THE MUSIC EDUCATION IN THE FUTURE-PROBLEMS AND PERSPECTIVES
Speaking about the music education in the future,
we actually speak about the presence, we analyze it, we see its good
and bad sides, we think what we would like to keep, what to avoid, we
make judgements, trying to foreseen something for the future. The
educational problems might be explained roughly through the following
basic questions: what is learned, how it is learned, and maybe, last
but not least, why we learn.
What is learned refers to the content of the educational programs. It
is widely known that the music educational has always been connected
with the music practice of the current time of living, e.g. with its
presence. However, in this century we have encountered an explosion of
information connected with the music field by broadening up the
borders of the very term “music”: the conquest of the, so far
unexplored and peripheral areas of non-European music, the
revolutionary development of the professional European music, the
invention of new technical methods and sound resources. Yet, unlike
the previous epoch, the music studies’ programs today are more
conservative, basing themselves on the past music, e.g. limited in
time and space on a very small and exactly in space located period.
Another important moment refers to the educational subjects executed
in various music departments-their number, title, essence, variability
and choice possibilities. In that sense, the educational subjects and
their content, in one word, the educational programs are interactively
influenced by both the principles of static and dynamics. Therefore,
the appropriate estimation of the mutual interaction between those two
principles is one of the important factors when we talk about the
modernization of the music education.
In this point we move towards the other question, e.g. how we learn?
It contains two aspects: organizational and methodological. Of course,
it is quite clear that the information has increased, while the time
limit of the educational courses has remained the same, not being in
position to enlarge them endlessly with a never-ending line of new and
newer content. In that sense, we can foreseen several possibilities:
1) Implementation of the principle of permanent education lasting
during the period of the regular studies in terms of seminars, summer
schools, parallel courses containing various problems in the field of
modern music and similar, various forms of postgraduating studies on
certain specific and concrete subjects; 2) Connection between all
levels of education which might be possible only when there is a clear
vision over the complete educational process and its final result. The
ordinary, the high and the university education processes must have
their own clear aims and they must provide maximum quality and
detailed knowledge within certain frameworks, not aiming to provide
and elaborate everything. Yet, it is a common thing to duplicate the
contents of the educational subjects on different levels of education
that makes the educational program extensive-so, instead of going
forward, we encounter a simple time marking. Important task should
be-the struggle to intensify the education, not by increasing the
number of the classes, but by enriching their content and aims.
Another aspect is the methodology of the music education. For sure, it
is not possible within this elaboration to explain the complexity of
the problem (theoretical education, instrumental education, basic
education etc.). We shall only remind ourselves that, similar to the
educational programs’ content, there is moment of mutual interaction
between the principles of static and dynamics within the methodology.
Every method and approach counting both the traditional and the new
ones (visualization, verbalization, dance etc.) should not be taken
outside the natural ways of receiving the music-most of all,
considering the live intonation. Therefore the famous didactical
principle of interaction between the theory and the practice in the
music education should play an important and suptil role: all of the
abstract and theoretical explanations are futile if not backed by
practical experiences and real music (singing, dancing, hearing, music
movements). A complete vision and acceptance of the music phenomena
should not be separated from the complete life experiences of the
child.
Thus we come to the question “Why we learn”? E.g. the question of
the social functions and the meaning of the music as part of the
Art-in certain period and in certain background. In other words, that
can be called, “music background”-its character, content,
specifics…What kind of theater and music life, what kind of
repertoire policy of the mass media we have, what is the music taste
and what are the preferences of the social classes of the population,
are their cultural needs satisfied, is there a choice, what is the
tradition of music acceptance-sensual, intellectual, followed by words
and process, e.g. is there a link on the relation
“composer-performer-audience-critics”. All this has an important
meaning that might increase or decrease the social status of the music
and in the process of defining the social role of the music in the
society. That also has certain impacts over the creation of the
personality of the participants in the music process, including the
youngest. The role of the quality music background has no less
importance in the music education than the high-grade programs and
educational methods.
Bearing on mind all of this, we can imagine the educational structure
containing three dimensions: vertical-connection of the three levels
of music education (primary-high-university); horizontal-high-grade
music background as reflection of the highly ranked social status of
the music; internal dimension-the quality of the content of the music
education. In that sense, working today, we are defining the future,
while the professional behavior of the future generations depends
directly from the professionalism today. Flexibility, adjustments to
the modern ways of life, dialectical between the traditional and the
modern, stable and mobile, static and dynamics, all those things are
asked by the music education today. The education of the present,
while speaking about the future, must incorporate the information, the
flow of professional stuff and personnel, ideas’ exchange and
permanent up-grades.
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