Independent schools play a vital role in supporting music in the curriculum<\/p>\n\n\n
Put the right child \u2013 boy soprano \u2013 in the right church, preferably\nancient and candlelit, at the right time, as close to Christmas as\npossible, and even strong men may weep. There is something about a\nfrosty December night, the silence and stillness of a packed\ncongregation, and the fragile purity of the young soloist piping the\nfirst verse of Once in Royal David\u2019s City before leading the choir<\/a> to\n their stalls to the accompaniment of organ and congregation. Such a\nmoment will be one of the best of the entire Christmas season. The\nsetting, the voice, the music, the imminence of the celebration of the\nbirth of Christ in a stable \u2013 not a dry eye in the house.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n School\ncarol services are often a long way from Christmas Eve \u2013 term dates\nbeing what they are \u2013 but the occasions are just as powerful, laced a\nlittle with parental pride, \u201cThat\u2019s my boy!\u201d or, \u201cDid you hear, he\u2019s won\n a music scholarship to\u2026\u201d. Music matters in schools in all manner of\nways \u2013 as an academic discipline in its own right, as an avenue for\nteamwork without risk of physical harm as in team sports, as an outlet\nfor talent and as a source of sheer joy to performers and audiences\nalike. And, of course, as a qualifier for a scholarship which will\nprobably include financial assistance with fees.<\/p>\n\n\n Increasingly,\nindependent schools are becoming the last outposts for teaching music. A\n recent New Statesman article tells us that 50% of independent school\npupils \u2018receive sustained music tuition\u2019, while the figure in state\nschools is 15%. The EBacc excludes creative subjects and nationally the\nnumber of students taking GCSE music in the last two years has declined\nby 7.4% and 8%, standing last August at 39,358. One fifth of state\nschools are not offering GCSE music, with 11% of those offering the\nsubject outside curriculum time.<\/p>\n\n\n Dire reports of\nfunding cuts and hard times ahead make it increasingly likely that\nindependent schools will assume a mantle of guardianship for music both\nin the curriculum and in performance<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n I was lucky\n then to attend a grammar school a very long time ago and have my mother\n opt on my behalf for the free violin lessons available at lunchtime\nevery week. I achieved Grade 4 and played for about 10 minutes in the\nNorth Wales Youth Orchestra, an opening I did not pursue because they\nrehearsed about 20 miles away, entailing two buses home at about 8.00pm,\n on a school night!<\/p>\n\n\n Candidly, I have not one happy memory of\nplaying the violin. Remember it vividly, yes; happy, not so much.\nPractising in \u2018the front room\u2019 (I know they no longer exist, but they\nwere quite the thing in the \u201960s) which was unheated, and I would stop\nwhen my fingers froze. Losing my lunch hours to the weekly lesson, where\n my teacher did a lot more demonstrating how a piece should be played,\noften with many trills, than listening to my scratchy contributions. And\n don\u2019t even mention the violin case and the bus \u2013 \u201cYou can\u2019t bring that\non here!\u201d \u2013 and walking the two miles home from the bus stop carrying\nthe wretched thing plus heavy leather satchel, remember those? There is\nirony in all this; as a child, my mother was taught the piano and wanted\n to learn the violin. I was taught the violin and wanted to be a\npianist. Preferably a jazz pianist, able to take a seat at any handy\npiano (St Pancras, anyone?) and improvise with genius, and be loosely\ncompared to Stan Getz. Music? Don\u2019t get me started.<\/p>\n\n\n More\nseriously, I will confess \u2013 and perhaps on reflection it\u2019s not\nsurprising \u2013 to long having a problem with GCSE music. In my experience\nboth at that grammar school in the Dark Ages, and in state and\nindependent schools thereafter, pupils were literally enabled to take a\nGCE\/GCSE in music by virtue of having had years of private tuition on an\n instrument, the playing of which formed an important part of the\nexamination. Music would sit in one of the option boxes when Year 9\npupils made their GCSE choices and pupils with a healthy Grade 6 in any\ninstrument would cheerfully sign up for what would be, for them, an\nabsolute doddle. Pupils who might well have loved music but had not had\nthe benefit of early instrument learning, knew before they started that\nthe subject was not for them.<\/p>\n\n\n Inter-house competitions are great showcases where loyalty to your house trumps total conviction that you have a lousy voice<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n I\n always thought it elitist and unfair and, candidly, I could not\nunderstand why the powers that be had created an exam which was\ncompletely unapproachable by 80%, at least, of the pupil population.\nThere is a certain poetic justice in the subject\u2019s decline if you keep\nthe bar that high and tie admission to serious financial investment on\nbehalf of parents over a prolonged period, not to mention years of\neffort and application from the pupil, possibly in a freezing front\nroom. You don\u2019t take a GCSE in geography because you\u2019ve already studied\nit for eight or nine years with a private tutor.<\/p>\n\n\n I never\nunderstood why there could not be a course entitled History of Music or\nMusic Appreciation that is accessible to anyone with a listening ear \u2013\nnot even necessarily finely tuned \u2013 and an interest in music.<\/p>\n\n\n You\nknow, the whole damn thing; the history and development of what we\nhandily call music. Where, when, how, why and who. How can you tell a\nBach from a Beethoven, a Beatle from a Brahms? After all, people study\nHistory of Art without lifting a brush and it has university departments\n who welcome those who are interested in art and know themselves to be\nnot remotely talented in art. Why must GCSE music be tied to your\ncapacity to produce music? It\u2019s a requirement, I fear, not unlike a\nmillstone round the subject\u2019s neck, and in today\u2019s hard-nosed, budget\nconscious world, it\u2019s one which may sink the subject.<\/p>\n\n\n There\n is something about a frosty December night, the silence and stillness\nof a packed congregation, and the fragile purity of the young soloist\npiping the first verse of Once in Royal David\u2019s City<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n Meanwhile,\n more cheerfully, and surely in all schools one way or another, music\nwill survive in performance as a marker for the talent, interest and\neven joy of the young performers. TV\u2019s Gareth Malone has galvanised us\nall to realise the magic of singing together, no instrument required. A\ndemocratic dimension in music, removed from \u2013 but sometimes featuring \u2013\nthe elitist glory of the soloist. In many schools which may have small\nmusic classes, there are increasingly occasions to get pupils on stage\ndemonstrating the talent they\u2019ve \u2018got\u2019. Inter-house competitions are\ngreat showcases where loyalty to your house trumps total conviction that\n you have a lousy voice, and puts you on stage, possibly sheltering in\nthe back row, but absolutely belonging to the house and giving it a\nwhole lot of welly in the last verse. Don\u2019t Stop Me Now? A positive\nanthem. What is often called \u2018The House Shout\u2019, seldom quite the\nequivalent of a chorus at Covent Garden, usually brings the metaphorical\n house down. Another example, like Sheku Kanneh-Masonon with his cello\nat Prince Harry\u2019s wedding, of music\u2019s capacity to move you to tears.<\/p>\n\n\n Dire reports of funding cuts and hard times ahead make it increasingly likely that independent schools will assume a mantle of guardianship for music both in the curriculum and in performance. It\u2019s quite a responsibility. God speed.<\/p>\n\n\n This article first appeared in IE-Today<\/a> on 13 December 2018<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Independent schools play a vital role in supporting music in the curriculum Put the right child \u2013 boy soprano \u2013 in the right church, preferably ancient and candlelit, at the right time, as close to Christmas as possible, and even strong men may weep. There is something about a frosty December night, the silence and\u2026 Read More »<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[53,71,138],"class_list":["post-490","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ie-today","tag-carol-services","tag-curriculum","tag-music"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=490"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}