Carrot and stick

I have a young student who had narrowly missed out on taking her grade 1 exam with her previous tutor about 18 months ago. Between then and becoming my student last autumn she had drifted, making little progress with a flute that was in need of some attention.

We started looking at the grade material again but I quickly realised she was bored with it, having studied for an exam that never materialised. She needed a new challenge and, having made some great strides (including prevailing upon her parents to get her flute sorted out), I felt she was ready to take grade 2.

That was some time before Easter and the exam has been booked (July) and paid for. Since then, however, she has done almost nothing. The effect of this is to go into reverse; the pieces she could play some weeks ago are now too difficult. Because she doesn't practise, her tone has suffered and she spends the first ten minutes of a lesson looking into the instrument (for blockages!) and adjusting the footjoint in the hope that her flute is somehow to blame.

There was an article on BBC radio this morning about the psychology of household waste collection. It turns out it is more effective to reward people for the amount they recycle rather than charge them for the quantities they send to landfill sites. Any psychology student could tell you that encouragement is more effective than punishment. Buoyed by this fact I gave her all the praise and flattery I could think of. I finished by telling her how much better her tone sounded at the end of the lesson than it had at the beginning. I may have exaggerated the improvement but there's nothing like practice if you wish to improve and she had, after all, just spent half an hour playing the thing.

After she'd gone I congratulated myself on avoiding dire warnings of impending failure if she didn't put in some work. Hopefully she is sufficiently astute not to assume from my positive demeanour that she will walk grade 2. So, carrot and more carrot for my students. The stick, should it be needed, will be wielded by the exam result when it arrives during the summer break.

Music theory vs music practice

The Associated Board of the Royal Colleges of Music offers exams up to diploma level in voice and various instruments. It also offers to examine people in music theory. The syllabus rarely attracts candidates for its own sake but to take a practical exam beyond grade 5 one needs to have passed grade five theory. And so I often find myself teaching grade five theory to students who have never studied the subject before, picking up the theory they have needed as they learned their chosen instrument rather as a child learns their native language.

I had a very good teacher when I studied theory and will boast, at the right time and place, of my 100% result at grade 8. But there is something of the nerdy anorak about this achievement. 'Music theory' as taught for Associated Board exams has nothing to do with any theory of sound, acoustics or even music. It is purely a study of a particular, albeit widely used, system of notation. There is a difference between, say, learning French and learning about language as a broader concept.

The notation system we favour has proved remarkably robust in the face of change but is not especially well suited to everything it tries to describe. I have to resist the urge to defend it in the face of disgruntled students who hold me entirely responsible. Syncopation and music in the key of F#, for example, can be horrible to read. The playing would be easier if the notation were clearer. Easier still if it were taught by demonstration and imitation. And perhaps this explains why classical musicians, as a rule, can't 'swing' without sounding like Sunday school teachers at a rave. They are hung up on the description in preference to the reality. After all, why bother visiting Rome if you've already read the guide book?

While my expertise in music theory is not wholly useless, I hadn't fully understood my discomfort with it until I read a book review in last Saturday's Guardian. It contained a quote from the book, We Are Not a Gadget by Jaron Lanier (Allen Lane) which goes: information is alienated experience. The ability to write, and so transmit, music and other languages is priceless but the written symbols are merely a description of the real thing.

Instrumental tuition for the unworthy

Should primary schools screen out children who may not excel and bar them from instrumental tuition? For some years my local primary school has administered just such a test. I only became aware of its existence when my youngest child failed – much to my surprise because I had considered her quite musical. She could carry a tune and was able to mimic her favourite pop stars with a fair degree of accuracy. When I asked her about the test it turned out to have had a strong written component. No allowance had been made for the fact that my daughter had just joined from a Rudolf Steiner school where children are taught to read and write at a later stage of their development and at a slower pace. I let it go. Piano lessons (private, not at school) were going well and she was enjoying life. On top of this, the music teacher was about to leave and I hoped that the test would leave with her

I was prompted to obtain a copy of the music test when my barber told me that, much to his surprise, his own daughter had been considered 'musical' and was to learn the viola at the school. Obviously the test had survived the change of music teacher. The test is divided into four sections; pitch, tunes, chords and rhythm. Instructions are given, questions asked and then a tape is played and the children write their answers.

Now call me thorough but these exercises need to be practised for the concepts to be understood. The instruction to the test administrator is 'Pause and check children understand'. My suspicion is that very few seven or eight year olds understood. In fact they understood so little that they couldn't even begin to explain. The silence around them just made them feel they were alone in not understanding. The answers are 'multiple choice' meaning you have a reasonable chance of success depending regardless of ability. It also means that the person marking the results has no real clue as to whether or not the question was understood.

I will not reproduce the test here as I find it abhorrent but I will email it to you on request. My point is not just that the test is flawed. I don't believe it should be replaced by a better one. My point is that everyone should have the opportunity to learn, whether they are future Mozarts or Hendrixes or not. If there aren't enough instruments to go round then draw straws. Are seven year olds barred from P.E. because they exhibit poor co-ordination? Of course not! Everyone can benefit from instrumental tuition. (More on teaching woodwind to disturbed and disabled children in a later post.)

With Christmas crackers a recent memory you've probably had enough of bad jokes. Please indulge me anyway: the kids that supposedly can't tell a high pitch from a low one, can't tell one tune from another and can't distinguish between two different rhythms, what happens to them? I'll tell you what happens to them. They get to join the school choir! Ho! Ho! Ho!