Is traditional skill learning dead?
November 19th, 2006 by jabramo
I came across this video entitled Amateur (Thanks to my colleague Steve Austin for bringing it to my attention) . It is created by Lasse Gjertsen, a professional video editor, but an amateur musician that doesn’t play the instruments he is depicted playing in the video. Can this video teach us something about the musical interaction in the technology-mediated classroom? If we were to get students to cut and paste video or audio to create an original composition—as in this video—do students need “traditional” technique and skill on “traditional” instruments to make music? If we can get students to make music without learning an instrument does this mean the end of scales and etudes in music education? Or will there always be a need for “old-school” skill building on “old-school” instruments? And if so, would it be appropriate for every student?
This is such an important question to wrestle with. I teach music to 19+ students - their aspirations are predominantly in popular music, and many of them can create and perform competent compositions before I hit them with any music theory.
The good news is that they WANT the theory to expand their language. Cut-the-corners musicianship is shallow - they want to know what they are doing and how to develop it.
But these are learners with a music specialism; your post refers (I think) to music in the general curriculum and there are a couple of points I would wish to raise.
Balance - the technology is a wonderful asset to creativity, but balance it with traditional music knowledge.
Convergence - the edges between the creative disciplines are increasingly blurred, so perhaps we need to re-mould our arts curriculum to bring music, video, art and writing together.
Scales are still beautiful though! So is playing an instrument!
I used your question as a discussion point in my class at TC last night Joe, and it yielded some great comments. My students were pretty unanimous in the feeling that traditional music skills will always be important - in a performance-based classroom. Whether or not choral and instrumental teachers will still be teaching traditional performing ensembles 50 years from now is a different question - one eluded to in an earlier post of yours.
In the General Music classroom however, loop-based compositions by students who may not be well-served in a performance-based classroom setting can be an outlet for creativity difficult to facilitate without technology. The Amateur Video is most definately a musical work. Obviously the composition that the author came up with is music - and there is clear evidence of traditional music skills in the process of composing. Will technology end the need for traditional music skills? I think not. I believe that technology creates the need-to-know within students that can inspire them to learn the music skills that will make their compositions more musical.
People like being able to play instruments; the joy is in the musicing as much as in the musical product. As another mode of musicing, the composing process you describe sounds like a lot of fun, too. For me, at least, it would still require a significant degree of learning.
In a different vein Joe, I wonder if as more music educators begin using these types of technologies in their classrooms, they resort to using the same types of “traditional techniques” but just through a new medium. I’m thinking of how so many people use technology as a parallel to what is already done on instruments or paper rather than using it to do things that aren’t possible in the analog world i.e. working on theory assignments using notation software. I wonder if five years from now someone will be asking the same question about “traditional techniques” with cutting and pasting and whatever the equivalent to etudes on a laptop will be. I’m also thinking about how there already exists a method book and notation system for the turntable. It seems to me to be somewhat antithetical to the spirit of the electronic cut and paste ethic to codify it with a systematic practice system.
I think we might see more and more music educators leaning towards the direction of informal learning ala Lucy Green and others. Where the formalities of scales and etudes are replaced by “doodling”and messing around on instruments. Check out the latest issue of IJME for some interesting articles in this area.
As for the cutting and pasting of video to create music.. I’m all for it! I can only imagine how time consuming though it must have been for Gjertsen to put together “Amateur”! How long do you think it will be until someone remixes it?
- Evan
[…] How long will it be before we refer to instruments, not as electric, but as digital? The Gibson digital guitar maybe the start of the trend. The fact that the guitar is digital is interesting, but the possibilities that exist due to its design are more so. If students were to begin using digital guitars in the music classroom how would we shift our teaching to take full advantage of the digital design? Joe Abramo recently posed some interesting questions regarding teaching traditional techniques due to advances in technology and how it is used in creating music. While many music programs are still focused on teaching traditional western European acoustic instruments, I’m sure we are going to see more and more electronic instruments being added to school music programs besides the traditional keyboards and guitars over time. At what point will the resources available and the advances they offer play a role in our pedagogy? […]
[…] Electronic Musicianship? I often here people argue that electronic instruments and technology might be great resources fro composition, but they do little to build performance skills. Joseph Abramo, a member of the Music Education Blog Collective, posted a video of an artist who displayed amazing editing skills to create a sophisticated drum beat. While the clip shows artistry in utilizing software and editing skills, my brother recently sent me a clip of a musician who displays outstanding musicianship skills with technology. […]
This is an interesting point- I am currently working on a master’s in music education, and this is something that has come up in some of my classes. The general consensus in my classes is that this type of approach to composition is a good ‘entry level’ approach to teaching composition. Musical composition is a very complex skill, and it is hard for students to just jump into the traditional notational and harmonic system without sufficient experience in music- the type of approach you described is much easier, and allows students to discover the most basic elements of composition that they can build later, more traditional skills on. Considering that the popular music that most students know and love nowadays is all built on traditional Western harmony, and they can learn more about it by playing their instruments, it will probably be a looooong time before acoustic instruments, scales, and études leave the music classroom! But, if they ever do go, perhaps they will be replaced by something that serves their purpose even better.
Gentlepersons,
One problem with sample or loop-based music is that it tends to be remarkable inexpressive, compared to that produced on traditional acoustic instruments.
There are techniques of electronic music synthesis which are very expressive, such as waveguide synthesis (listen to a demo here: http://www.patchmanmusic.com/yamahaVL70m.html). These techniques have not been widely used, due to the lack of a sufficiently easy-to-learn and expressive electronic controller. I am hoping to meet that need with my forthcoming controller, the Thummer (www.thummer.com).
One of the advantages of electronic controllers is that their expressive controls can be enabled progressively, as the student gains skill. For example, on the Thummer, one can turn off all of the expressive controls until the student has mastered the keyboard, then turn on a single expressive joystick, then another, then an axis of motion sensing, etc.. This is in marked contrast to (say) the violin.
Another advantage is that once an electronic interface like the Thummer is mastered, it can be used to control any electronic sound. A Thummer-player can, with the appropriate synthesis hardware or software, perform with the sound of a clarinet, trumpet, violin, piano, electric guitar, or any other simulated or imagined sound, all with the same controller…and all with expression.
The Thummer is not yet a commercial product, and I would welcome feedback from this blog’s readership on how it could be improved for educational use.
Thanks!
Jim Plamondon
CEO, Thumtronics Inc
The New Shape of Music(tm)
www.thummer.com
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