lessons. The system is SO broken. We homeschool, too, which enables us to take the kids and expose them to all sorts of wonderful live music, like Altan last spring, and Lunasa last night, and Kevin Burke and Ged Foley in two weeks, not to mention the ballet, contradancing, ceili dancing, literary readings, the symphony, museums, etc., many of which we did as school field trips growing up. Now they are deemed unnecessary, too expensive, and liability laden. But from what I read and have experienced in my own life, those exposed to the arts and encouraged to participate are well-rounded individuals who can think and reason and adapt and find creative solutions to problems--their minds are stimulated. (And what's more, homeschooled kids are being actively pursued by colleges and universities for these very characteristics, and employers are beginning to realize once again the strength of a classic liberal arts education.) Thus far, our kids both play piano and whistle; the older one starts the lever harp next month, and the younger one wants to learn to play the guitar, too, and after seeing Lunasa, I wouldn't at all be surprised if she says she'd like to give the pipes a go. Music--the arts--aren't just important, but essential to mankind's very existence and sense of identity. I find it difficult to fathom how anyone can deem them unimportant, and I have to assume that such individuals never had the opportunity to pursue them, had them forced upon them so as to destroy the pleasure, or are so brainwashed by the sheeple mentality of those "leading" the eduational systems that they can't even comprehend how it fits into life. Okay, rant over. Stepping off soapbox. Back to work.
“Too much rigidity spoils the enjoyment, and why should any kid's dreams, musical or otherwise, be stifled?”
Ah, well, there’s the rub, innit? How to actually offer music in the schools without killing it.
“Expose them tactfully to an eclectic mix. Let them find their own way.”
And this is the answer. Schools could do this. It’s not that hard. It would certainly take no more effort than what goes into the typical high-school marching band. [Resisting the urge to comment further on marching bands.]
Is it important?
Is it important?
Do you think that it is important for our childen to learn music?
It dont just mean trad, although I am biased, but any form of music.
My daughter seems to get alot from it, and not just by learning how to play the instrument, but also in terms of concentration span, attention to detail, new skills, an understanding of patterns and a social life that she wouldnt have if not for playing music.
When I asked her teacher about the frequency of participation for the pupils in the arts and how (in my opinion) it may help my daughters development, she looked at me as though I had grown a flute out the top of my head!
Am I the only mad parent that thinks it important that her child has access to learn music for various reasons and not JUST for the sake of learning an instrument?
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by blas
Re: Is it important?
There are those that think that learning without the written is just as important - see the Kathryn Tickell programme that was on tv the other week, she was running a group of children learning to play by ear - thinking without the written aid can be even more important - I know a musician who is dyslexic, finds learning anything written a serious chore, but his playing is spot-on and superb - couldn't get him for St Pats' because he was in NYNY, instead of London, playing.
Your kids' teacher may have lost sight of what she is giving her pupils - it happens.
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by Guernsey Pete
Re: Is it important?
Nope. Sorry. Only need math and reading. Eveything else is just fluff and might lead children into a dangerous open-mindedness. Next thing you know, they’ll be thinking for themselves. Nope, can’t have it.
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by Bob himself
Re: Is it important?
I think the most important thing is that children hear live music coming from people they know especially their parents, ideally you should sing to them from an early age; at 5 months or so the child’s neocortex starts to analyse and assimilate anything that you can throw at it and once they’ve sussed out that music is important stuff they'll develop an understanding of it.
PP
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by Pied Piper
Re: Is it important?
I raised 3 children and the all played music. I always thought it helpful that I did - Dad practiced every day so it was just a normal part of life in our house. Non of them has stuck with it, but I know it's "in there" as it was with me.
Oh, and Bob's warning is correct - learning music can lead to evil things like think for themselves and worse - having fun.
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by flutedoog
Re: Is it important?
Music is one of those things that gives life meaning--I can't imagine life without it--whether it is in a pub, on a radio, in church, in a community concert, or a paid performance, whether participating or just listening.
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by AlBrown
Re: Is it important?
As always, with any kind of activity, you have to gauge as best you can how formally and to what extent you help your kids develop their music potential.
We exposed our kids to music from the get-go, whether by playing it in our parlor or by taking them to festivals, concerts or house jam sessions. But for a variety of reasons, we didn't pursue formal music lessons for either of them in elementary school; some of it was financial, but it also had to do with their temperaments, frankly -- not every kid is necessarily cut out for the kind of music instruction you're most likely to encounter.
But our kids always enjoyed music throughout school, and participated in the choral group programs, so they at least had that kind of involvement.
A few years ago, our oldest decided to teach herself guitar, and we wound up buying her a used Epiphone. She is able to play enough chords so she can learn songs by her favorite writers, e.g. Ani DiFranco, Liz Phair, Joni Mitchell, Simon & Garfunkel. Maybe she'll end up taking lessons some day, but at least she is able to wrap herself in music when she wants, or needs to -- to decompress after a tough day at school, for example.
Our younger one actually took voice lessons for several months when she was 14, just to help her think about projecting, articulating, moderating tone, and so on. She sang plenty before she took lessons, and she continues to do so, even for her own pleasure.
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by sts
Re: Is it important?
Open their ears - their minds will follow.
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by drone
Re: Is it important?
there is no music on the EOG testing..if there were, then the teachers would teach to it...
very sad state...that's one of the reasons we home-school
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by Sunnybear
Re: Is it important?
Absolutely. Learning music, languages and travel are roads to peace.
stv
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by stv culchie
Re: Is it important?
There's a suggestion in some of the posts here that the shortage of music in the curriculum is somehow the fault of the teachers. Is there anyone here who lives in a place where the teachers control the curriculum anymore? In most of the situations I'm familiar with, the role of music in the curriculum is determined by a complicated political game played by government officials, local school administrators, and the voters. Money, teachers, and students are the game pieces that the players use.
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by GaryAMartin
Re: Is it important?
More and more, in the US anyway, teachers are under the tyranny of high-stakes testing. Teach-to-the-test is not the teachers’ idea. Their jobs depend on it. Not just music and art, but social studies, history, science, health, etc. are being sacrificed on the altar of standardized testing.
Is music education important? I think music is as important as literature.
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by Bob himself
Re: Is it important?
[cue internal monologue]
......must fight urge to mention "No Child Left Behind".........must fight urge to mention the President and his policies........must fight urge to make this discussion political..............if I don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything.......................aaaaaargh.............
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by AlBrown
Re: Is it important?
Do you really need an answer to this question?
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by Dr. Dow
Re: Is it important?
I have found that, at music festivals in Ireland, all the musician kids seem to have respect for older musicians - not just the for the 'respected' musicians, but even for me and others like me. Perhaps I'm just used to the *attitude* of city kids, being from London. But many of the kids at these festivals *are* city kids - and I don't think this kind of respect is by any means universal among kids in Ireland, in the cities or in the country. This probably has something to do with the social mechanism by which the Traditional Music is propagated in Ireland - perhaps more so than the music itself. But I do think that an early start at music introduces kids to the possibility of enjoying a (largely)peaceful pursuit.
Or am I living in Pays de Nuage Coucou?
# Posted on March 29th 2006 by CreadurMawnOrganig
Re: Is it important?
If you have instruments lying about the house, the kids will either lift them or not. My brat plays all sorts of instruments, self taught, never had a teacher. I mean, what could I teach him?
# Posted on March 30th 2006 by bodhran bliss
Re: Is it important?
Yes.
Run a Google search for the keywords "music brain development" if you have any doubts.
# Posted on March 30th 2006 by John Galt
Re: Is it important?
I totally agree. And learning music allows you to work with people who are different from you, and a lot of times older than you. In my experience, I have had the opportunity to listen to many amazing musicians, and I think this makes me respect my elders and their cultures. I was never taught music in school, or as a kid, but I wish I would have because I think it helps you in all aspects of life.
# Posted on March 30th 2006 by m
Re: Is it important?
A few years back I came out of O'Connell's Galway sat on a bench just in time to witness 5 kids put fire to an old man sleeping in the park. Ive yet to see anything as shocking.
I doubt these kids were offered a chance to play an instument.
# Posted on March 30th 2006 by lamh trom
Re: Is it important?
“Do you really need an answer to this question?”
Now, Dowzer, since when does needing an answer have anything to do with whether we fulminate, elaborate, pontificate, obfuscate or master the craft of vapid discourse?
# Posted on March 30th 2006 by Bob himself
Re: Is it important?
Oh my. I haven't seen the word "fulminate" (well, maybe once or twice) since college, in the late 70s, when there was some grafitti (a grafitus?) on the walls of the tunnels under the dormitories that I remember after 30 years:
Any more of this egregious balderdash and I shall fulminate!
But I see by the autobiography that Bob himself wrote himself about himself that he's probably too old to have grafted that grafitus to the wall.
# Posted on March 30th 2006 by GaryAMartin
Re: Is it important?
i think the national curriculum could devote 1 hr per week to every child learning an instrument as it demonstrates the value of being able to use ones hands, which is a priceless skill for adult life
# Posted on March 30th 2006 by Ripthecalico
Re: Is it important?
I have actually tried really hard to find out what percentage of arts to 'normal' subjects there are on the curriculum. Let me tell it could be a full time job!
# Posted on March 30th 2006 by blas
Re: Is it important?
Fulminate, obfuscate, etc.: I can’t remember which of those is supposed to make you go blind.
# Posted on March 30th 2006 by Bob himself
Re: Is it important?
Yes absolutely. I think Music is treated very shabbily in the UK. Wherever you live, pursue it with your school. Keep pushing and someone will have to start thinking about it!!
Unfortunately, in most schools music is an afterthought. In our local school, a "music" session is held to occupy the children so the rest of the teachers can go off and do their planning stuff. I wonder what would happen if we treated other subjects like that? "Oh, we'll do some maths to keep them quiet"
# Posted on March 30th 2006 by Mark Harmer
Re: Is it important?
It's worse in New Zealand, few children learn to play an instrument unless their parents are very wealthy and learning an instrument is a must to keep up with the other parents; or the parents are musical. For many people admitting you play something other than a guitar is an embarrassment and there will always be someone riduculing a musician. Music is taught from ages 5-14 as group singing and occasionally alto recorder taught by repetition and fingering, never actually learning to read music. About 15 years ago there was a scheme where music teachers would be paid to come into high schools and teach wind, string, brass and piano. But this is no longer the case, its now strictly user pays. At $60 a hour plus the cost of an instrument, not many can afford it.
Music is now a rich mans sport in New Zealand.
Finding musicians to session play with who arent advanced or advanced snobs is a difficult find. There just isnt the willingness or the money to try.
Even when it comes to rock music the musicians have the same technique and I am sure all the producers were taught by the same person. Personally I think that 90% of the commercial music out of New Zealand is total rubbish and instead of spending money funding music videos for bad hip-hop wannabes that the arts council should be spending money employing music teachers to teach in schools.
# Posted on March 31st 2006 by Joze
Re: Is it important?
Have you ever heard of art for art's sake? You play music because it's fun. You find it fun because you play it.
That's all there is to it.
# Posted on March 31st 2006 by Joe CSS
Re: Is it important?
I play because it’s fun, but I also play because it nourishes me. I need it like I need sunshine.
# Posted on March 31st 2006 by Bob himself
Setting fire to old men in park
If that can happen in Ireland (or Scotland), where music lessons are the norm, what chance have we in England where such lessons are not free?
# Posted on March 31st 2006 by geoffwright
Re: Is it important?
Sorry, but I think it is a world wide phenomenon. It has to do with the availability of sanitised studio produced music with all the ruff! polished off it. So the average Joe Bloggs is used to stars and hearing perfectly produced music, not the beautiful live warts and all stuff. Therefore, you really have to be a star to get listened to. Hard to compete with it.
There are some kids who only go to school for what they call 'music', and, yes, it is guitar rap noisy idol stuff, but its a way out of a life destined to less than mediocrasy, so I say they should go for it. They play what they do because it nourishes them. Don't kid yourself, their compulsion is at least as great as ours. They enjoy it, and fair play to them, it gives them a voice, but I recon they do come away sounding exactly the same 'just another brick in the wall'. And they might say the same of us.
# Posted on March 31st 2006 by Clear Drops
Re: Is it important?
"Music is now a rich mans sport in New Zealand.
Finding musicians to session play with who arent advanced or advanced snobs is a difficult find"
a worldwide trend perhaps?
Disclaimer: Not that anyone on here, on anyone I've ever played with who might remember me, would fall into that category
Geoff, music education is wasting away in Scotland. Luckily my kids went to a school where it's well-supported - a "rough" school that had funding thrown at it and established a good music department
# Posted on March 31st 2006 by Bren
Re: Is it important?
I think it is a mistake to go put values on creativity. Teach the kids what they want to learn. By all means leave instruments laying about. Expose them tactfully to an eclectic mix. Let them find their own way. Too much rigidity spoils the enjoyment, and why should any kid's dreams, musical or otherwise, be stifled?
# Posted on March 31st 2006 by Clear Drops
Re: Is it important?
"there is no music on the EOG testing..if there were, then the teachers would teach to it...
very sad state...that's one of the reasons we home-school"
Ditto here. I was unable to have private music lessons as a child, but in elementary school, we had music class every week, and PE often involved folk dancing. After elementary school, one could join school band or orchestra for lessons. The system is SO broken. We homeschool, too, which enables us to take the kids and expose them to all sorts of wonderful live music, like Altan last spring, and Lunasa last night, and Kevin Burke and Ged Foley in two weeks, not to mention the ballet, contradancing, ceili dancing, literary readings, the symphony, museums, etc., many of which we did as school field trips growing up. Now they are deemed unnecessary, too expensive, and liability laden. But from what I read and have experienced in my own life, those exposed to the arts and encouraged to participate are well-rounded individuals who can think and reason and adapt and find creative solutions to problems--their minds are stimulated. (And what's more, homeschooled kids are being actively pursued by colleges and universities for these very characteristics, and employers are beginning to realize once again the strength of a classic liberal arts education.) Thus far, our kids both play piano and whistle; the older one starts the lever harp next month, and the younger one wants to learn to play the guitar, too, and after seeing Lunasa, I wouldn't at all be surprised if she says she'd like to give the pipes a go. Music--the arts--aren't just important, but essential to mankind's very existence and sense of identity. I find it difficult to fathom how anyone can deem them unimportant, and I have to assume that such individuals never had the opportunity to pursue them, had them forced upon them so as to destroy the pleasure, or are so brainwashed by the sheeple mentality of those "leading" the eduational systems that they can't even comprehend how it fits into life. Okay, rant over. Stepping off soapbox. Back to work.
# Posted on March 31st 2006 by Gaelic writer
Re: Is it important?
“Too much rigidity spoils the enjoyment, and why should any kid's dreams, musical or otherwise, be stifled?”
Ah, well, there’s the rub, innit? How to actually offer music in the schools without killing it.
“Expose them tactfully to an eclectic mix. Let them find their own way.”
And this is the answer. Schools could do this. It’s not that hard. It would certainly take no more effort than what goes into the typical high-school marching band. [Resisting the urge to comment further on marching bands.]
# Posted on March 31st 2006 by Bob himself
Re: Is it important?
Oh great Goddess, how couldn't it be?
# Posted on April 1st 2006 by cathrynb