Sound Ways of Knowing
Music in the
Interdisciplinary
Curriculum
JANET R. BARRETT CLAIRE W. MCCOY KARI K. VEBLEN
Sound Ways
of Knowing contains fresh, new
ideas for teachers who want to reinvigorate their teaching by connecting music with other areas of the curriculum in valid and imaginative ways. Through lessons that feature music along with the study of history, cultures, and the other arts, Sound Ways of Knowing shows how music special- ists, classroom teachers, and other arts specialists can collaborate to plan rich and multifaceted experiences for elementary and secondary students. Barrett, McCoy, and Veblen translate contemporary theories about interdisciplinary curriculum into practice while addressing current controversies in the curriculum. They demonstrate how the power of music can enhance students’ understanding of expression, history, and culture, and conversely how the study of those wider contexts can enhance their understanding of music. Moving from discussions of general principles to their applications in curriculum and lesson planning, Sound Ways of Knowing begins with an examination of the role of music in personal and communal experience and proceeds to a theoretical overview of curriculum design and issues of integrity in interdisciplinary work. The authors then intro- duce the “facets model,” a planning tool for exploring works of art in depth, which serves as the organizing model for the remainder of the book. Subsequent chapters demonstrate its use in generating detailed teaching material from germinal ideas. In the process, fully scripted lesson plans are provided for sample classroom units devoted to study of the Renaissance, the American Civil War, and the music and culture of Mexico. Sound Ways of Knowing is generously rounded out with scenarios depicting real-life classroom situations and with field-tested exercises and activities for the teacher.
Sound Ways of Knowing
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Sound Ways of Knowing
Music in the Interdisciplinary Curriculum
Ianet R. Barrett Claire W. McCoy Kari K. Veblen
Schirmer Books
An Imprint of Simon & Schuster Macmillan New York
Prentice Hall International
London Mexico City New Delhi Singapore Sydney Toronto
Copyright © 1997 by Janet R. Barrett, Claire W. McCoy, and Kari K. Veblen
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the Publisher.
Schirmer Books
An Imprint of Simon 8c Schuster Macmillan
1633 Broadway
New York, New York 10019
Library of Congress Catalog Number: 97-19813 Printed in the United States of America Printing number
123456789 10
Copyright notices and permissions for reproduced material appear on pages 327-28.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Barrett, Janet R.
Sound ways of knowing : music in the interdisciplinary curriculum / Janet R. Barrett, p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-02-864530-8 (alk. paper)
1. School music — Instruction and study. 2. Interdisciplinary approach in education.
I. McCoy, Claire W. II. Veblen, Kari K. III. Title.
MT10.B3 1997
780’.71’2 — dc21 97-19813
CIP
MN
This paper meets the requirements of ANIS/NISO Z39.48-1992 (Permanence of Paper).
To my family , Mark, Alex, and Paige, with gratitude for their love and encouragement.
JRB
To Celia and David, with thanks for their patient and loving support.
CWM
To the memory of James Robert McKinty, who loved music and knowl- edge, and with appreciation to Brian Stuart Yandell for his encourage- ment and support.
KKV
Table of Contents
PREFACE ix
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS xiii
chapter i Music in Our Lives i
chapter 2 Music and the Interdisciplinary Curriculum 9
chapter 3 Integrity in the Interdisciplinary Curriculum 35
chapter 4 Getting to Know a Work of Art 49
chapter 5 Exploring Relationships among the Arts 69
chapter 6 Perceptions, Patterns, and Processes 85
chapter 7 Planning Interdisciplinary Arts Experiences
for Students 109
chapter 8 Music in Context 135
chapter 9 Music as an Expression of History:
The Renaissance 157
chapter 10 Music as an Expression of History:
The American Civil War 195
chapter 11 Music and Culture 243
chapter 12 Music as an Expression of Culture: Mexico 271
chapter 13 Music and the Curricular Imagination 315
NOTES 323
PERMISSIONS AND CREDITS 32 7
NAME INDEX 329
SUBJECT INDEX 334
vii
Preface
c
ound Ways of Knowing: Music in
the Interdisciplinary Curriculum presents a vision for teaching and learning in which the potent power of music is integrated throughout the curriculum. Through lessons that fea- ture the study of music along with history, cultures, and the other arts, a Sound Ways of Knowing shows how music specialists, classroom teachers, and other arts specialists collaborate to plan rich and multifaceted learn- ing experiences for elementary and secondary students.
Sound Ways of Knowing is a word play on the double meaning of sound. The most obvious meaning, of course, is the musical one. We propose that music brings us to a fuller understanding of ourselves and the world in which we live. Music is a reflection of the expressive impulse; sound orga- nized as music is a window to thought and feeling, history and culture, the individual and society. Sound also connotes strength, validity, and substance, as in jozWjudgment or sound reasoning. In this sense, we place music at the fundamental center of school programs, to be addressed by teachers and students as a curricular imperative for a comprehensive education.
In most schools, specialists provide instruction in the discipline of music based on a well-defined, sequential curriculum. Such instruction is essential to students’ development of music concepts and skills. But, as the sub tide of this book, Music in the Interdisciplinary Curriculum , implies, there are also sound connections to be made between music and other disciplines within the curriculum. Because music is inextricably linked with artistic expression, history, and culture, other disciplines within the curriculum that are also concerned with these broad concepts — such as language, art, dance, theater, and social studies — may be the most logical areas with which to forge interdisciplinary connections. In this book we focus on ways that the study of music can enhance students’ understand- ing of artistic expression, history, and culture, and, conversely, how the study of artistic expression, history, and culture can enhance understand- ing of music. While other connections are possible — the relationship of rhythmic concepts to mathematics, for example — we feel that the study of artistic expression, history, and culture afford the greatest potential for teachers and students to make meaningful, organic connections.
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Sound Ways of Knowing
This book was written for anyone who might participate in making these connections for students, including music specialists, other arts spe- cialists, and classroom teachers (both preservice and in-service); arts supervisors; curriculum coordinators; and principals. The ideas and mate- rials in this book have been field-tested in several college courses and in- service workshops.
Interactive Exercises
Exercises and activities appear throughout the text to help you engage with and make sense of the ideas we present. Your responses to these exercises and activities are critical to the development of your own ideas and practices for interdisciplinary teaching. Exercises encourage you to apply the central ideas introduced in the chapters to your own experience.
Classroom Focus
Throughout the book you will hear the voices of teachers: preservice teachers, music specialists, other arts specialists, and classroom teachers. Often, these voices are those of real people, but sometimes they reflect composites of teachers with whom we have worked. You will consider how ideas for interdisciplinary teaching are born, how they grow and evolve as a result of collaboration, and how they influence the intellectu- al and social climate of a school. You will see illustrations of the comple- mentary roles that music specialists and classroom teachers play in plan- ning and teaching interdisciplinary lessons. Scenarios use classroom sit- uations to introduce, connect, or illustrate discussions of important con- cepts and issues in the chapter.
Relationships between Theory and Practice
Some of the chapters in this book provide an overview of general princi- ples that serve as a foundation for developing interdisciplinary curricula, especially as they relate to artistic expression, history, and culture. Lesson plans in Chapter 7 explore connections between music and poetry, liter- ature, art, and movement. Three chapters provide in-depth examinations of interdisciplinary approaches to specific topics, including the study of the Renaissance (Chapter 9), the American Civil War (Chapter 10), and the music and culture of Mexico (Chapter 12).
Fully scripted lesson plans are included in these chapters as models for classroom use. One such lesson features a side-by-side commentary on the rationale for each step of the lesson plan, and another contrasts a basic version of a lesson with a version that is enhanced by more careful atten- tion to cultural authenticity. Sections within the lesson plans tided Enhancing the Understanding of Context provide descriptions of his-
Preface
xi
torical background and cultural practices for teachers’ reference; informa- tion in these sections can also be provided to students as appropriate to their level of comprehension. Please note that while the term “lesson” may imply to some an educational experience limited to a single block of time, our lessons sometimes extend over a period of days or weeks.
Although the lessons in this book can be taught as presented, we include them primarily as models and illustrations of interdisciplinary planning. Because there are many paths that the pursuit of a particular idea could follow — more than can be explored within a single lesson — we also include ideas for extending the lessons that can serve as springboards for your own planning and development. Most of the lesson plans we pre- sent are designed for elementary and middle school students, but many could also be adapted for use with high school students.
Other features include Strategies, which provide guidelines and tech- niques for you to consider as you implement lessons or curricular projects of your own design. Sections titled Controversy in the Curriculum invite you to consider provocative issues in the selection of content that require the exercise of professional judgment.
Organization
If you read this book from start to finish, you will move from discussions of general principles to their applications in interdisciplinary planning. This approach might be most appropriate if you already have some expe- rience with designing curricula or interdisciplinary lessons. If you have not, you may find it helpful to read some of the application chapters first to provide a context for the discussion of those general principles.
The first chapter, “Music in Our Lives,” encourages you to examine the role of music in personal and communal experience, inviting your reactions and reflections in the form of a personal essay. The second chap- ter, “Music and the Interdisciplinary Curriculum,” provides a more theo- retical overview of the principles and practices of curriculum design, a discussion that is extended to issues of integrity in interdisciplinary work raised in Chapter 3. Chapter 4, “Getting to Know a Work of Art,” describes the processes of learning new works before starting to design curriculum based on those works. Chapters 5 and 6 establish a founda- tion for interdisciplinary experiences in the arts by emphasizing the sim- ilarities and differences between and among art, music, theater, dance, and literature. The facets model \ a planning tool for exploring artworks in depth, is introduced in these chapters and serves as the organizing struc- ture for the remainder of the book.
The lessons in Chapter 7 show how you might use the facets model to expand germinal ideas into fully developed experiences. Chapters 8 and
Sound Ways of Knowing
xii
1 1 raise issues and possibilities for exploring music’s role in historical and cultural studies, which take curricular shape in Chapters 9, 10, and 12 through the study of the Renaissance, the American Civil War, and Mexico. These comprehensive chapters feature scenarios, discussions of instructional issues, and detailed lesson plans for interdisciplinary experi- ences. Finally, the last chapter portrays the creative intellectual engage- ment of teachers as they exercise curricular imagination.
Acknowledgments
We wish to thank many indivi- uals who contributed to this book and supported our work during its development and production. Colleagues who consulted with us and freely contributed their expertise include Daniel Garcia Blanco, Karen Bradley, David J. Elliott, Paul Haack, James Hainlen, Lawrence Kaptain, William and Susan Kephart, Dane Kusic, Jesse and Sandra Lilligren, Scott Lowery, Ronald McCurdy, Fernando Meza, Pam Paulsen, Nancy Rasmussen, Roger Revell, Josh Ryan, Daniel Sheehy, Tom Solomon, David Tovey, and Brian Yandell. We are grateful to those who led us to helpful resources, including George Ferencz, Ramona Holmes, Geraldine Laudati, James McKinty, Brian Miller, Steven Sundell, and Ellen Zwilich. We would also like to acknowledge Lawrence Aynesmith, Steven Dast, Jon Lahann, Mitch Rosenfelt, Scott Ruffing, Erin Stapleton-Corcoran, and Diane Walder, who assisted in the production of materials used in the book.
For their useful and insightful reviews of the manuscript, we wish to thank Mary Hookey, Nipissing University; Jan McCrary, Ohio State University; Janice Smith, Asa Adams Elementary School; Judy Svengalis, Des Moines Public Schools; and Ellen McCullough-Brabson, University of New Mexico.
We are especially grateful to students in our undergraduate and grad- uate courses, whose enthusiasm for interdisciplinary work and thought- provoking questions have influenced and inspired our thinking. Special thanks to those students who have granted permission to use or describe class projects or journal entries as examples throughout the book: Kara Alt, Jeff Behling, Brett Brown, Joanna Cortright, Beth Herrendeen, Ruzica Jovanovic, Peter Kahl, Ellen Luchsinger, Kristin Martin, Jenine Meunier, Carla Morena, and Donald Pochmara.
We express our appreciation to our photographer, Sandra Norstrom, and the teachers and children at three schools who graciously opened their classrooms to us: Tom Ryan of Purdy Elementary School in Fort Atkinson, Wis. (Rick Brietze, principal); Jane LeFevre of Milton West Elementary, Milton, Wis. (Carol Meland, principal); and Marilyn White
xiii
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Sound Ways of Knowing
and Vicki Samolyk of Elm Creative Arts School, Milwaukee, Wis. (Darrel Jacobs, principal). Thanks also to Shawn Kolles and Daniel Sheehy for photographs used in Chapter 12.
We extend our appreciation to Dean Karen Boubel of the College of Arts and Communication at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater for well-timed research support for Janet Barrett in the fall semester of 1995.
We are grateful to our editor, Jill Lectka, of Schirmer Books, for her skill and expertise, and also to Andrew Libby, production supervisor, and to Andrew Ambraziejus, managing editor of Macmillan Library Reference, for guiding the manuscript to its final form.
chapter 1 \*
Music in Our Lives
Imagine that a friend \ who is taking a film class , needs a willing subject for a biographical documentary. Thinking that this is your only chance for stardom, you agree. Your friend asks you to assemble artifacts that will document who you are and the experiences that have shaped your life. In preparation for the film- ing, you gather scrapbooks of photographs and clippings, diaries, personal corre- spondence, diplomas, yearbooks, home movies and videos, treasured objects, and souvenirs. Your friend comes to your house, video camera in hand, and spends several hours filming as you tell your life story.
When you go to preview the film, you're curious and a bit apprehensive about the way the film will portray your life. As the film rolls, you realize that the music your fiend has chosen for the soundtrack is all wrong — it has nothing to do with you. An important aspect of your identity, your music, is missing.
«t
ike your fingerprints, your signa- i J ture, and your voice, your choices of music and the ways you relate to music are plural and interconnected in a pattern that is all yours, an ‘idioculture’ or idiosyncratic culture in sound” (Crafts, Cavicchi, 8c Keil, 1993, p. 2). The Greek word idios means “one’s own.” Your own musical world, or “idioculture,” is like no one else’s. Music is a constant presence in your life, although you may not be con- scious of the depth and breadth of your musical experience. Most of us rarely take time to reflect on the array of music in our lives and the way our interactions with music shape our identity.
You may be wondering what a discussion of your own personal musi- cal world has to do with the role of music in the interdisciplinary cur- riculum, the subject of this book. Have you thought about how your own music background, with its diversity of interests and experiences, can become a source of ideas for planning educational experiences for stu- dents? Have you considered that within a school community there are students and teachers whose musical worlds intersect in some way — through shared interests in a particular style of music, performer, or com- poser? There may be unique components of those musical worlds as well, as individuals hold special interests, knowledge, or expertise in a particu-
l
2
Sound Ways of Knowing
lar type of music. These interests, in all their richness, may be the start- ing points for planning imaginative lessons that link music with the study of culture, history, and expression. Sometimes individuals undervalue what their musical worlds have to offer to the classroom. As a first step toward recognizing the extent of your musical world, -with its implications for connecting with the curriculum, we suggest you take time to engage in the following exercise.
Examining Personal Musical Experience The Circles Exercise, Part 1
The purpose of this exercise is to think about your personal musical experiences and their impact in your life. On an unlined sheet of paper, draw circles to show different pools of musical activity in your person- al history: your “music circles” diagram. The categories listed below may be helpful to get you started, but feel free to add additional categories to the list. Label each circle with the category title; inside each circle, jot down the tides or short descriptions of the music that fits within the category. Because some of these circles may be related in time or place, you may wish to make them appear close together or overlapping on your diagram. Others may stand alone as singular events.
~ Early memories — songs you remember being sung to you as a child ~ Songs you recall singing in school ~ Musical works you have performed
~ Songs you can sing or pieces you can play entirely from memory ~ Recordings you would not want to live without ~ Your least favorite music examples ~ Music you have heard or performed in the past 24 hours ~ Music you have taught (or love to teach) to others ~ Music that puzzles, intrigues, or challenges you
~ Hidden pleasures — what others might be surprised to know about your tastes
When you have completed drawing and labeling your circles, con- template what they reveal about your music interests and involvement. In what ways do these circles reflect the influences of the time and place you were born, places you’ve lived, and significant people in your life?
Music in Our Lives
3
Making Sense of Musical Experience
Three sets of circles representing the music idiocultures of three preservice teachers are provided to illustrate how music backgrounds can serve as a foundation for curriculum planning. In her circles (Figure 1.1), Kara, a preservice elementary teacher, recalls the influence of her family, school experience, and travel, and describes her current involvement with music. Another preservice elementary/middle school teacher, Brett, represents his personal history by drawing arrows to show the path of his music devel- opment and changes in taste from the songs his parents sang to him to his rediscovery of Native American music, a part of his cultural heritage (Figure 1.2). Don, a preservice music teacher (Figure 1.3), spends a great deal of time performing music as well as listening to it. Because music is both a personal source of satisfaction and the focus of his professional career, Don’s circles show the intensity of his involvement with music.
What do these circles reveal? They suggest some of the various roles that music may play in ones life — for relaxation, for recreation, as a part of family and religious rituals, as a cultural expression, as a life’s work. They may also reveal how one interacts with music through listening, performing, and valuing musical works. The circles can also show the breadth and variety of one’s musical repertoire — children’s songs, rock and roll, folk music of particular cultures, “classical” compositions, jazz, country music, reggae, music of the Renaissance, and Broadway tunes.
Earliest Memories
"Streets of Laredo"; "If You Want to Get to Heaven" (songs my dad used to sing to me before I went to bed)
Musical Experiences Outside of School
Took piano lessons from second to fifth grade 1 didn't like to practice); "Chariots of Fire"; Broadway songs from Annie
Musical Places I've Been
Branson, Missouri, the country music capital of the world; New York City to see Phantom of the Opera
Other
Experiences with Music
I love to dance to music, listen to my collection of ^CDs, listen to music on the I radio, listen to music re- ; laxation tapes, sing in church
Musical Experiences in School
Played the clarinet in fifth grade band: "Hot Cross ^Buns";sang in the seventhy v grade choir: "Puttin' on J the Ritz"
Songs I Sang in Kindergarten
Kindergarten teacher played holiday songs on the piano: "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" and "Frosty the Snowman"
Figure 1.1
Kara’s Music Circles
4
Sound Ways of Knowing
Figure 1.2
Brett's Music Circles
Music in Our Lives
5
Least Favorite
Any bad remakes )
Musical Works and Where I've Performed Them
Recordings I Would Not Want to Live Without
Sound track to the movie 'Round Midnight; Arvo Part, Summa; The Artist formerly Known as Prince, Sign-o-the-Times; Sting, The Soul Cages; Mozart, Requiem; Daniel Lentz, O-KE-WA; Any Motown record
My Hidden Pleasure
Music from the Renaissance, Michael Praetorius
"Night in Tunisia" — Switzerland;, "1812 Overture" — Detroit; "Sudden Sam" —
Detroit; "Angel Eyes"—
New Orleans
Songs I Can Sing From Memory
Bob Marley, "Jamming"; \ Georg Philipp Telemann, Sonata in A Minor for gamba and continuo;"My Funny Valentine"; Sting, "Englishman in New York", The Police, "Roxanne"
Music I Have Heard in the Past 24 Hours
Gustav Mahler, Totenfeier; Aretha Franklin, Greatest Hits;
Pearl Jam; Jean Sibelius, Symphony No. 3 in C, Op. 52; Bob Marley and the Wailers, "Jamming";John Coltrane, "A Love Supreme"
Figure 1.3
Don’s Music Circles
Even the least favorite styles and types of music are an indication of strongly held preferences and personal opinions.
Kara’s early musical experiences may be an important source of insight into her work with elementary-aged students. She may remember the impact of her early musical experiences as she encourages the children in her classroom to develop their own music interests. The breadth of Brett’s interest and participation in music may be expressed in many ways, as his eclectic tastes in contemporary popular music may intersect with the musical interests of his students. His wide-ranging involvement with the musics of many cultures, manifested in a listening repertoire that ranges from music of the Incas to the East Indian sitar, and his performance of Native American flute and drum music, may enable him to relate to stu- dents of diverse backgrounds. Brett may serve as a model of openness to many types of music expression for students whose music worlds are more limited than his. Don’s intense engagement in music, which prompted him to become a music specialist, will be invaluable as he prepares to teach students of varied ages and levels of skill, and possibly even those with interest in music as a career. Don also enjoys listening to music of diverse styles and eras, spanning from 500 years ago to the present. The backgrounds, interests, and professional goals of Kara, Brett, and Don prepare them to bring music into students’ lives in different and comple- mentary ways.
6
Sound Ways of Knowing
As we have explored this idea of music idiocultures with students in our classes, we have been intrigued and informed by what we have dis- covered. Our students’ ethnic and cultural heritages — Serbian, Hmong, Norwegian, Jamaican, Polish, Native American — have generated interest in music traditions new to us and to their classmates. Other students’ cir- cles revealed special areas of expertise, such as the music of the Civil War, the blues, and minimalism, which became the basis for creative lesson plans. We’ve also learned from students who have shared music examples drawn from extensive CD collections, performed a repertoire of folk dances from family traditions, or acquired an assortment of unusual instruments while traveling.
Examining the Musical Experience of Others The Circles Exercise, Part 2
If you could look at the circles of experience that students in elemen- tary, middle, or high school might draw, what would you learn about their idiocultures? Try the circles exercise with an entire class or with individual students. What do their circles reveal about the breadth and depth of their musical involvement? Compare your circles with theirs. Are there any commonalities? What realms of experience and types of music are different than your own? We know that personal interest plays an important role in learning. How could you use your under- standing of students’ musical worlds to make learning more meaning- ful for them?
As you conduct this exercise, you may change your expectations about the preferences of students. Young children are generally open to a range of musical styles and genres. As children approach adolescence, however, their tastes become more narrow and homogeneous (LeBlanc, Sims, Siivola, & Obert, 1996; May, 1985). But are those tastes really as homo- geneous as adults perceive them to be? Adolescents’ preferences tend to be lumped into the global category “popular music,” as if the entire age group shared a music monoculture. When adults have asked adolescents to sketch their music circles, they have often been amazed at the degree to which adolescents can detect subtle nuances among substyles within popular music.
After adolescence, music preferences may begin to broaden with age and experience. When Julie, a music teacher in her 30s, compared her music circles with those of her students, she became more aware of how her preferences had changed over time: “As I get older, my musical inter- ests and tastes move farther from Pop and Rock, and closer to music from
Music in Our Lives
7
other cultures as well as folk music. As a music teacher, your role is to pro- vide musical experiences for your students that lay a good foundation for their ‘tapestry of experience.’”
In this chapter, you have been encouraged to examine your music background, preferences, and formative experiences. The insights you gain from this exercise may reveal (a) what you consider to be “good” music, (b) the pool of musics from which you may be inclined to draw examples for the classroom, and (c) the modes in which you feel com- fortable interacting with music. When you compared the music circles of students with your own, did you find more intersections or contrasts? The intersections among your sets of circles can point to comfort zones from which you can launch into explorations of less familiar music. At first, the contrasts between your sets of circles may appear too great to find that comfortable common ground. The contrasts, however, may provide an opportunity to explore the diversity of music knowledge and skills that are present in any classroom. They can point to student expertise and interests on which you can build to enrich the learning environment.
In Chapter 2, our attention turns from music in our personal lives to music in the curriculum. We address how music is an essential compo- nent of school experience and discuss the roles of classroom teachers and music specialists in providing meaningful and imaginative musical expe- riences for students.
References
Crafts, S. D., Cavicchi, D., 8e Keil, C. (1993). My music. Hanover, N.H.: Wesleyan University Press.
LeBlanc, A., Sims, W. L., Siivola, C., 8c Obert, M. (1996). Music style preferences of different age Mstcntrs. Journal of Research in Music Education 44:49-59.
May, W. V. (1985). Musical style preferences and aural discrimination of primary grade school children. Journal of Research in Music Education 33:7-22.
*\ chapter 2 j*
Music and the
Interdisciplinary Curriculum
Visualize a scene set in the days of the Roman Empire, conjuring up individuals standing in small horse-drawn, two-wheeled carts, poised for the race of their lives. Just before the race begins, a stirring fanfare is heard, which signals the horses and riders to run toward the distant hori- zon with determination and courage. Each driver directs the horses and guides the cart through the smoothest parts of the terrain, leaving impres- sions of the chariot’s wheels in the ground to mark the path of the jour- ney. The word for the vehicle you are imagining is curricle, and the course on which the chariot runs is called the curriculum {Compact Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, 1971, p. 1271). Curriculum, the word we use so frequendy in education to describe the scope and sequence of study, is quite literally a path or course of action.
For purposes of illustration, we could suppose that the terrain repre- sents the totality of human experience and the chariots represent various forms of that experience: social, political, scientific/technological, eco- nomic, cultural, and aesthetic. Or, to parallel the way those forms are addressed as school subjects and disciplines, we could imagine the chari- ots as music, art, dance, literature, theater, history, science, mathematics, language, physical education, or geography. Since we’re already taking lib- erties with this scene, let’s turn our attention to the drivers. The chario- teers in these vehicles feel a strong obligation to find the most direct and expeditious routes to follow. They have traveled this way before, so they are well acquainted with the terrain. Sometimes chariots travel alongside one another in parallel motion; at other times, the paths intersect.
Transform the imagery in this visualization to set the stage for what is to come. Suspend the breakneck pace of the drivers and watch them pull back on the reins. Change the tempo and character of your imagined scene from a competitive race to a more relaxed and observant journey. At this calmer pace, the drivers begin to notice interesting features of the ter- rain that were previously blurred and vague. In time, the drivers start to
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Sound Ways of Knowing
entertain notions of traveling toward different inviting vistas, even though the paths are less well traveled and are in need of clearing. At a rest stop, after a welcomed stretch of the legs and some water for the horses, several drivers discuss the possibilities of alternate paths and agree to embark together on an exploration toward new destinations.
The curriculum is both the terrain and the journey combined, or, in educational terms, a blend of content (knowledge and understanding) and process (teaching and learning). Further, the curriculum takes on meaning because it is designed for and takes place in particular settings (the school context and community). Teachers, charged with the respon- sibility to make informed decisions about content and process, articulate goals and chart courses of action in the form of educational experiences. The path of the curriculum is not a straight- and- narrow race toward the horizon, however. A curricular course of action may be adjusted and redesigned as teachers encourage and accommodate student interests. Particular features of the educational setting — schedules, resources, poli- cies— also influence the curriculum by offering both opportunities and constraints for action. Of particular interest to this chapter are the points at which teachers decide to set out in new and interesting directions, especially when they consider how music and other subject areas can be brought together in meaningful ways.
In this chapter, we address central questions and issues related to cur- riculum work of teachers and the role of music in interdisciplinary study. These central questions include:
~ What is curriculum work and what views of knowledge are expressed in teachers’ curricular beliefs and practices?
~ What is meant by a disciplinary or interdisciplinary focus toward the curriculum?
~ Why should music be considered an integral part of the general cur- riculum?
~ Why should disciplines in addition to music be featured as integral components of the music curriculum?
~ How do current curricular practices reflect various orientations toward music in the curriculum?
~ What are the characteristics of teachers’ work when they create exemplary interdisciplinary curricula?
Music and the Interdisciplinary Curriculum
11
The Questions of Curriculum
The term curriculum, is used in many ways and contexts by participants in the educational process. Although the chariot metaphor begins to address the defining question “What is curriculum?” we might also productively ask “Where is the curriculum?” or “Where does the curriculum reside?” From the following list of possible locations, which description most closely matches your typical or customary view of the curriculum?
~ The goals and standards written and endorsed by professional asso- ciations, teams of teachers, or policy-making agencies such as state departments of instruction or accrediting bodies
~ The manuals, outlines, handbooks, teacher editions, student text- books, and curriculum guides that organize the scope (what is to be included) and sequence (the progression or order) of crucial ideas, concepts, and topics
~ The lesson plans (written and enacted) that teachers design as they prepare and direct educational experiences
~ The experiences of students in classrooms as they come into contact with activities, materials, ideas, influential adults, and peers in order to acquire skills and understanding
~ The expectations for learning held by parents, administrators, and members of the school community
~ The tangible forms of evidence that point to the strengths of a school program, such as the accomplishments and performance of graduates, test scores, and public recognition for the work of stu- dents and teachers
~ The overall plan of studies including all of the courses, course con- tent, activities, and events that mark a student’s progression from elementary to middle to high school, often followed by college and university programs
~ The lasting, long-term effects and enduring impressions of school experience — what we take with us long after the immediate course, class, or lesson ends
The curriculum can be represented in many forms — through actions in classrooms, documents, articulated beliefs, intentions, and memories. Many voices enter into the conversation about curriculum as they discuss what schools should teach and what students should know and be able to
12
Sound Ways of Knowing
do in order to grow and thrive as individuals and as members of a larger community. You may have noticed that hardly a day passes without some public debate in newspaper reports, journal articles, features, and inter- views in broadcast media over the nature and purposes of the curriculum. The study of curriculum — its principles, content, processes, products, val- ues, goals, participants, and dilemmas — captivates the attention of critics of the educational process as well as teachers, administrators, and parents (who often function as critics, too). Critics point out the beliefs and assumptions that many of us have begun to take for granted by calling them into question. If we take the criticism seriously, we wresde with the questions, brush the dust from our assumptions, and engage in curricu- lum inquiry.
At the heart of these representations, conversations, and debates is an elegant and simple idea: The curriculum becomes real through the work teachers and students do in pursuit of understanding, defined by Gardner and Boix-Mansilla as “the capacity to use current knowledge, concepts, and skills to illuminate new problems or unanticipated issues” (Gardner 8c Boix-Mansilla, 1994, p. 200). Teachers have primary stew- ardship over the nature and character of this work; their intellectual and personal energies are directed toward the creation and sustenance of vibrant and compelling environments for learning. Curriculum docu- ments and standards developed by others are useful as general outlines or descriptions of possible choices, helping to shape our broad concep- tions and purposes with greater clarity. But teachers — aware of their own interests, needs, and talents and of how these attributes complement the interests, needs, and talents of students — create plans for learning to suit the particular characteristics of school communities. Sizer (1985) com- pares curriculum making to the work of an artisan: “The construction of the subject matter of any curriculum is a task of cabinet making, not of prefab carpentry. The pieces have to fit the conditions peculiar to each school. Master plans for cities, states, and the nation that standardize instruction are certain to be inefficient: no one set of procedures can serve most students well” (p. 115).
Teachers design, invent, implement, assess, and critique the curriculum in never-ending cycles of action and reflection. To do so, they must oper- ate from their own conceptions of what curriculum work entails and what the curriculum is. An individual teacher’s view of the curriculum is con- textually bound and dependent upon that persons values, past experi- ences, and theories of “how the world works.” This explains why you might hear such diverse and almost contradictory views of curriculum when talking with teachers. Epistemology, a branch of philosophy con- cerned with the nature, forms, and limitations of human knowledge,
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addresses general metaphors and systems of thought. For example, con- trast a view of knowledge as fixed and static (what we know about a sub- ject has already been discovered and sequentially arranged; the primary task of the learner is to acquire that clearly defined structure of knowl- edge) with a view of knowledge as dynamic and fluid (what we know about a subject is constantly being defined, expanded, and redefined; learners have to make sense of this rich but ill-defined universe of knowl- edge from their own perspectives). In the first view, the learner’s mind is a container to be filled with information; in the second, the learner active- ly builds a system of new understanding using available information. These views influence the way we think about knowledge in art forms and the way we design educational experience with artworks1 (Parsons 8c Blocker, 1993).
Kliebard (1989) reminds us that for the products and processes of cur- riculum planning and evaluation to be valid, we must critically examine our assumptions and beliefs about the nature of educational experience. This will help us to clarify our personal theories of knowledge and to acknowledge the way those theories are revealed in daily classroom prac- tice. Curriculum inquiry challenges us to make informed choices about goals for our classrooms while exercising our critical and creative powers. The time we spend asking questions about the purposes of a new curric- ular initiative may be more important to the final outcomes than the nuts-and-bolts tasks of writing objectives, lesson plans, and long-range sequences. Kliebard identifies four primary areas for curriculum inquiry: “why certain things should be taught, who should get what knowledge, what rules should govern teaching school subjects, and how the compo- nents of the curriculum should be interrelated.” He continues: “Curriculum development requires sophistication, judgment, and intelli- gence and only secondarily technical skill” (p. 5).
The components of the curriculum and their relationships are addressed in the next section of this chapter. But first, let’s take a tour of a typical school setting to see what a classroom can tell us about the curriculum.
Take a Tour . . .
It can be difficult to find an elementary or middle school that is empty by 5:00 or 5:30 because many teachers prepare for the next day’s activities after the school buses depart and committee meet- ings end. But let’s assume that we can find a school where we are free to take an uninterrupted stroll through classrooms and wander through the colorful spaces.
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In a cheerful, well-organized fifth-grade classroom, we start with the ubiquitous schedule written on a white marker board, the more contemporary counterpart of the classic chalkboard. Here, the entire day is partitioned into smaller chunks of time. Although the schedule is not the same every day, we find we have stumbled upon a day of the week when some subjects, the “specials,” are grouped together to allow classroom teachers a block of joint planning time with other teachers in their grade-level teams.
|
Opening |
8:15-8:30 |
|
Reading |
8:30-9:45 |
|
Recess |
9:45-10:00 |
|
Math |
10:00-11:15 |
|
Circle |
11:15-11:30 |
|
Lunch |
11:30-12:00 |
|
Recess |
12:00-12:15 |
|
Specials: Music |
12:15-12:45 |
|
RE. |
12:45-1:15 |
|
Art |
1:15-2:15 |
|
Library |
2:15-2:45 |
|
Journals |
2:45-3:00 |
We know this particular schedule doesn’t reflect the entire pro- gram because we find folders in student cubicles marked “Science,” “Social Studies,” and “Health” along with the subjects fisted for this particular day. Letters neatly stacked beside the cubicles are ready to send home to parents, with checklists of school subjects to discuss with the teacher at the upcoming parent-teacher conferences.
The music room is down the hall and easy to spot from the tell- tale staff-and-treble-clef banner across the door. Since no one is around, you succumb to temptation, pick up a pair of mallets, and improvise on the xylophone for a minute. The music teachers week- ly schedule is posted near the desk at the back of the room, with the names of 9 or 10 teachers per day written in the grid to correspond to the parade of 30-minute classes. This afternoon’s schedule looked like this: 5C — Hutton; 5B — Stein; 3A — Naughton; 3B — Ehly; 4D — Clark; Kindergarten — Kolarik. Under a border of composers’ portraits, you notice samples of listening maps created by students of different grade levels and photographs from the last all-school program. Rows and rows of smiling singers show full or partial sets of front teeth.
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Finally, you peek into the teachers’ workroom/lounge where notices of upcoming in-service sessions and workshops are posted above the photocopier to catch the attention of teachers: “Connecting the Curriculum through Whole Language,” “Assessing the Integrated Curriculum,” and “Arts across the Curriculum.”
Disciplinary and Interdisciplinary Curricula
Can you recall an instance from your own school experience when sever- al ideas that seemed unrelated suddenly fell into place, forming a larger pattern that you had never considered before? Do you remember how it felt to make such a satisfying connection? Do you recall what circum- stances led up to the new understanding? This natural sense-making ten- dency to connect, relate, associate, and join features of experience is a hallmark of a capable learner. The cultivation of this sense-making ten- dency is one of the primary occupations of teachers. In the broadest sense, such connections constitute the fundamental rationale for interdiscipli- nary study in schools.
Few would argue against such connections. Teachers celebrate and fondly recall moments when the “lightbulb goes on.” But how does the way a school is organized or the way the curriculum is structured make these connections more or less likely? In the scenario above, the school’s organization seems to partition school subjects by time of day or week, location within the building, and teacher. It would be easy to assume that these partitions make it difficult for students to form powerful connec- tions that cross disciplinary boundaries. But that assumption does not necessarily hold true if teachers keep these questions in mind as they design educational programs: How can schools emphasize meaningful relationships among forms of knowledge? How can students be encour- aged to see the big picture and address interdependent, complex prob- lems? Perkins (1992) suggests that if these connections are not explicidy addressed by the curriculum, teachers should not assume that they will spontaneously occur in the thinking of students. “Knowledge,” he cau- tions, “does not pop up reliably” (p. 49).
“The intellectual world is full of disciplines, subdisciplines, and disci- plinary combinations simply because there are so many ways to look at things,” Hope reminds us (1994, p. 39). In elementary and middle schools, disciplines often come packaged in the form of school subjects. (Some of these subjects, like the “social studies,” are already labeled in an interdisciplinary fashion.) Each discipline or school subject has its own central concepts, vocabulary, treasured examples, key figures, traditions, problems, and forms of experience. These conventional categories are
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useful to help us impose order on the world and on the school day, as well. But these disciplines and categories of knowledge can also cloud our per- ceptions by separating what could be related.
Most elementary and some middle-school teachers identify strongly with their chosen affiliation as curriculum generalists (the “classroom teacher” whose professional preparation features a broad range of sub- jects) or as curriculum specialists (such as music, art, dance, physical edu- cation, or theater teachers whose teacher education program looks quite different from that of the generalists). In this book, we argue that stu- dents’ educational experiences are strengthened when both generalists and specialists attend to the potential of disciplines within the curriculum to connect and cohere. For interdisciplinary understanding to flourish, teachers must share a collective responsibility for and commitment to integrated forms of study.
Creative curriculum design requires effort, creativity, insight, and desire. The rewards must be worth the hefty personal and professional demands of time and energy for teachers. In the next two sections, we will argue for the benefits of such work from the perspective of both class- room teachers and music specialists.
Examining Musical Connections in Educational Practice
As the day’s schedule on the marker board in “Take a Tour” suggests, it is quite common for school subjects to be taught separately in their allot- ted blocks of time. We know from our own school experience, though, that this compartmentalized schedule doesn’t prevent savvy teachers from bringing school subjects together in creative and informative ways.
Think about your own educational history to identify examples when musical subjects have been addressed in other classes or when music classes have been enriched by attention to other subjects. You may also be able to cite examples from your own teaching or the class- room practice of teachers you have observed. One teacher, for exam- ple, recalled how his high school English literature teacher had played musical examples from the Elizabethan period that could have been incidental music for Shakespeare’s plays. Another teacher described how the study of the music of Spain had enriched her foreign language classes by emphasizing cultural traditions. In a choir setting, an expert on Old English literature and language was invited to the rehearsal to explain and authenticate the pronunciation of a choral text. Another director sent students to the library to find interpretations of Dylan Thomas’s poem, “Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night,” a text they were preparing to perform.
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In what ways has interdisciplinary study been a part of your school experience? What was the impact of this study on your interests and understanding? What examples of meaningful connections have you noticed in your classroom observations and conversations with other teachers?
Music in the General Classroom
Music is just too powerful to be confined to a certain space in the school, block of time in the day, or particular teacher alone. Classroom teachers who weave music throughout the school day open opportunities for stu- dents to make connections to many forms of experience. The fundamen- tal rationale for broadening the scope of topics and activities to include music is this: A comprehensive general curriculum is incomplete without music, because music is central to personal and shared experience.
In the first chapter of this book, we encouraged you to investigate the role of music in students’ lives by asking students to complete the circles exercise. Their responses testify to the ubiquitous presence of music in students’ surroundings and the ways personal identity and experience are marked, deepened, and remembered through music. Students use music as a frame of reference to organize their personal histories. As teachers
Figure 2.1
A Class of Second Graders Playing the Singing Game Charlie over the Ocean. Photo by Sandra Norstrom.
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seek ways to honor diverse backgrounds and to acknowledge individual differences, they may ask students to describe their musical interests and activities. This act moves conversation from the general to the specific, and from the impersonal to the personal. When we reveal our favorite performers, songs, or compositions or tell stories about past musical involvement, we discover new avenues for discussion and exploration. Insight into students’ musical lives is not limited to verbal responses alone, however. Young children often become engrossed in classroom activities and may spontaneously break out in song or rhythmic chants that are natural and charming extensions of their interest and enthusiasm. Through these personal expressions, teachers and students may find a common ground for interpersonal understanding.
Traditions, rituals, ceremonies, celebrations, and customs are part of communal experience, which is enriched by the inclusion of music. Noteworthy events and achievements are set apart with fanfares; losses or tragedies are commemorated with appropriate tributes. When a commu- nity of teachers and learners makes music together, social bonds and affil- iations are strengthened. Performing in groups is especially satisfying because individual efforts contribute to the success of the whole ensem- ble. Teachers have observed the power of music making to knit a collec- tion of individuals into a close community.
Another compelling reason for including music in classrooms relates to its potential for cultivating perception. In our daily lives, music is everywhere and readily accessible, but random environmental exposure is insufficient to educate students in the richness and depth of musical experience. Because schools are committed to educate the mind, body, eye, hand, ear, and feeling, teachers seek to develop students’ abilities to perceive and discriminate keenly among forms of experience. In a world bombarded with sound, students must learn to listen with focused atten- tion and intelligence. The sheer quantity and variety of images and sen- sations in modern life make it imperative for teachers to help students make sense of the jumble and learn to sort and sift among the choices. When classroom teachers use musical examples alongside narrative accounts, folktales, poetry, paintings, sculpture, videotapes, films, and CD-ROM programs, they provide multiple paths of introduction to important ideas and valuable opportunities to exercise perceptual skills.
The arts in general have long been heralded as a domain where cre- ativity flourishes and personal interpretation is respected (as in the pop- ular exhortation “there’s no one right answer”). When assignments or projects are open-ended, such as ones that encourage students to write songs or to choose representative musical works to perform or describe, creative expression and interpretation flourish. Musical understanding,
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however, requires a balance of both creative and critical thought. Students learn important lessons of evaluation and aesthetic criticism as they ana- lyze and reflect upon their creative output. A fuzzy attitude toward musi- cal products (“anything goes”) upsets this balance by downplaying possi- bilities for improvement. Whenever musical activities are incorporated in the curriculum, therefore, teachers must account for the ways students form standards of judgment and develop foundations of competence with the materials and tools of the discipline.
Interdisciplinary study demands attention to the quality of the rela- tionships among the areas we seek to connect, a matter of integrity we will address in subsequent chapters. Teachers often raise valid concerns about the purposes of interdisciplinary experiences; cautionary voices help us refine our beliefs and clarify practices. Many educators are jusdy concerned when it appears that a discipline is corrupted or trivialized as an attach- ment or window dressing to other areas of study. Schwab (1978) speaks of a “perversion. . . [which consists of] degrading subject matter to the role of servant” (p. 377). A related criticism, reminiscent of this chapter’s opening description of the curricle, is launched by May (1993): “Typically, one sub- ject and its concomitant activities turn out to be nothing more than a recreational vehicle (RV) for the other, to make the other a palatable or interesting excursion for students.” She warns, “Serious distortions and misconceptions can occur” (p. 185). Arts educators are particularly sensi- tive to these distortions because the full range of extrinsic and intrinsic rewards of engagement in the arts seems stereotyped and diminished if the arts are included solely for their entertainment or utilitarian value. These cautions and concerns reinforce the need for interdisciplinary projects informed by the knowledge, wisdom, and professional expertise brought to the curriculum by both generalists and specialists.
The Interdisciplinarity of Music Education
Out of necessity and passion, music educators are very protective of one of their most precious resource, instructional time in the curriculum. Leonhard (1991) conducted a national survey of arts education in American public schools and found that school schedules devote only one hour per week on average to music instruction at the elementary level. By the end of the first full week of school, the classroom teacher may have nearly as much contact with a student than the music teacher will have over the course of a typical 32-week year. At the middle school level, only 28.6 percent of small middle schools (fewer than 500 students) and 30.8 percent of large middle schools (more than 500 students) require music classes, although many schools offer band, orchestra, or chorus as elec- tives. It is not hard to see why the wise use of instructional time is of great
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urgency and importance to music teachers. For that reason alone, many music educators are understandably cautious about interdisciplinary plans, weighing their justification carefully in light of the ambitious goals and scope of the music curriculum.
How likely is it, then, for the music specialist to incorporate the study of other disciplines into the music curriculum? We believe it is very like- ly, if practice is based on this premise: A truly comprehensive music program is already interdisciplinary in nature because musical understanding draws upon many forms of knowing and understanding. Strong programs in music education draw from varied sources of insight and information to enhance the musical understanding of students. When this enrichment brings about breadth and depth in the performance, analysis, and creation of music, while at the same time illuminating the social, historical, and aesthetic dimensions of music making, the music program justifiably earns the label comprehensive. Hope (1994) argues that this compre- hensive nature is true of study in all of the arts, suggesting that “the intel- lectual functions of art, science, history, and philosophy [come] together with the knowledge, skills, subject matters, and purposes of dance, music, theatre, and the visual arts” (p. 40). In the following paragraphs, we describe these interdisciplinary dimensions of music education.
When students perform, create, and respond to music, understanding is enhanced through attention to style. Teachers can emphasize the ori- gins and genesis of a work, the conditions of its creation, and how those characteristic features of time and place influence the performance of the work. A technically accurate realization of pitches and rhythms can fail to move us if these crucial stylistic elements are ignored. Through authentic and stylistically accurate performances of music, students are led to won- der about the individuals or groups who expressed ideas in sound. This natural curiosity establishes a purpose for finding out more about the people behind the music, and lures us to “travel” to other settings, peri- ods, and regions.
Often when teachers and students find out more about the origins of a work, they attend to those impulses that moved composers and musi- cians to create in the first place. The impetus for creation might reside in an intriguing text, a tempting commission, a technological advance in sound production, the virtuosic abilities of particular performers, the desire to commemorate an event, the challenge to portray a story, or the urge to represent a feeling or idea. Each story of creation becomes an opportunity to delve into other disciplines and forms of human experi- ence. Discoveries about the birth and pedigree of a musical work fold back into our music making and strengthen it.
Music and the Interdisciplinary Curriculum
2,1
Just as music reflects the social world, it is also firmly situated in the physical world. Musicians develop skills and techniques that rely on the recognition, control, and manipulation of sound. Music educators teach students how to differentiate among sounds with perception and refine- ment, how to produce them with accuracy and precision, how to organize, balance, and blend sounds in satisfying arrangements. The roots of this sensitivity to sound are fascinating, indeed. From infancy, children learn to recognize the distinctive qualities of timbre in their parents’ voices. Soon, children gleefully discover the satisfaction of making varied sounds, which adults hear in their early vocalizations and baby babble. Learning to control the production of that sound is a prerequisite to tuneful singing in later years. Children also respond to intriguing sounds in their envi- ronment and learn the joys of making sounds themselves by banging on pot lids, dropping car keys, and playing with other delightfully noisy objects. Later, students learn to discriminate among and label hundreds of timbres produced by instruments and voices and develop finely tuned abilities to recognize certain performers or instruments by their distinc- tive sound qualities. The science of sound, acoustics, and the expressive creation and organization of sound, music, are closely related.
Figure 2.2
Third Graders Playing a Singing Game. Photo by Sandra Norstrom.
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Music is also physical as it relates to the body, to movement and kines- thetic feeling. From the early Greeks onward, music frequently has been touted as a means to enhanced physical well-being through control of the breath, muscles, skeletal system, tongue, and larynx. The underlying beat in a musical composition parallels the rhythmic regularity of the heart- beat and respiration. As children grow, they become more coordinated, develop fine motor skills, and increase their breath capacity. Through expressive movement to music, singing, and playing, students use their bodies to learn about music, internalize rhythm, and relate sound and gesture. Even musical activities we usually think of as developing “natu- rally,” like singing, are complex, coordinated systems of aural perception, physical production of sound, and cognitive engagement.
Music is a form of cognition, involving processes of thinking in sound and with sound. Composition, improvisation, performance, analysis, rep- resentation, reflection — all of these musical activities depend upon men- tal skills and strategies that are particular to the discipline. When students are engaged in music making, they perceive patterns and structures in the music, compare new sounds with previously heard melodies, rhythms, and harmonies, and respond with new creations, interpretations, and real- izations. Amazingly, this system of complex mental activity works so flu- idly and dynamically that we see, on the outside, what appears to be effortless performance. Because of the complexity and immediacy of musical thought, cognitive psychologists have turned to music as a fasci- nating subject for study and examination. Music educators especially wel- comed the inclusion of musical intelligence in the list of multiple intelli- gences described by Howard Gardner in his now-famous book, Frames of Mind (1985). As new findings in cognitive science enlarge our under- standing of the way the mind works, we may eventually form a clearer picture of the role music plays in cognitive development.
Finally, music is an expressive art, with repertoires of works, conven- tions, traditions, and common practices as well as groundbreaking devel- opments, revolutions, and innovations. We examine the purposes and processes of artistic creation through our study of musicians and their works. We also study the expressive kinship of music to other art forms. Ballet, musical theater, films, and opera are inherently interdisciplinary as they draw upon sound, images, text, gesture, and narrative in original and provocative combinations. The intersections and interactions of art forms are fertile ground for curriculum inquiry and development.
Even though these interdisciplinary aspects of music suggest multiple associations with other subjects, not all music educators are quick to adopt this emphasis in their teaching. Some caution that overenthusiasm for the interdisciplinary nature and benefits of music, when coupled with
Music and the Interdisciplinary Curriculum
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Figure 2.3
A Second Grader Performing “Ode to Joy” Using Graphic Repre- sentation. Photo by Sandra Norstrom.
the limitations of resources and shifting school policies toward the arts, could weaken the position of music in the schools. These cautionary voic- es are worth heeding.
One argument contends that the arts are a special province of under- standing with forms of representation, perceptual skills, abilities to pro- duce works, and evaluative capacities that take years to develop. Within the limitations of time and resources, proponents of this position argue, teachers would be wiser to concentrate on building their own competence and the competence of students in a primary art form. As programs or curricula broaden from this specialized base of experience, the fear of superficiality sets in. What if programs are so general and intermittent that students develop only a cursory acquaintance with art forms? What if students’ misconceptions about the arts are strengthened rather than corrected? Smith (1995) warns that “when the arts are channeled into the mainstream and made part and parcel of everything, arts education becomes dangerously diffused” (p. 24). As the arts successfully permeate the entire curriculum, arts educators begin to worry that integrated pro- grams may be seen as a replacement or substitute for comprehensive arts
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curricula. To counter these fears of superficiality, diffusion, and replace- ment, we believe that arts specialists should have primary responsibility for developing regular and sequential programs of instruction. This is not to suggest that the arts are the exclusive province of specialists, though. General classroom teachers and arts specialists can collaborate on projects that complement both the arts programs and other areas of the curricu- lum, strengthening the overall educational experience for students. A broad focus on “arts across the curriculum,” however, must not compro- mise the depth of “arts within the curriculum.”
Figure 2.4
A Music Teacher and an Art Teacher Engaged in Collaborative Planning. Photo by Sandra Norstrom.
Multiple Perspectives on Music in the Curriculum
In the following section, we are introduced to four different teams of teachers who are engaged in curriculum planning around a conference table in the media center of their schools, listening in on their conversa- tions just at a point when the question of the use of music comes up in the discussion. Some of these teachers are classroom teachers; others are music specialists. Their particular roles and identities are not as impor- tant, however, as what the conversations are meant to illustrate: the vari- ous ways music is incorporated into the educational program. See if you can identify the perspectives of the teachers in each team after you read each scenario.
Music and the Interdisciplinary Curriculum
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Team A
"It just seems that after I finish planning for science, math, social studies, lan- guage arts, health, and everything else, that I've used up all of the day," Ann moaned. "So, to incorporate music somewhere,! have started to collect record- ings of songs that have something to do with the topics and themes of other lessons. Every now and then, I use one of the songs I've found in my collection of cassettes and CDs to introduce the theme of the day, for example. I know we don't sing as often as we could, but I notice that each time we do, my third graders seem to perk up. It really doesn't take all that much time, but at least there is some music in the day."
"I know what you mean, "said Alicia. "I do the same thing. I've found that cer- tain children in my class who may be having difficulties in other subjects, like math or reading, join in with confidence whenever we sing together. I think they feel better about themselves when they feel like part of the group, and singing is such a good group activity. Some of the songs even help them remember facts about math, science, or social studies, too."
Team B
"Do your kindergarten students seem really frazzled by the end of the day since we switched to this new all-day, everyday kindergarten plan?" Bridget asked Ben. "My class hasn't settled into a productive schedule yet.""Absolutely," he replied. "Sometimes they get so wound up by the middle of the afternoon, it's hard to get anything accomplished. But I've finally hit on an idea that seems to be working. It seemed to me that my class needed an outlet for their ener- gy and creativity, so I've incorporated 'Expression Time' every day around 1 :30 or so. The children find places at the tables or on the floor with big sheets of newsprint and crayons or markers, and I play soothing, classical music in the background. The kids spend about 15 minutes drawing to show how the music makes them feel. As I watch them, I can just see them settle down. And you should see some of their colorful drawings! We hang them up all over the room." "What happens next?" asked Bridget. "Do you talk about the drawings or the music?" "We could, but I don't want the children to think there is only one right way to show their ideas," replied Ben. "Each drawing is so special and unique that I'm just pleased the children have an outlet for their creativity. Since the class always seems so much more focused and ready to concentrate after Expression Time, I usually take the opportunity to introduce a new math or social studies lesson while their minds are still fresh."
Team C
After some pleasant chitchat, Chris called the small group of teachers to order. "We really outdid ourselves last fall at Parents' Night, didn't we? I had so many comments from parents who enjoyed watching their children perform. By the
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way, I still have the parrot in my room and I'd be glad to donate him to anoth- er classroom for a while.”
"Sorry, two gerbils and a hamster are enough for me," Carla said. "I agree about the program, though. I've even had parents mention our Rainforest Review when they brought their children to school this September. I think they will be expecting another grand gala this year. And I think I've hit upon just the right angle," she said with a twinkle.
"I was thinking about the opening of the new Community Senior Center, and I came up with the idea, 'Generations of Entertainment,"' Carla continued. "What if we sang songs of different decades, worked on a big time line of events during those decades, found costumes to wear for different songs, and invited grandparents and guests from the senior center as well as the parents to see the children perform?"
Charles interjected, "You know, we could even ask for some audience par- ticipation in the songs or dances of various periods. Wouldn't it be terrific to have the whole school singing at the same time with the audience?"
"I think an intergenerational program would feel like a wonderful celebra- tion and a way to bring the whole community together," said Chris. "And besides, I can't think of any way that this theme would involve classroom pets. Let's get started."
Team D
"Japan. Hmmmm . . . Japan." Darlene, David, and Diane fell silent. "Let's think carefully about this," Darlene said, reviewing the main points of the conversa- tion. "This invitation from the educational director of the Art Center for the sixth graders to participate in the Museum Outreach Program is intriguing.The theme of the exhibit/Water, Air, Fire, Earth,' certainly has lots of potential, and the fact that it coincides with a performance of the Kodo drum ensemble at the Civic Center is almost too good to be true. But I don't want to agree to par- ticipate unless we can really figure out a way to weave our middle school goals for social studies, literature, art, and music with these special events in a meaningful way. Remember how we felt about the African mask exhibit? It was wonderful, but it didn't seem to align with our curriculum in the way we had hoped it might. How will this approach lead students to a deeper under- standing of Japanese culture and tradition?"
"I think we need to start by asking some essential questions, "offered Diane. "For instance, I would want students to answer the question 'How do Japanese people express ideas about nature through poetry, art, and music?' and also 'What are cultural traditions and characteristics of Japan?"'
David said, "I think we should pull out our original goals for the year and see how this project works with what we've already planned. In my case, I'll be ready by that time to focus on tone color by teaching a unit on orchestral
Music and the Interdisciplinary Curriculum
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instruments. But I have some recordings of koto and shakuhachi music, so I might open it up to include instruments of the world. We can extend what students know about sound production in orchestral instruments to our study of Japanese instruments. Perhaps I could tie into the elemental theme by showing how the instruments are made from natural materials. If I can find recordings of the drumming ensemble, we can prepare for the Civic Center performance. I wonder if the drumming has a particular significance within the culture? I think I have some background reading and listening to do!"
"I'll do a library search of artworks and literature to see what I find," said Diane. “I remember seeing a terrific video series in the library catalog when I was browsing through it last week.The first connection that pops out at me is something to do with representations of nature, but I have to get deeper than that. What makes a Japanese wood print so particularly Japanese? I especially need to think about the direct ways students will be involved in studying rep- resentative works and also in creating their own. Let's take a few days to gath- er resources before we come together for our next planning session."
For interdisciplinary curriculum work to be meaningful, teachers must address questions of purpose, balance, and relationship among discipli- nary areas. There is no question that all of the teachers in these scenes included music in the design of classroom experiences, but they used music to different degrees, for different reasons, and, most likely, to vary- ing ends. Certainly, music can be used as an effective strategy for mem- orizing facts, an especially pleasurable form of group activity, an oudet for creative ideas, or a focal point for community gatherings. These useful functions, as admirable or desirable as they may be, are inadequate to serve as primary reasons for the inclusion of music in the curriculum. In the absence of a stronger rationale, teachers could be led to a false sense of accomplishment, assuming that music is being taught or learned when it might be more accurate to say that music is being used. What is the dis- tinction? A comprehensive program attends to the quality of students’ experiences with music by addressing the ways students learn to perform, describe, and create music; the use of carefully chosen musical examples to study; the development of perception; and the cultivation of expressive responses to music.
From 1987 to 1990, the National Endowment for the Arts and the U.S. Department of Education sponsored an ethnographic study of the way the arts are taught in elementary schools (Stake, Bresler, & Mabry, 1991). The study described how art, music, dance, and theater are addressed in the schools by classroom teachers, arts specialists, and artist- in-residence programs. From this investigation of regular, ongoing prac-
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tice, Bresler (1995) identified four styles of arts integration in the elementary curriculum: (a) subservient; (b) affective; (c) social; and (d) coequal, cognitive. As you read the description of each style, you may want to refer to the conversations from the teams of teachers as described above, which were written to illustrate these views and perspectives.
In the subservient style, the arts are used primarily in the service of other subjects to enliven lessons and to aid memory, but are not necessar- ily taught as subjects in and of themselves. In other words, activities in the arts, such as singing songs with topical lyrics, or coloring, cutting, and pasting pictures related to chosen themes, are seen as sufficient ways to address teaching music or art. The arts are used to “spice” other subjects (Bresler, 1995, p. 33), or, to use Wanda May’s analogy, they act as “recre- ational vehicles.” The primary reasons cited for including musical activi- ties in this style were to save time by superimposing musical activities on top of other subjects of study and to improve students’ self-esteem by allowing for other forms of classroom experience besides words and num- bers. Ann and Alicia, the teachers in Team A, deserve commendation for incorporating recordings and songs in the flow of the day, but from this limited excerpt of conversation, we might wonder what musical under- standings are being addressed or cultivated.
Teachers who exemplify the affective style see music as a way to change the overall mood or tone of the classroom, using musical activi- ties as a change of pace or break in the day. Music may be played as a background to other activities, such as working on math problems or completing seat-work assignments. Another attribute of this style involves the use of music to invite creative, individual response. This prac- tice provides blocks of time or opportunities for students to respond to recorded music by drawing pictures, engaging in movement, or describ- ing how the music makes them feel. Open-ended responses by the chil- dren provide outlets for individual ideas and reactions. Bresler suggests that teachers who incorporate musical activities in this way do so to com- plement the structured and highly organized “regular” curriculum by including opportunities for students to respond in a free, unstructured manner. However, they stop short of asking the kinds of questions or of drawing attention to detail that would lead to the development of artis- tic perception and technique. In the example ofTeam B, then, Ben might enrich “Expression Time” by directing attention to particular features of the music and asking children to describe how their drawings reflect those features.
The social integration style emphasizes the role of music in the social fabric of schooling. Music is seen as an integral way to build community among students, teachers, administrators, parents, and community mem-
Music and the Interdisciplinary Curriculum
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bers. Chris, Carla, and Charles exemplify this style as they describe the goal of the intergenerational program as a vehicle for bringing the children and the community together. School ceremonies, rituals, and traditions reflect the beliefs and values of school communities and also shape cultur- al expectations and norms (Barresi & Albrecht, 1988). Again, music is viewed as complementary to the overall curriculum as a means to enter- tain and to build cohesion. These social functions of music are very impor- tant but cannot stand alone as a foundation for musical learning.
Figure 2.5
A Third Grader Spinning a Dreidel While Classmates Dance the Hora. Photo by Sandra Norstrom.
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The coequal, cognitive integration style emphasizes “active percep- tion and critical reflection on the technical and formal qualities” of music (Bresler, 1995, p. 34). In this approach, teachers draw students’ attention to the aesthetic content of works, leading them to identify characteristic features of the music and refining the quality of perception. This style was least commonly found among the teachers in Bresler’s study; those teach- ers who exhibited these practices either had extensive backgrounds in the arts or worked in close consultation with other teachers to provide a com- plementary range of skills, interests, and abilities. In the scenario, Darlene, David, and Diane consider the overarching goals of their pro- grams, the selection of representative, engaging works, the degree to which disciplines and works are related, and the kinds of experiences and involvement that will lead students to deeper understanding of Japanese culture. In planning, they inventory their own knowledge and engage in additional study and research. Time, effort, professional judgment, and collaboration are key ingredients to the success of such ambitious and worthy initiatives.
Teachers and Exemplary Interdisciplinary Curricula
Bresler’s study of practice shows the range of meaning possible in the phrase “integrating the arts into the curriculum.” By describing the four styles as they are found in schools, she portrays a range of beliefs and gra- dations of depth in school programs that profess to teach music. We can form opinions about the quality of these programs by identifying the function that music serves in each classroom setting. We can also see how the process of clarifying educational purposes is crucial to the design of an interdisciplinary curriculum.
Insight for curriculum work also comes from identifying characteristic patterns in the most inclusive, rigorous, inventive, and strong programs. From observation of such programs and reflection on the qualities of the teachers who design them, we have generated a list of characteristics of teachers who create exemplary interdisciplinary curricula. As you read the following characteristics, turn your thinking from the current status of schools, what is, to the possibilities and potential for growth and change, what could be.
~ Curiosity and an intellectual disposition to seek connections.
Teachers who are prone to look for, listen for, and think about rela- tionships, patterns, influences, and coherent meaning act as models of intellectual curiosity for students.
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~ Attention to reciprocal and complementary relationships between and among disciplines.
Insights from related disciplines — social studies, art, dance, or liter- ature, for example — strengthen understanding in music. In turn, teachers carefully consider how experiences in music enhance or strengthen understanding in the related disciplines. This synergistic affinity dissolves confining borders between subject areas and opens up fresh possibilities for investigation and experience.
~ Sensitivity to a balance of time and emphasis.
Factors of quantity and quality of time are crucial. Teachers note the frequency and duration of student engagement in a discipline and the portion of the day or week devoted to such work. They also address the degree to which students attend to significant works, processes, and products in the complementary disciplines. Music is not used as window dressing for social studies, for example, or vice versa. Because representing the essential nature of disciplinary knowledge is a weighty responsibility for those whose primary training has been in another area, teachers often turn to quality resources or seek collaborative input.
~ Depth of understanding.
Interdisciplinary experiences go beyond shallow exposure to deeper forms of understanding, which includes knowing in more than one way. In particular, teachers design educative experiences that allow students to study a work, theme, topic, or problem from many per- spectives. In the arts, these perspectives may be addressed by study- ing a work’s structure and content, origin and context of creation, and capacity for expressive meaning.
In Chapter 3, we will turn our attention to matters of quality when designing curriculum around music and other subjects. For educationally sound programs, teachers must consider the essential elements of musical experience, the strength of connections between and among disciplines, and broad goals and aims for the curriculum. As teachers imagine and evaluate, create and critique curriculum, they must test the soundness and validity of educational ideas and initiatives.
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References
Barresi, A., and Albrecht, G. (1988). School culture. In G. Olson (ed.), Looking in on music teaching: The context book. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Bresler, L. (1995). The subservient, co-equal, affective, and social inte- gration styles and their implications for the arts. Arts Education Policy Review 96 (5): 31-37.
Compact edition of the Oxford English dictionary. (1971). Oxford: Clarendon.
Elliott, D. J. (1995). Music matters: A new philosophy of music education. New York: Oxford University Press.
Gardner, H. (1985). Frames of mind: The theory of multiple intelligences. New York: Basic Books.
Gardner, H., & Boix-Mansilla, V. (1994). Teaching for understanding in the disciplines — and beyond. Teachers College Record 96 (2): 198-218.
Hope, S. (1994). Making disciplinary connections. In B. O. Boston (ed.), Perspectives on implementation: Arts education standards for America’s students (pp. 38-46). Reston, Va.: Music Educators National Conference.
Kliebard, H. M. (1989). Problems of definition in curriculum. Journal of Curriculum and Supervision 5 (1): 1—5.
Leonhard, C. (1991). The status of arts education in American public schools. Urbana, 111.: Council for Research in Music Education.
May, W. T. (1993). Why teachers cannot respond to Leonhard’s propos- al. Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education 117: 167-191.
Parsons, M. J., &, Blocker, H. G. (1993). Aesthetics and education. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
Perkins, D. N. (1992). Smart schools: From training memories to educating minds. New York: Free Press.
Schwab, J. J. (1978). Science, curriculum, and liberal education: Selected essays. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
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Sizer, T. R. (1985). Horaces compromise: The dilemma of the American high school. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
Smith, R. A. (1995). The limits and costs of integration in arts education. Arts Education Policy Review 96 (5): 21-25.
Stake, R., Bresler, L., 8c Mabry, L. (1991). Custom and cherishing: The arts in elementary schools. Urbana, 111.: Council for Research in Music Education.
chapter 3 \*
Integrity in the Interdisciplinary Curriculum
At the end of the first day of the August teacher in-service meetings at Four Winds School, Nina Farraj, a music specialist, felt frustrated. During the day, her principal had shown a series of videotapes on interdisciplinary teaching and how it had been implemented in a variety of schools. In the videotaped pro- grams, music was mentioned only superficially or was poorly portrayed. The featured musical examples consisted mostly of nursery songs to which new words had been added, and music teachers were never shown as members of curricu- lum planning teams. The cumulative effect of these examples seemed to short- change the role of music across the curriculum.
Driving home, Nina mulled over the concept of interdisciplinary teaching. “I can see how there would be some real advantages to that approach, ” she thought, “ but I must convince my colleagues that music can be incorporated in a meaningful way that doesn't compromise music itself.”
How do teachers integrate the curriculum well? Ackerman (1989) recommends that teachers consider validity within a discipline, validity for the disciplines, and validity beyond the disciplines when eval- uating the intellectual and practical sense of interdisciplinary curricular programs. To judge a program as valid suggests that it is sound or well reasoned. This soundness is crucial to disciplinary and interdisciplinary curriculum planning. We have chosen, however, to cast Ackerman’s basic notion of validity in a slightly different way, by referring instead to the integrity of curriculum. Integrity connotes sound and valid ideas as well, but also suggests the “state of being whole, entire, undiminished” (Flexner, 1987, p. 990). Curriculum plans, then, whether involving just one discipline or more than one, must be evaluated as full and coherent wholes. Integrity within the discipline occurs when teachers plan and conduct instruction in a manner that upholds standards of quality in a particular field of study. Curriculum work in two or more content areas makes sense when teachers attend to natural and organic connections to preserve integrity between or among disciplines. Integrity beyond the
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disciplines is addressed when teachers consider the broad goals and pur- poses of schooling and the way the attainment of these goals contributes to the students’ general development and quality of life.
Integrity within the Discipline of Music
One of the most important roles of the teacher is to identify what is essential in understanding any topic, subject area, or discipline. To return to the metaphor of curriculum as a path discussed in Chapter 2, we might ask what assumptions or principles guide teachers as they navigate through the territory of all that is possible to explore, ultimately selecting the most important routes for exploration. If educational experiences in a discipline are to have integrity and meaning for students, we must always be asking the essential question, What are the fundamental components and forms of experience in the discipline?
Although it sounds redundant, teaching or learning music is depen- dent upon engagement in music. This means that active music making is the highest priority for both teachers and students, as opposed to learn- ing about music through other, less immediate means such as reading about it in books, playing computer games with musical symbols, or lis- tening to someone else discuss how they make music. Insight can be gained from these secondary sources, certainly, but to know music is to do music. This mission of working in, around, and within real music encom- passes three intertwining branches of content: (a) musical examples or music literature, (b) the elements and structure of music, and (c) the processes of music making.
Examples/Literature as the Content of Music. Music is a body of works, although the number of works and range of styles are ever expand- ing. These works may be centuries old or the immediate product of a class improvisation. They may be easily recognized by many people (the “warhorses” of the literature) or may be known to a relative few. They may be organized in familiar and predictable ways or may challenge our per- ceptions and expectations. They may remain in our memory for decades or may dissipate the second the last pitch is sounded. Whatever their staying power or influence, musical examples are not just vehicles through which teachers teach about music; they are music.
Bamberger (1991) reflects on the all-too-common dinner party con- versation when individuals claim that they “don’t know anything at all about music” even when they can recall a substantial number of tunes, hum or whistle parts of them, and possess a rather extensive collection of musical recordings. This paradox may reflect people’s beliefs about musi- cal knowledge and the common assumption that only certain kinds of knowledge “count” toward musicality (being able to sing or play fluently,
Integrity in the Interdisciplinary Curriculum
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for example). An individual’s personal repertoire is one valid form of musical knowledge.
What body of works will we choose for the classroom? Criteria for the choice of musical examples often include the appropriateness of the example for the students; the inclusion of a wide menu of types, genres, and styles of music; and the quality of the musical example itself.
Appropriateness for the students includes a judgment of the example’s possible appeal. In the teacher’s professional opinion, will this music engage the interest of students? The answer to this question often depends upon particular classroom settings and the knowledge the teacher has of the students’ preferences and past reactions to musical works. If the work is a song, the text must be considered. Is the subject matter of the text appropriate and interesting for students? School poli- cies and community expectations should also be considered when choos- ing literature, as teachers strive to exercise cultural sensitivity in the selec- tion of works to study and perform. The length of the musical example is often a prime factor, as teachers select shorter or longer pieces based on their knowledge of the students’ attention, endurance, and skill. The com- plexity of the musical example is also important. If students will be asked to perform the work, teachers analyze how the technical and expressive demands of the piece provide a challenge suited to the skills and capabil- ities of the student. This can vary, though, with the type of interactions children have with the music. Students may listen to a recording of a work, for example, that is beyond their performing abilities but not beyond their skills of comprehension and response.
The realm of possible musical works spans the globe and extends through centuries of human experience. Access to this musical panorama is expanding as technology makes the preservation and transmission of works commonplace. To be knowledgeable about music, students need to be familiar with a wide variety of musical styles and genres, such as repre- sentative works from various historical eras and diverse cultural traditions.
Teachers make informed judgments about the quality of the music they select for the curriculum. Within the plethora of possibilities and the limited constraints of time, there are works that deserve our attention and works that are too trivial, objectionable, or mundane to consider. A framework for judging the quality of artwork, including music, is provid- ed by Reimer (1991): (a) craftsmanship, the “expertness by which the materials of art are molded into expressiveness”; (b) sensitivity, “the depth and quantity of feeling captured in the dynamic form of the work”; (c) imagination, which refers to the “vividness of an art object and its perfor- mance”; and (d) authenticity, the “genuineness of the artist’s interaction with his materials in which the control by the artist includes a giving way
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Sound Ways of Knowing
to the demands of the material” (pp. 332-336). Although in later chap- ters we will refer to authenticity in terms of the cultural origins and con- texts of a work, Reimer’s use of the term suggests the presence of the artist’s ideas within the work as echoes of the artist’s distinctive personal signature within a medium. Teachers continually define and redefine per- sonal and professional standards of quality as they note the lasting appeal and endurance of works, student engagement and interest, and richness of content that invites new interpretation.
Elements and Structure as the Content of Music. Music is organized sound. When we perform, create, or listen to music, we notice patterns and regularities in the sound — aural (heard) features that make the music comprehensible and meaningful to us. Music interests us because these patterns can be heard and felt on many different levels, in many schemes of organization, and in infinite combinations. Sometimes the patterns are so characteristic that we can identify a particular composer’s style, or the work’s affiliation with a particular region or group of musicians. The way a performer or composer works with these structures of sound by empha- sizing, minimizing, repeating, changing, or highlighting nuances within the patterns is a reflection of the musician’s craft or fluency.
We refer to these patterns and structures as the elements of music, and we label them by categories of rhythm, melody, harmony, form, tone color, and texture (see Table 6.3 for a useful review of these elements). We use these categories to draw attention to particular features of a musical example. After encountering many examples of these elements as they are embodied in varied types of works, we form concepts of music. These mental structures allow us to make sense of new works because we have built a good general sense or concept of how melodies go, how beats might be grouped into meters, how harmonies pull the music toward or away from important tonal centers, or any other relationships of sound. Verbal labels and terms for these features expedite our conversations about music with other individuals.
The teaching of music has integrity when teachers give attention to these elements so students can form music concepts. Instruction often focuses on musical examples that highlight these elements, which helps students acquire a vocabulary of representative patterns and structures, along with labels for identification. For example, teachers might begin by presenting a song in ABA form, with very distinct differences in the B section to set it apart from the A section. Later, students might attend to the phrases within a section, labeling smaller groupings of musical ideas as same or different. Or, more subde differences in a phrase might lead to a categorization scheme of same, similar, or different, with a correspond- ing set of labels, a, a', or b. Perceptions become more acute as we learn to
Integrity in the Interdisciplinary Curriculum
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attend to simultaneous layers of musical events while, at the same time, we notice additional musical details and nuances.
Fluency with these elemental building blocks includes our ability to recognize and label what we hear, but also extends to what we can do with music as we work within the grammar or syntax of a musical style. How does rhythm work when we improvise in a blues style or play a Sousa march? How does rhythm work when singing a spiritual, or a work song, or other songs in an oral tradition? How does rhythm work when we play an accompaniment to an African story song or tap repeated patterns on a drum for a Renaissance dance? These elements of rhythm, melody, har- mony, form, and so on are universal in that they can be found in many styles of music, but they are at the same time particular when they are used in the “language” or syntax of a musical style.
Figure 3.1
Fifth Graders Performing with their Teacher in an Ensemble. Photo by Sandra Norstrom.
Processes as the Content of Music. Musicians demonstrate an incred- ible range of musical actions and activities. To encourage such fluency in the music classroom, teachers provide many options for music making and offer a diversified approach to musical development. Students gain competence and skill in performing by learning to sing or play. Students also create new musical ideas through improvisation, composition, and interpreting and arranging the compositions of others. Producing sound
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is central to musicianship. Teachers strive to develop students’ sensitivity to the relationships, qualities, and subdeties in sound. As students notice how a work is organized, how characteristic elements can be heard in the music, and how these elements are used expressively, they show how acutely they perceive sound. New works are learned and created as stu- dents observe and imitate the music making of others, using the ear, hand, and voice to learn “by ear.” To develop music literacy, students learn how to represent sound in various forms, which includes reading and writing using both graphic and conventional symbols for music. Finally, learners think about their musical experiences as they direct their efforts, monitor what they have learned and what yet needs to be mastered, eval- uate music and their performances of it, and consider how the works they perform, create, analyze, or represent fit within the stylistic contexts they seek to understand. This realm of activity encourages deliberate reflection upon sound. Comprehensive music programs give students experiences with all of these processes. Students who learn to produce, perceive, rep- resent, and reflect upon sound become well rounded and accomplished musicians.
Production, perception, representation, and reflection broadly encom- pass the fundamental processes of music. Consider how these four broad processes are incorporated into the nine content standards for music in the 1994 National Standards for Arts Education (Table 3.1) (Consortium of National Arts Education Associations, 1994).
Table 3.1
Content Standards in Music
1 . Singing, alone and with others, a varied repertoire of music
2. Performing on instruments, alone and with others, a varied repertoire of music
3. Improvising melodies, variations, and accompaniments
4. Composing and arranging music within specified guidelines
5. Reading and notating music
6. Listening to, analyzing, and describing music
7. Evaluating music and music performances
8. Understanding relationships between music, the other arts, and disciplines out- side the arts
9. Understanding music in relation to history and culture
Students engage in these forms of musical activity to acquire skill, develop technique, heighten perceptual abilities, make novel contribu- tions, evaluate progress toward goals, and most importantly, begin to define their competence and identity as musical individuals. Through thoughtfully selected and arranged experiences in the classroom, students acquire the skills and dispositions to move toward independent musi-
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Integrity in the Interdisciplinary Curriculum
cianship. The satisfaction that comes from mastering new challenges encourages students to take on new musical ventures. Note that standards 8 and 9 also refer to the music’s relationship with other disciplines, as nec- essary understanding for informed musicianship.
In summary, educational experiences in music have integrity when stu- dents and teachers are engaged in processes of producing, perceiving, rep- resenting, and reflecting on sound, while attending to the elements of sound that make musical works expressive and give them significance in our lives. Whether the classroom is inhabited by five-year-olds or college students, the impact of the experience will depend upon the choices teachers make from the infinite varieties of musical works, elements, and forms of musical engagement.
Figure 3.2
A Third Grader Locates Ghana on the World Map Before the Class Sings a Song from Ghana. Photo by Sandra Norstrom.
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Later in the year, Nina Farraj found herself sitting beside her colleagues in the front of the room during parent-teacher night. Her principal had organized this meeting so the teachers could describe some of the innovative and collabo- rative projects they had designed. As Nina listened to her colleagues, she was pleased to hear them describe how they had incorporated music in thoughtful, expressive ways into their study of literature, dance, art, and social studies. Nina's zeal in communicating the essential components of instruction in music had paid off, but in turn, she had also learned more about the essence of teach- ing other subjects in the curriculum. The teachers at Four Winds had spent many hours of planning and preparation to coordinate their efforts, and as a result, their ideas were inventive, lively, and powerful.
When it was Nina's turn to talk about the changes in the music program brought about by the interdisciplinary initiative, she began by describing how this year had been full of new discoveries as she consulted historical and cultur- al sources to enhance her understanding of the origins of musical works. She told the parents how the students had suggested placing a time line around the perimeter of the music room as a record of the different works they had studied. She also displayed the large world map that helped the children locate the musi- cal traditions of other cultures. Nina also described how she had learned much from her colleagues in art and literature as they found meaningful connections among works of art and explored those connections with students.
Integrity between and among Disciplines
In the previous chapter, we stated that teachers must address issues of purpose, balance, and relationship when designing interdisciplinary cur- ricula. Whether a teacher is planning innovative lessons individually or working collaboratively within a team, great new ideas are accompanied by a flurry of important questions: Why are we doing this? What is the significance of these ideas? What forms of experience and classroom activities are most useful in gaining new understanding? Why put these particular ideas or works together? Are we giving equal time and empha- sis to each area we’ve incorporated into the curriculum? For each new plan or idea we add to the curriculum, what will be replaced or eliminat- ed? Do we have the resources and materials we need? How will we real- ly know what the students learn through their participation in these lessons? What do we know about this topic already? What do the stu- dents know? Will they be interested in these ideas and find them useful? These questions are important to the issue of integrity between and among disciplines.
An English logician named John Venn used interlocking, overlapping circles to represent the degree of relationship between and among sets of objects or ideas. We can borrow this graphic organizer from mathematics
Integrity in the Interdisciplinary Curriculum
43
to test the validity of ideas between and among disciplines. Representing the relationship between ideas with circles is nothing new in interdisci- plinary work; in fact, various diagrams, webs, and graphics are used in dif- ferent models of curriculum planning (Fogarty, 1991; Jacobs, 1989; Kovalik, 1992). Venn diagrams are a simple yet powerful tool to test the strength of connections and related ideas.
To begin, consider that music can be taught as a discrete subject, apart from other areas of the curriculum. If students happen to make a con- nection between music and another area, it comes as a result of their own process of discovery rather than any intentional act on the part of the teacher or school to stress the relationship.
Figure 3.3
Music and Another Subject
One very common framework for interdisciplinary work uses a topi- cal theme as the integrative area (oceans, transportation, animals, the cir- cus, etc.):
Figure 3.4
Music and Theme or Topic
In many of the topical units that we have examined, it appears that music is related to the general model only through the texts of songs cho- sen to relate to the theme. If you can “animate” the two circles above, move them together and overlap them only slightly to show the degree of their true relationship. In this instance, we might imagine the two circles with a very small shared area because only the words of the song relate to the topical theme:
Figure 3.5
Music and Theme with Minimal Overlap
44 Sound Ways of Knowing
To move beyond this rather superficial “words about X” context, choose two subject areas with a truly complementary overlap of content, such as music and social studies. When students are learning about the lives of people in the Civil War era, music may be used as a means to show the depth of feeling and intensity of emotion. Here, the two areas are drawn together with almost a magnetic pull, since studying the music of the Civil War illuminates that time in history, and understanding the cir- cumstances of the Civil War helps us to understand and perform the music of that time with greater sensitivity.
Figure 3.6
Music of the Civil War and History of the Civil War
Finally, it is certainly possible to design interdisciplinary curriculum units in which more than two subject areas are related in reciprocal, com- plementary fashion. Art forms that are intrinsically multidisciplinary, such as ballet, are prime candidates for three- or four-ring Venn dia- grams. To understand a ballet, students might study the music, the chore- ography, and the visual elements of costume and set design. Each area is integral to the holistic form, so the circles move together and overlap in close proximity.
Figure 3.7
Music, Dance, and Visual Elements
Venn diagrams can be useful tools to evaluate the intersections of con- tent found in single lessons, entire units, or year-long curricular programs. We have found this strategy helpful in the early exploratory phases of idea generation, as well as later stages of review and evaluation. As teachers reflect on curriculum projects to evaluate why they worked so well or what should be modified in the future, the strength of content relation- ships is assessed. In collaborative efforts, this exercise encourages teach- ers to forge a consensus about the purposes of the plan. Sketching out
Integrity in the Interdisciplinary Curriculum
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these circles and thinking about the ways they overlap clarifies the nature and extent of mutually complementary relationships between and among disciplines.
After several years of teaching at Four Winds School, Nina decided to return to school in the summers to complete a graduate degree in music education. She found the whirlwind of classes, readings, and papers to be stimulating and worthwhile. Her interdisciplinary experiences had prepared her well to think about the Big Picture of education. Nina felt a sense of satisfaction as she reflected on the ways that her classroom practices, her strong beliefs about the power of music, and important educational theories aligned.
In courses on the foundations of education and curriculum development, Nina thought about the relationship of her carefully designed music program to the interdisciplinary focus of her school. She confirmed her belief that music allows children to acquire knowledge and skills in ways that match their learn- ing characteristics and personal styles. She thought ahead to her students' years in middle school, high school, and college, and hoped that they would continue to show enthusiasm for learning music and seek out new experiences in the future, whatever their professional goals might be.
Integrity beyond the Disciplines
The philosopher John Dewey conceived of education as growth, a process of “continual reorganizing, reconstructing, and transforming” (1944, p. 50). He called upon educators to examine the needs and capacities of stu- dents in order to plan curriculae that are “flexible enough to permit free play for individuality of experience and yet firm enough to give direction towards continuous development of power” (Dewey, 1938, p. 58). For stu- dents to realize their intellectual and personal power fully through educa- tive experience, teachers must contemplate the overarching purposes of education and the curricular decisions and actions that lead to the attain- ment of those purposes. We might ask: How does an interdisciplinary emphasis in curriculum move students closer to the realization of their potential as individuals? How might the cultivation of this potential eventually lead to important advances in knowledge and the amelioration of social problems? How does a teacher ever really know the long-lasting effects and ultimate outcomes of classroom experience?
Earlier in the chapter, we suggested that integrity beyond the disci- plines involves consideration of the broad goals and purposes of school- ing, as well as the way the attainment of these goals contributes to the students’ general development and quality of life. Educational thought and discourse revolve around complicated issues and essential questions embedded in these two interrelated areas. Many educational theorists have contemplated these aims of education, publishing arguments and
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Table 3.2
The Purposes of Schooling ( Goodlad)
frameworks against which teachers can assess beliefs and practices. This relationship of theory and practice is mutual, however, because educa- tional theories often arise from practice in the first place. These impor- tant ideas and questions can stimulate lively conversations about the cur- riculum. Goodlad (1984) grouped the purposes of schooling into four categories: (a) academic goals; (b) vocational goals; (c) social, civic, and cultural goals; and (d) personal goals (see Table 3.2).
A. Academic Goals
Mastery of basic skills and fundamental processes Intellectual development
B. Vocational Goals Career education
C. Social, Civic, and Cultural Goals Interpersonal understandings Citizenship participation Enculturation
Moral and ethical character
D. Personal Goals
Emotional and physical well-being Creativity and aesthetic expression Self-realization
How do these worthy goals, which we often view as the culmination of experience from kindergarten through college, play out in the everyday reality of lessons and classes? Interdisciplinary study may be crucial to the attainment of these large purposes by dissolving boundaries between sub- jects and allowing teachers and students to work together on large, com- plex problems and issues.
Another view of the mission of schooling especially relates to the arts in the overall experience of schools. Eisner (1991) proposes six aims of schooling that hold profound implications for school life and interdisci- plinary curriculum development. He suggests that these ideas are the most valid and worthwhile lessons we could teach, including (a) the idea that “the exploration of ideas is sometimes difficult, often exciting, and occasionally fun,” (b) learning “how to formulate [our] own problems and how to design the tactics and strategies to solve them,” (c) encouraging the “development in the young of multiple forms of literacy,” (d) “teach- ing the young the importance of wonder,” (e) “helping children realize that they are part of a caring community,” and (f) “teaching children that they have a unique and important personal signature” (pp. 13-16).
Integrity in the Interdisciplinary Curriculum
47
Eisners aims inspire us to provide students with imaginative and expressive experiences in music, art, theater, dance, and literature. To design these experiences with creativity and insight, teachers need to con- sider how they come to know new works fully and comprehensively, which is the subject of Chapter 4. Personal insights may lead to peda- gogical insight in preparing to teach those works to students.
References
Ackerman, D. B. (1989). Intellectual and practical criteria for successful curriculum integration. In H. H. Jacobs (ed.), Interdisciplinary curriculum: Design and implementation (pp. 25—37). Alexandria, Va.: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
Bamberger, J. (1991). The mind behind the musical ear: How children devel- op musical intelligence. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Consortium of National Arts Education Associations. (1994). National standards for arts education: What every young American should know and be able to do in the arts. Reston, Va.: Music Educators National Conference.
Dewey, J. (1938). Experience and education. New York: Collier.
Dewey, J. (1944). Democracy and education: An introduction to the philosophy of education. New York: Free Press. (Originally published 1916.)
Eisner, E. W. (1991). What really counts in schools. Educational Leadership (February): 10-17.
Flexner, S. B. (ed.). (1987). The Random House dictionary of the English language (2nd ed.). New York: Random House.
Fogarty, R. (1991). The mindful school: How to integrate the curricula. Palatine, 111.: Skylight.
Goodlad,J. I. (1984). A place called school. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Jacobs, H. H. (ed.). (1989). Interdisciplinary curriculum: Design and imple- mentation. Alexandria, Va.: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
Kovalik, S. J. (1992). Integrated thematic instruction. Village of Oak Creek, Ariz.: Books for Educators.
Reimer, B. (1991). Criteria for quality in music. In R. A. Smith 8c A. Simpson (eds.), Aesthetics and arts education. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
*\ chapter 4 ]*
Getting to Know a Work of Art
Sometimes Running
Sometimes running to yes nothing and too fast to look where and at what I stand and there are trees sunning themselves long a brook going and jays and jewelry in all leafages because I pause
John Ciardi
In his poem, “Sometimes Running,” John Ciardi (1962) reminds us that if we don’t take time to examine the world around us and the world within us, we will miss the opportunities for awe and wonder that life can offer. The arts — music, painting, sculpture, poetry, dance, and theater — can be powerful antidotes to our stress-filled, fast-paced, quick-fix, sound-byte culture. Thomas Moore, in his book Care of the Soul (1992), asserts that “we’ll feel empty if everything we do slides past without stick- ing.” The arts are important because they arrest attention and “invite . . . us into contemplation — a rare commodity in modern life. In that moment of contemplation art intensifies the presence of the world” (p. 286). When we are participating in the arts as creator, performer, or perceiver, we are able “to see more in our experience, to hear more on normally unheard fre- quencies, to become conscious of what daily routines, habits and conventions have obscured” (Greene, 1995, p. 379). To achieve this heightened aware- ness, one must make a commitment of time and effort. Georgia O’Keeffe, who painted spectacular canvas-filling flowers, said, “Still — in a way —
49
5°
Sound Ways of Knowing
nobody sees a flower — really — it is so small — we haven’t time — and to see takes time, like to have a friend takes time” (cited in Hecht, 1995, p. 4). Just as O’Keeffe took the time to observe every minute detail of the flowers she painted, we viewers must take the time to “see” what she pre- sents to us. So while the arts can serve as a catalyst for contemplation, they cannot automatically offer their full benefits if they are encountered only casually. To derive full value from the arts, we must be willing to become actively engaged with them over time.
Art, as a refinement and intensification of our human experience (Dewey, 1934), is a magnifying glass for the soul. A magnifying glass can be used to bring cloudy images into focus. It can also be used to focus sunlight with enough intensity that it can burn a hole in paper. The artist, through visual images, melodies, physical gestures, or poetic language, not only helps us clarify our thoughts about life experiences, but also helps us distill and intensify the feelings of joy, sorrow, wonder, or amusement we associate with those experiences. Consider, for example, some ways music serves to add meaning to an experience or to intensify its emotional impact. We sing “Happy Birthday” to make a birthday celebration even more festive. Quiet, reflective music adds solemnity to a funeral. Film soundtracks pique our anticipation, raise our anxiety level, or allow us to relax in a flood of relief as the violins soar, assuring us of a happy ending.
Our intense responses to the arts often provoke a desire to convey our newly discovered insights to others. Our verbal attempts to do so, howev- er, lack the forms of representation in sound, space, and time that are the qualitative dimensions of artistic experience. Words seem like straitjackets when compared with the fluid, lively, and simultaneous elements of a folk dance, jazz quartet, opera chorus, or grand finale in the musical theater.
Still, we are compelled to attempt to represent our experience in words, as much to ourselves as to others. For ourselves, we seek to articulate our understanding and to observe our processes of engagement in the hope that future encounters with artworks will be as intense, enjoyable, and profound. In our roles as teachers, friends, or family members, we describe our most vibrant responses so that others might seek similar opportunities for artistic experience. Leonard Bernstein (1959), as gifted as anyone in pointing the way to musical experience through words, resigned himself to “joining the long line of well-meaning but generally doomed folk who have tried to explain the unique phenomenon of human reaction to organized sound” (p. 11). He summarized the neces- sity and inevitability of the challenge:
Ultimately one must simply accept the loving fact that people
enjoy listening to organized sound ( certain organized sounds,
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anyway); that this enjoyment can take the form of all kinds of responses from animal excitement to spiritual exaltation; and that people who can organize sounds so as to evoke the most exalted responses are commonly called geniuses. These axioms can neither be denied nor explained. But, in the great tradition of man burrowing through the darkness with his mind, hitting his head on cave walls, and sometimes perceiv- ing a pinpoint of light, we can at least try to explain; in fact, there’s no stopping us. (p. 11)
Attending a concert, dance, or play is an opportunity to observe our own process of engagement with works of art. In the next scenario, com- pare this description of engagement with arts performances you have attended.
Several months ago , you purchased tickets for a performance of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night by an acclaimed acting company. You have anticipated this performance for weeks (whenever you've had a tiny crevice of time to think about your cultural agenda in the midst of your hectic schedule). Now, on the evening of performance, your frustration mounts as unsolicited phone calls cause a chain reaction of delays, compounded by heavy traffic and packed parking ramps. As the usher escorts you to your seat and hands you the playbill, you con- sider speed-reading the synopsis, just so you'll be better prepared to understand the roster of players and enjoy this comedy. “ Perhaps I should have checked out a copy of the play from the library, "you think with a twinge of regret, just as the hall lights dim.
"If music be the food of love, play on. "The opening line only serves to remind you that you didn't have time for dinner after work. For the first 10 minutes, you struggle to calibrate your ear to the rhythms and vocabulary of this rich lin- guistic feast. "Maybe I'm just too frazzled for Shakespeare ton ight, "you think with resignation, still working diligently to catch the flow of the story and the relationships of the characters. "I'll go along for the ride, but they'll have to lug me along with them. "Then, the miraculous happens as the preoccupations of the day fade and you find yourself caught up in Shakespeare's web of words. In the crazy mix-up of identities, you want to call out to warn Olivia that her beloved is not Cesario, but Viola in disguise. You sense that it is inevitable that Malvolio will fall right into the trap of vanity set for him by Sir Toby Belch and his drunken cohorts. You listen with rapt attention as Feste, the jester, addresses the central flaws and features of the human condition. By the end of the play, you feel uplifted, transformed, and thankful that even though your life is complicated and fast moving, the problems you need to solve are far less messy than the tangled webs of deceit and dirty tricks portrayed in this comic tale.
5? Sound Ways of Knowing
The Individual and the Artwork
The preceding scenario depicts the power of artwork to engage and move an individual, not just in the sense of deep emotional response, but also in the sense of the individual’s relationship to the work of art. To discuss this relationship, the metaphor of location, in which distance or position signifies engagement and understanding, will be used. At the beginning of the play, this person was fully “outside” the play, caught up in the vicis- situdes of modern life that contributed to the sense of distance from deep comprehension of meaning or personal response to the work. If you can imagine yourself as the playgoer in this scenario, we might say at the out- set that you are as removed as possible from Twelfth Night.
Figure 4.1
“ Removed "from the Work
This distance brings detachment and objectification. You look on the work as an important cultural artifact to be preserved or studied, but this preservation or study exists apart from your rich, subjective inner life. You may examine the work, but you aren’t led to examine yourself in the process. Or, it is certainly possible, when you are in the “removed” state, that you have little interest in the work at all, viewing it as an extraneous frill or idle amusement.
In contrast, search your personal experience to recreate the sense of being fully within a work — engaged in comprehension, personal response, or dialogue with the work or the impulses of its creator. Recall a time when your senses were heightened and your perceptions were clear while performing, listening to, creating, evaluating, viewing, or examining a song, play, poem, sculpture, dance, or other work. The distracting barri- ers that held you at arm’s distance were removed, and the dimensions of the experience were expanded. For a time, you were transported to the center of the artistic experience. When the encounter with the work ended, you may have felt a sense of returning to the world of reality. Although we may not be able to articulate how we arrived at this “place,” we remember the vitality, the sense of personalization, heightened aware- ness, and enhanced meaning.
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Figure 4.2
"Within” the Work
The business of philosophy, psychology, sociology, and the hybrid dis- cipline of education in the arts is to describe both the “removed” position and the location of “within” and also to address how an individual moves from one to the other. Since location is our current metaphor, we are going to call this notion the idea of transport.
You
Figure 4.3
Transport from “Removed" to "Within the Work
Transport is concerned with an individuals progression from detach- ment to engagement, from superficial acquaintance to deep comprehen- sion, from transitory encounter to long-lasting ownership. When students encounter the arts in classroom settings, teachers have opportunities to observe and reflect upon the degrees of engagement, comprehension, and ownership among students. We sense occasions when students are removed, confused, or disaffected; we also feel the exhilaration of con- nectedness.
Comprehension
Figure 4.4
Engagement with and Comprehen- sion of the Work
As we orchestrate educational experiences for the classroom, we can direct our reflective effort to pay attention to the forces or conditions that allow or even propel movement from “without” to “within.” In turn, our insights may strengthen the quality of students’ encounters with music, theater, art, dance, and literature.
54
Sound Ways of Knowing
Examining Personal Experience The Transport Exercise
One way to gain insight into teaching and learning is to attend with care and deliberation to the quality of your own personal experience. Through this examination of your thoughts and responses, you may find parallels to important puzzles of curriculum design and instruc- tional strategy. Play with the notion of transport by choosing a musical work that you don’t know well but have been attracted to in passing. (You could either choose a recording to study or a musical example to perform.) Set a limited period of time — a weekend, per- haps— to chart your own progress from “removed” to “within.” Use your strategic thinking and available resources to move yourself from superficial acquaintance with the work to fuller, deeper understanding. Make note of your path and the moves you make toward understand- ing in an attempt to monitor your own responses to the process. When you think you’ve arrived in the center of understanding the work (as centered as possible in this short window of time), summarize what you learn about the means of transport you used to get “within.” If an illustration conveys the best sense of the journey, draw a map of your process. Engage in this experiment before you read the remainder of this chapter. You may find the following questions helpful in thinking about the task:
~ How do you define “within” and “without” in your own terms?
~ How do you know when you reach a point where you are able to think and feel “within” the music?
~ Can you fall out of that center place? Does the depth of experi- ence endure or fade? Why?
~ What about the rate of transport? Sometimes we “get it” imme- diately. Sometimes works grow on us. Does it make any differ- ence whether you get “within” at a snail-like 35 miles per hour or a speedy 65?
~ What helps you to understand the music? What blocks trans- port? How do you eliminate distractions along the way?
Stages of a Relationship with a Musical Work
There are, no doubt, as many paths from “without” to “within” as there are combinations of individuals and musical works. Teachers probably cannot predict or prescribe how quickly students will be ready to perform or understand a work, or when they will come to “own” it. Generalizations
Getting to Know a Work of Art
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about the process of getting to know a work are tricky because each indi- vidual relates the new work to the pool of works already known (what cognitive psychologists called schematic knowledge). The depth and width of this known pool vary among individuals, of course. Personal his- tories act as lenses, filters, or mirrors for new experience.
For the purpose of illustration, however, entertain the possibility that any individual may go through various stages of a relationship with a work1 (see Table 4.1), just as friendship or courtship may go through a progression from initial introductions to deep intimacy. Although the idea of stages implies that everyone passes through each stage in the same sequence, an itinerary that is certainly too rigid and linear for describing artistic experience or personal relationships, a general map of the changes in the quality of experience might illuminate varying levels of engage- ment with a work. For this description of a deepening relationship, assume that the individual first hears a recording or live performance of a musical composition.
|
Stage |
Description of Stage |
Table 4.1 |
|
0 |
No relationship. You have no contact with nor interest in the work. You have never heard it, or you have heard it and do not care to hear it again. |
Stages of Interaction with a Musical Work |
|
1 |
Personal, incidental relationship. In public or private settings, you have heard the work and recognize it, either by sound, title, or association.You recognize the work whenever you encounter it in your everyday experience. |
|
|
2 |
Personal, intentional relationship. In private settings, you seek out the work so that you can hear it more often. You listen for it on the radio, or perhaps you make note of the title so you can purchase a recording of it. You find yourself humming the melody, singing some of the words, or tapping the rhythm as you bond with the work. The important element of personal choice is exercised at this level;you take the initiative to select this work over others. |
|
|
3 |
Public relationship. You commit to a public declaration of your enjoyment of or interest in the work by telling your friends, col- leagues, or students about it. Perhaps you endorse a particular recording or play the work for them to see how they respond. You make your preferences public. |
|
|
4a |
Performing relationship. You expend the effort to learn the work so that you can play it or sing it without the recording or score — that is, you memorize it. You also bring your own inter- pretive ideas to the performance. |
continues
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Sound Ways of Knowing
|
Table 4.1 |
Stage |
Description of Stage |
|
Stages of Interaction with a Musical Work (continued) |
4b |
Pedagogical relationship. You know the work so well you decide to teach it to others so they will be able to listen to it with understanding or be able to perform it. You determine how you will teach it and how you will enhance the students' learn- ing by providing information about the sociocultural context of the work. You engage in research about the work to understand it origins and structure. |
|
5 |
Long-lasting personal and professional relationship. You come back to the work time and time again for further levels of understanding and enjoyment. The work takes its place in your personal repertoire of known works. Students, friends, or col- leagues may associate this work with you — "This is Michael's favorite song''or"l performed this work with Ms. Howard in high school." |
Certain themes that run through this progression suggest principles to consider when constructing curriculum in music: repetition, choice, iden- tity, context, elements/structure, performance, critique/evaluation, creative response, and resources. A common theme is repetition, the opportunity to become familiar with a work by hearing it many times. Multiple encounters are often necessary, for just as the creator of a work may persevere at the task of bringing a work of art to fruition, perceivers may need patience and time to cultivate a relationship with a work. Some individuals experience sudden, immediate, and profound insights on a first hearing of a composition; for others, meaning is revealed in layers as the listener comes back to the work again and again. The speed of reve- lation may depend on features of the work as well as the perceptual skills and prior knowledge of the listener. Through repeated encounters, we incorporate the images, sounds, and patterns from the work into our “interior” until we sense that we know the work. Like the nearly obses- sive process of playing a new recording over and over, we know we are “within” the music when we hear the sound of the next selection in the silences between tracks of the compact disc.
Choice implies a level of personal commitment. When we seek out a particular work and select it over other possible works, we have already made tentative connections with the work. Attraction and interest, piqued by the tide, composer, or familiarity with similar works, lead us to take the initiative to hear the work again and again. In classrooms, it is typical practice for teachers to select the musical material to study or per- form, so this desire for another encounter with the piece must be kindled by some other means (planning the introduction of the piece to pique
Getting to Know a Work of Art
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students’ curiosity, for example). If listening stations are available, stu- dents can make their own decision to hear works again and again, or to select something new. Identity is another theme. We respond to the work as a listener, performer, or composer, or as a teacher imagining how our students would respond. We can direct our attention toward the work in different ways depending upon the personal or professional hat we are wearing at the time. The context of a work is important in situating the example in a time or place and in addressing its power in the lives of indi- viduals and groups.
Through heightened perception of elements, we notice how the work is constructed, or focus on the constituent parts that make up the whole. We may approach the work from various perspectives of personal experi- ence, or stances of performer, critic, or creator. Resources are also important. We can turn to liner notes, commentaries, analyses, scores, other recordings, other musicians and teachers, or biographies to assist our interpretation or process of understanding.
Studying our responses to and engagement with a work may be a nec- essary prerequisite to teaching that work. If we notice how we become enamored or intrigued with a work to the point where we decide to bring it into the classroom, we may be able to communicate the intensity of our relationship with it as we introduce it to students.
A Teacher’s Path from "Outside” to "Inside” in Preparation for Curriculum Development
As teachers, we have observed classroom experiences that struck us as particularly innovative and engaging, bearing the imprint of a creative, thoughtful teacher. We have also read impressive, carefully designed, and thoroughly researched lesson plans, which have inspired us to explore new ideas in our classrooms. It is not as common, however, to be able to eavesdrop on the birth of the ideas that lead to these experiences and plans. How are little sparks of ideas fanned by teachers into the vivid real- ities of classroom practice? What goes on behind the scenes in the mind of a teacher who is casting about for ideas in preparation for classroom experiences?
In the following excerpt from the journal of an experienced teacher, Joanna describes her process for understanding a work of interest, the Concerto Grosso 1985 by Ellen Taaffe Zwilich. Joannas entries describe her encounters with Zwilich’s work as a series of phases. As we read, we notice how she remains open to the possibilities for imaginative curriculum design that stem from her own curiosity and engagement as a learner.
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Sound Ways of Knowing
Joanna’s Journal
Phase one: I listen to the music a couple of times while reading the sparse notes with the recording. I know I do this to get the big pic- ture without trying to understand any components. I notice a few things. I can hear the Handel influence. I think Zwilich’s music sounds like a scribble.
Phase two: Another day. I have some more information now from the notes. First, I read that Zwilich was commissioned by the Washington Handel Society for a piece commemorating Handels 300th birthday. I found out that Zwilich played the violin and loved the sonata she quotes in the music. Armed with a little more infor- mation, I listen again, but still am not ready to follow the score. I want to see if my ears can hear the juxtaposition of old and new in the music. They can — very easily. I now have the hook to hang my teaching hat on. I’ll have the students listen for and compare the old and the new. I like how Zwilich’s music flows into Handel’s and back again.
Phase three: I listen three times with the score in front of me to see if I can come up with a plan of the piece. It’s pretty simple and one that fifth graders can discover. After an introduction of long tones, the Zwilich sound takes off. Soon a violin breaks in with Handel’s theme, taking us back 300 years. The late-twentieth-century sounds return. The two eras flow back and forth — yes, the kids will really be able to hear this, and it sounds neat. I know that what I’m doing here is putting on my “kid ears,” which is when I try to hear the piece as my students would, figuring out what catches my attention first. Phase four: After letting the piece jell in my brain, I listen once just to enjoy it. This is the place where I know I am inside the music because my brain is full of the fun it will be to introduce this music to the kids. Then I start to sketch out my curriculum. My own path from “outside” the work to “within” looks like this:
Figure 4.5
Joanna’s Path from Outside to Within
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We can identify Joanna’s process of bonding with the work through repetition, her pedagogical stance as she considers how the students will respond and “get it,” and her intentional use of resources to expand her knowledge of the composer’s creative intent. She finds the process of preparation and discovery to be enjoyable, and hopes students will expe- rience the same pleasure in learning as they form a new relationship with Zwilich’s composition.
In the lesson plan below, students are encouraged to describe their process of coming to know a new work. As they reveal their ideas, teach- ers can look for signs of transport from outside to inside.
Lesson Plan
Honoring the Past through Quotation
Rationale Musical style arises from using complex blends of sound in characteristic ways.
Style involves relationships in sound, sometimes obvious, sometimes subtle, that lead us to recognize the influence of a particular time, place, composer, or related group of musicians. We recognize and categorize styles by perceiving the musical vocabularies and grammars of the composers and performers who make music in that "language." Style is perhaps one of the most difficult concepts to describe verbally, although it is often far easier to sense when we encounter a distinctive style in sound. Juxtaposing two different styles of music is an especially useful strategy to help students hear stylistic differences. In this lesson, students are asked to identify style in the form of quoted musical material from the Baroque period found embedded in a twentieth-century work by Ellen Taaffe Zwilich.
Suggested
Grade Level Fifth through Eighth Objectives Students will
~ identify contrasts in Baroque and twentieth-century style through listening. ~ discuss ways in which quotations can pay tribute to voices from the past. ~ show the stylistic changes in the Zwilich Concerto Grosso 1985 through movement.
~ create a musical map to show the contrasting ideas in a concerto grosso. ~ compose a musical "conversation" with another student in class.
~ reflect on the process of becoming acquainted with a new musical work.
6o
Materials
Introducing the lesson
Developing the lesson
Sound Ways of Knowing
~ A sample of quotations students are likely to recognize ~ Recordings: Zwilich, E.T. (1 989), Concerto Grosso 1985, conducted by Zubin Mehta with the New York Philharmonic, on Ellen Taaffe Zwilich [CD], New York: New World Records; Handel, G. R (1 994), Sonata in D major, HWV371 , Op. 1 , No. 3, performed by R.Terakado, C. Rousset, H. Suzuki, and K. Uemura, on Sonatas for violin and basso continuo [CD], Japan: Denon ~ Paper for student responses, two file cards per student, large sheets of paper and markers for musical maps, streamers ~ Classroom instruments or instruments the students bring to class for the composition exercise
1 ) Begin by reading a sample of familiar quotations that students are likely to recognize. Encourage students to identify the person quoted, if possible. (Suggestions include the "I Have a Dream" speech of Martin Luther King Jr., John F. Kennedy's inaugural speech "Ask not what your country can do for you," and any recognizable phrases from individuals in your school com- munity.) Note how quotation marks set apart the quoted material. Draw attention to "quotes within the quote." (King used phrases from the Declaration of Independence; Kennedy's speech was said to be based on John Greenleaf Whittier's funeral oration.) Why do people quote other peo- ple's words? (Because the person quoted has said profound and inspiring things or has said them in elegant ways; perhaps the people quoting might wish to pay tribute to the life of the person quoted or to show they are familiar with important ideas, etc.)
2) Composers can quote musical ideas, too. In the composition we are about to hear, the composer, Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, has woven her own ideas with the musical ideas of another composer. Listen the first time to familiarize yourself with the entire piece. Play the entire first movement, "Maestoso, "of Zwilich's Concerto Grosso 1985, which lasts for 2 minutes, 41 seconds. Ask students to write a short sentence describing their responses to the piece on the first hearing.
3) Ask students to decorate one file card with the label "new" and another with "old." As we listen a second time, see if you can recognize when Zwilich is composing in the twentieth-century, "new" style, and when she is quoting the ideas of another composer. Hold up your cards to show what your hear during the piece. Play the entire movement .Jot down what you heard this time that was different from your first hearing. Just as quotation marks set up an expec- tation for the reader that someone else's ideas are being cited, before the violins
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Figure 4.6
Ellen Taajfe Zwilich. Photo by Andrew Sacks.
play the quoted theme, another instrument plays a musical quotation mark in this composition. What is it? (Answer: The harpsichord arpeggio before the first occurrence of the Handel theme.)
4) When we don't have differences in words to help us figure out who is speaking, how do we recognize a musical quote? In this case, Zwilich, a contemporary composer using contemporary musical ideas, is quoting from George Frideric Handel, a composer from the Baroque period 300 years ago. Zwilich even bor- rows the title Concerto Grosso, which describes a Baroque form built on the idea of contrast — a small group of instruments pitted against the large group (the Latin word concertare means "to contend with"or"to fight"). She shows that her composition includes a new "voice," too, by adding 1 985 to the title. Why might Zwilich chose to quote Handel? (The liner notes from the Zwilich recording calls this composition "a friendly handshake across the centuries" [Rich, 1 989].) Establish the context for the composition by reading this note from the score of the Concerto Grosso 1985 (Preston, 1 985):
In 1984 the Washington Friends of Handel commissioned New York composer Ellen Taaffe Zwilich to write a work in com- memoration of the three-hundredth anniversary of Handel's birth.Ms.Zwilich almost immediately thought to base her own
6 2
Sound Ways of Knowing
Example 4.1
Zwilich’s Theme from Concerto Grosso 1985 by Ellen Taajfe Zwilich. Copy- right © 1985 by Mobart Music.
work on that composer's D-major Violin Sonata. "I performed the work many years ago/' she said. "And I especially love the opening theme of the first movement — the striking head motive and the beauty of the generative tension between the theme and the elegant bass line." The resulting composition, she says, is a "twentieth-century response to the spirit of George Frideric Handel. My concerto is both inspired by Handel's sonata, and, I hope, imbued with his spirit." (Zwilich, cited in Preston, 1 985, p.4)
5) As we listen to this piece for the third time, does this knowledge about Zwilich's ideas change what you hear? Write down what happens as you listen, now that you know some of the reasons Zwilich quotes Handel.
6) Divide the students into two groups, distributing different-colored stream- ers to each group. Realize the "Maestoso" through movement by asking one group to move fluidly during the Handelian passages and another group to show the angular"chase" of Zwilich's ideas.
Example 4.2
Zwilich’s Quote from the First Movement of the Sonata in D Major for Violin by Handel. Copy- right © 1985 by Mobart Music.
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7) Invite students to create a map of this dialogue between two musical styles by choosing one color of marker for Zwilich's themes and another for Handel quotes. As we listen again, draw as much detail as you can to show what you hear. (If students are new to mapping, you may direct them to think about the upward and downward contours, distance between sounds or intervals, or musical thoughts or phrases.) Students may need several hearings before their maps are finished. (You may wish to play the recording once for the stu- dents to draw the Zwilich,then again to add the Handel.) On another time through, label the instruments you hear or add any phrases to your map that might help another listener to follow your diagram. Exchange your map with another student and see if you can follow the other's work.
Figure 4.7
Sample No. 1: Musical Map of Concerto Grosso 1985
64
Sound Ways of Knowing
Figure 4.8
Sample No. 2: Musical Map of Concerto Grosso 1985
Closing the lesson
How does this process of mapping help you to focus on the contrasting styles? Do they look as different as they sound? Write again.
8) At the premiere performance of Concerto Grosso 1985, the original Handel sonata (HWV371, Op. 1, No. 3, first movement) was played before the Zwilich. Let's listen to the two pieces in that order to see how the order of per- formance influences our ability to hear the quotes in the Zwilich. How does this strengthen the contrast between the Baroque style of Handel and the twenti- eth-century voice of Zwilich? How does Zwilich keep the composition "togeth- er," even with the quoted material? Write or discuss.
9) Invite each student to compose a short piece using available classroom instruments, instruments students bring to class, or voices, in a way that will show their own musical ideas or style characteristics. (This activity may be extended over several class periods.) Then pair students and ask them to blend their compositions so they make a new, longer one with recog- nizable shifts between one person's style and the other person's style. Perform these musical conversations. Can other class members tell when the identity of the composer changes? As a variation, students could also compose a short piece to alternate with quotes from some known musi- cal work. Whose musical ideas will you honor in this manner?
Assessment
Extending the lesson
Getting to Know a Work of Art
65
~ Can students identify contrasts in style by showing where the quotations occur in the first few hearings of the piece?
~ Do the students move expressively to reflect changes in style, articulation, dynamics, and contour?
~ Collect the musical maps and study them to determine how students are able to represent multiple aspects of the composition, for example, melod- ic contour and interval, timbre, and phrases.
~ How articulately do students describe differences in perception when they hear the original Handel before the Zwilich?
~ Do students reveal characteristic compositional personalities in their musi- cal conversations?
~ What do students conclude about the process of becoming acquainted with a new work, especially one in the twentieth-century style?
~ Find other examples of the old juxtaposed with the new. Can you find other instances of paying tribute through quotation in music, art, poetry, dance, and theater? How do changes in the creator's use of the medium "move" the reader, listener, or viewer across decades or centuries?
~ Read more about Zwilich's processes of composition, as described in "Conversations with American Composers: Ellen Taaffe Zwilich" (Grimes, 1 986).
~ Identify other musical compositions that are based on quoted material, such as Copland, Lincoln Portrait ("Camptown Races"); Ives, Second Symphony and Fourth of July; and Schuman, New England Triptych ("Chester").
~ On other occasions, listen to the entire Zwilich work, which consists of five movements in arch form (the first movement and the last are paired, the second and fourth are paired, the third is the center of the arch). Listen to a concerto grosso by Handel after listening to Zwilich's Concerto Grosso 1985.
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STRATEGIES
Guiding Listening
Music listening experiences in the classroom are most successful when the music is engaging and the listener's attention is directed in some way to the important features of the music. Here are some tips for planning listening experiences:
~ Keep listening experiences brief. Outside of the classroom, students tend to listen to popular songs that rarely exceed three min- utes in length. In a sense, their attention spans have been trained to that length of time. While it is a goal to increase students' capacity for extended listening, it is wise to start with brief compositions or musically meaningful excerpts from longer works.
~ Provide opportunities for repeated listening. Music exists in time: We hear it, then it's gone. Because we can't create a "freeze- frame" of music, we need to hear it more than once to be able peel away the layers of complexity. Generally, the more we listen to a complex piece of music, the more we grow to like it. Make friends with the music; listen to it several times.
~ If a composition is based on a song, sing the song before listening to the composition.
The only thing that students should listen to while the music is playing is the music. Avoid talking about the music while it is being played. Written or pictorial guides allow the students' listening to be guided without cre- ating an overload of aural information.
Use listening guides or activities to point out the important features of a composition. Printed listening guides allow the students to follow the descriptions as they listen. Listening activities may be designed so that students have to make decisions about what they are hearing in the music. Remember that musical events can go by very quickly, so when designing activities that include opportunities to respond, limit the number of responses students have to make.
If students have been asked to answer ques- tions about what they have heard, provide an opportunity for them to listen again to com- pare their answers with your answers. Marking papers for the correct answer will have no learning value if the students do not have an opportunity to associate the proper respons- es and labels with the sounds they hear.
References
Bernstein, L. (1959). The joy of music. New York: Simon & Schuster. Ciardi, J. (1962). In fact. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press. Dewey, J. (1934). Art as experience. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons.
Elliott, D. J. (1995). Music matters. A new philosophy of music education. New York: Oxford University Press.
Greene, M. (1995). Art and imagination: Reclaiming the sense of possi- bility. Phi Delta Kappan 76 (5): 378—382.
Grimes, E. (1986). Conversations with American composers: Ellen Taaffe Zwilich. Music Educators Journal 72 (6): 61-65.
Getting to Know a Work of Art
67
Hall, G. E., Loucks, S. E, Rutherford, W. L., 8c Newlove, B. W. (1975). Levels of use of the innovation: A framework for analyzing inno- vation adoption. Journal of Teacher Education 26 (1): 52-56.
Handel, G. F. (1994). Sonata in D major, HWV371, Op. 1, No. 3, per- formed by R. Terakado, C. Rousset, H. Suzuki, and K. Uemura. On Sonatas for violin and basso continuo [CD]. Japan: Denon.
Hecht, A. (1995). On the laws of poetic art. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Moore, T. (1992). Care of the soul. New York: HarperCollins.
Preston, K. K. (1985). Notes for Concerto Grosso 1985 (Ellen Taaffe Zwilich). Hillsdale, N.Y.: Mobart Music.
Rich, A. (1989). Liner notes for Mehta, Zubin (conductor) 8c New York Philharmonic, Concerto Grosso 1985. On Ellen Taaffe Zwilich [CD]. New York: New World Records.
Zwilich, E. T. (1989). Concerto Grosso 1985. Conducted by Zubin Mehta and the New York Philharmonic. On Ellen Taaffe Zwilich [CD]. New York: New World Records.
*{ chapter 5 \*
Exploring Relationships
AMONG THE ARTS
np
he various manifestations of the J- arts, among them music, paint- ing, literature, sculpture, dance, and theater, reside in the world of expres- sion. They allow us to express in a powerful, concentrated way the ideas, emotions, and events about which we humans care most deeply. Musicians, painters, poets, sculptors, dancers, and playwrights have cele- brated, interpreted, and preserved the great historic and mythic events and personas of human civilization. They have addressed the profound human themes of love, worship, relationships with nature, conflict, and death. Whether we are experiencing someone else’s artistic expression or creating our own, the arts help us explore the connection between our outer and inner lives.
In this chapter and the next, we will be examining commonalities and differences between and among the arts. We, the authors of this book, are music educators, so our discussions of other art forms will often be cast in relationship to music. Visual artists, poets, dancers, or playwrights would probably bring different perspectives and emphases to the topics we will address. You, the reader, may have in-depth experience with one or more of these art forms. As you encounter the ideas presented in this chapter, think about examples from the art forms with which you are most famil- iar that you could add as illustrations of the ideas.
There are many examples of how people working within one art form have been profoundly influenced by other art forms. Sometimes the influ- ence is revealed by the metaphors they use to describe their own art. Sharon Olds’s description of poetry as “singing the language without melody” (Gross, May 19, 1995/June 29, 1988) is one such example. Wassily Kandinsky used music as a metaphor for his painting: “Color is the keyboard, the eyes are the harmonies, the soul is the piano with many strings. The artist is the hand that plays, touching one key or another, to cause vibrations in the soul” (cited in Cole, 1993, p. 53).
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Sound Ways of Knowing
Sometimes specific works inspire new creations in other art forms. Modest Mussorgsky composed Pictures at an Exhibition after seeing an exhibition of paintings and sketches by his friend, Victor Hartmann. William Carlos Williams’s poem “The Dance” was inspired by Brueghel’s painting The Kermess.
Collaborative projects such as ballets, films, and musicals integrate the work of writers, choreographers, composers, and designers. Consider the collective artistic energy in the Ballet Russe’s production of Pulcinella with music written by Igor Stravinsky and production design by Picasso; the combined efforts of composer Aaron Copland and dancer/choreog- rapher Martha Graham that resulted in Appalachian Spring; and the col- laboration between Wynton Marsalis and choreographer Garth Fagan in the contemporary ballet Griot New York. The music of John Williams has played an integral role in films directed by Steven Spielberg such as Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Schindlers List, and Raiders of the Lost Ark. The realm of musical theater abounds in collaborative teams of composers and lyricists such as Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, George and Ira Gershwin, and Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim.
Making connections between and among the arts can be exciting and revelatory; it seems like a very natural thing to do in the classroom. Each student in a class, because of differences in previous experiences, individ- ual proclivities and interests, or school instruction, has an individual pro- file of familiarity, understanding, and comfort with various art forms. Relating two or more art forms provides students the opportunity to learn by analogy and metaphor — to learn something new by relating it to something they already know. Access to quality experiences with the arts strengthens students’ capacity to see or hear beyond the surface so that they may deepen their understanding of the arts and how they work.1
The teacher who wishes to design curriculum to lead students on their own paths of discovery must understand what kinds of classroom con- nections between and among the arts promote understanding and insight and what kinds of connections are shallow and misleading. An important first step is to become aware of the ways art forms are distinct as well as similar. In this chapter we will explore those areas of similarity and dif- ference and propose a model to assist teachers in discovering meaningful intersections between and among the arts.
Josh wrinkled his nose and forehead in concentration. With great intensity, he studied a painting of a woman in a brightly colored robe sleeping on desert sand with a lion, a jug, and a lute-like instrument nearby. He was trying to see what that painting had in common with the lively music pouring from the CD player. Finally, he raised his hand and shared his conclusion: “ The paint-
Exploring Relationships among the Arts
71
Figure 5.1
Henri Rousseau. The Sleeping Gypsy. 1897. Oil on canvas , 51"x6'7" (129.5 cm x 200. 7 cm).
ing has an instrument in it , and you have to have instruments to play music. ” Josh’s teacher looked crestfallen. She was disappointed because her students just didn’t seem to make the expected connection that both the painting and the music had something to do with night.
The intention of Josh’s teacher was to design a learning experience leading toward one of the music achievement standards from the National Standards for Arts Education: “Compare in two or more arts how the characteristic materials of each art (that is, sound in music, visual stimuli in visual arts, movement in dance, human interrelationships in theater) can be used to transform similar events, scenes, emotions, or ideas into works of art” (Consortium of National Arts Education Associations, 1994, p. 45). She had chosen Henri Rousseau’s The Sleeping Gypsy and Eine Kleine Nachtmusik (A Little Night Music) by Mozart as examples from two different art forms that relate to the theme of “night.” Unfortunately, she did not consider that these two works-, while related by title, are not closely related in mood, style, or structure. Rousseau’s painting evokes hushed tension, while Mozart’s lively music is more suggestive of celebration. Because Eine Kleine Nachtmusik and The Sleeping Gypsy have little in common beyond the nominal theme of night, it is understandable that Josh could not easily draw meaningful parallels between them.
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Sound Ways of Knowing
How Do the Arts Differ?
Perhaps before we look for commonalities among the arts, we would do well to explore how the arts differ. One basic difference among the arts is how the dimensions of time and space come into play. In Table 5.1, physical dimensions of time and space are listed in the column on the left. For each of the art forms listed in the top row, consider which physical dimensions are integral to the experience of the art form, then mark the appropriate cells in the chart to indicate the relationship. You may also find it useful to imagine yourself as the viewer, listener, per- former, creator, or critic to examine your ideas from different perspec- tives. The first cell, time and music, has already been marked for you. After you have completed this exercise, compare your responses with others. You may find that the exercise leads to clearer understanding but also, perhaps, to additional questions as you consider certain types of works that seem to be special cases.
Table 5.1
Physical Properties of the Arts
|
Music |
Poetry |
Dance |
Painting |
Sculpture 1 |
|
|
Exists in time |
|||||
|
Exists in two- dimensional space |
|||||
|
Exists in three- dimensional space |
What did you discover as you completed this exercise? Here are some ideas that have emerged when others have thought about these properties.
Music and dance are temporal experiences: They have a beginning, a continuation, and an ending. In live performances, they are here and gone. One can study a music score or dance notation, but the experience will not be the same as the performance. Kinetic sculpture (sculpture that moves) is much like music and dance in that it unfolds and changes over time. Although painting and nonkinetic sculpture do not change percep- tibly over time, the element of time is involved as the viewer scans differ- ent portions of a canvas or examines a sculpture from all sides.
Poetry, in its spoken form, exists in time; in its written form, it exists in two-dimensional space. There are some aspects of poetry that must be heard or imagined in the “mind’s ear” to be appreciated, such as the
Exploring Relationships among the Arts
73
rhythm and the sounds of words; some aspects of poetry must be seen to be appreciated, such as visual rhyme and the placement of the lines on the page.
Most painting can be characterized as existing in two-dimensional space, but this characterization is not without exception: Heavily textured paintings take on a third dimension, as layers of paint add depth. Three- dimensionality, however, is most usually associated with sculpture and dance. Because of this characteristic, sculpture and dance are best experi- enced firsthand; photographs and videos do not allow us to have the experience of three-dimensional space necessary to understand these art forms fully.
Each mode of artistic expression involves the senses in a slightly dif- ferent way. Sight is employed in the perception of painting, sculpture, and dance, and in the reading of poetry. We hear music and poetry, and some- times we hear the rhythms of the body in dance. Even some sculptures are meant to be heard. The tactile sense is important in appreciating sculpture and weaving; even when we cannot actually touch the works, we can imagine how they would feel.2 The kinesthetic “sense,” that is, the vital experience of rhythmic movement in one’s own body, comes into play when a dancer dances, a musician plays, a painter paints, an actor acts, or a sculptor sculpts. Their movements, and the results of their movements, may also evoke a sympathetic kinesthetic response from the viewer. This is the phenomenon James Laughlin describes in this line from his poem “Martha Graham”: “music moves moving from her into us” (Laughlin, 1988, p. 17). Visual art can arouse a similar response: “The body of the viewer reproduces the tensions of swinging and rising and bending so that he himself matches internally the actions he sees being performed outside” (Arnheim, 1989, p. 26). The rhythms of poetry can also evoke a kinesthetic response from the listener or reader.
Because art forms differ in their physical properties and the way they engage the senses, each art form provides its own unique lens on experi- ence. Each also has its own limitations on what it can “say” to us. As an illustration, consider three works on the subject of swans: The Ugly Duckling by Hans Christian Anderson; a painting of a swan; and a com- position for cello and harp, “The Swan,” from Carnival of the Animals by Camille Saint-Saens. What aspects of “swanness” can be expressed by each? If we had never seen a swan before, Anderson’s descriptions would allow us to piece together in our imaginations our own idea of what a swan looks like and how it moves. In a painting, we can observe a swan’s appearance and its environment. The painter, by choice of color and line can also communicate something of a swan’s peaceful grace as it swims in
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Sound Ways of Knowing
a lake. As we listen to the composition by Saint-Saens, we cannot learn anything about what a swan looks like, but its graceful, flowing move- ment is suggested by the cellos gently undulating melody. If we listen carefully to the harp accompaniment, we can hear patterns of cascading tones that might suggest shimmering water.
Table 5.2
Common
Terms/Different
Phenomena
Common Terms but Different Phenomena
When the arts are described, identical words are sometimes used to char- acterize very different phenomena. This practice may trick us into mak- ing invalid conclusions about commonalities among the arts unless we take into account the different characteristics of the media (Thomas, 1991). Rhythm is a term that is used in characterizing music, poetry, dance, painting, and sculpture. In music and poetry, rhythm is an aural phenomenon that exists in time; in painting and sculpture it is a visual phenomenon that exists in space. In dance, rhythm can be perceived visu- ally and, sometimes, aurally. Color is another example of a word that refers to different phenomena. In painting, color refers to pigment or hue. In music, however, the term color can be used in reference to the charac- teristic sound of instruments or perhaps the harmonic characteristics of certain chords or intervals. So while it may appear at first glance that terms such as rhythm and color may point to meaningful relationships between and among the arts, in reality, they may not. Other terms that pose similar problems are listed in Table 5.2.
|
Music |
Poetry |
Dance |
Visual Art |
|
|
Rhythm |
patterns pro- duced by group- ings of tones of varying duration and stress |
sense of move- ment created by patterns of strong and weak elements in the flow of sound and silence in speech |
organization of movement patterns in time |
regular occurrence of similar visual elements |
|
Texture |
pattern of sound created by melodic lines, a succession of chords, or a com- bination thereof |
the elements of poetry such as imagery, rhythm, meter, alliteration, etc., that cannot be paraphrased |
visual or tactile sur- face characteristics |
(continues)
Exploring Relationships among the Arts
75
Table 5.2 (continued)
|
Music |
Poetry |
Dance |
Visual Art |
|
|
Line |
rhythmic succes- sion of tones; the contour of a vocal or instrumental part and its hori- zontal motion |
a unit in the rhyth- mic structure of poetry that is formed by the grouping together of a number of the smallest units of the rhythm (syllables, stress groups, metri- cal feet) |
movement that connects two points to take the body through space; the shape of a dancer's body |
outline or contour; the defining bor- der between areas |
|
Gesture |
movement of a musical line that suggests a physi- cal action |
movement of the body or parts of the body for com- munication of qualities, ideas, or emotions |
the artist's brush strokes or other marks on the work that might provide insight into the artist's way of working |
|
|
Color |
(tone color) char- acteristic sound of instruments or voices |
figures of speech; vividness or variety of emotional effects of language |
qualities, mood, or emotion evoked by movement |
hue or pigment |
|
Consonance |
combination of musical tones felt as satisfying and restful |
repetition of similar or identical conso- nants or words whose main vowels differ |
||
|
Composition |
the act of creating music; the work thus created |
the organization of movements into a form or structure with a sense of wholeness |
the organization of visual components to form a unified whole |
|
|
Movement |
a division of an extended compo- sition such as a symphony, sonata, or concerto; the forward motion of music through time |
rhythmic flow of words |
interactions of energy and space through the med- ium of the body |
representation of motion |
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Sound Ways of Knowing
Before we begin a discussion of how to integrate the arts most fruit- fully, one additional caution should be raised. Music, like each of the other arts, is a unique discipline that must be taught through a rigorous, structured curriculum to be grasped fully. Like each of the other art forms, it has its own materials, processes, and structure. Learning to use sound, paint, words, clay, gestures, and movement in expressive, artistic ways are very different ventures. So while interdisciplinary instruction can be tremendously valuable, it must be based on strong sequential programs of instruction in the individual art forms.
Making Connections
How can we as educators go about exploring connections among the arts and then use that knowledge to provide meaningful experiences for our students? Generalizing across art forms is complex and difficult because the arts press out against boundaries, which results in frequent exceptions to any generality. Then we risk misunderstanding rather than enlighten- ment. What is a thoughtful teacher to do? David Best (1995) contends,
Cooperative, interdisciplinary ventures can be highly successful.
But their educational value always depends upon the particular possibilities of greater understanding implicit \n particular cases.
That is, it depends upon the enrichment of understanding for students that is inherent in particular cases, where working together from different disciplines offers really fruitful, imagi- native educational enlightenment, (p. 88)
If greater understanding comes from the study of particular cases, then a full exploration of the many dimensions of a painting, a piece of music, a poem, or other artistic expression is an important place to start in any interarts curriculum planning.
Sometimes, thinking in terms of models kindles our imaginations and provides structure for our explorations. One day, we, the authors of this book, were idly playing with some plastic geometric toys while brain- storming. One of those toys, a polyhedron, inspired the concept of facets as a model for developing a fuller understanding of a work and for point- ing to possible intersections among the arts.
The Facets Model for Exploring Connections
Consider the sparkling diamond, ruby, and emerald: These gems are cut with many facets so that when the light enters the top facets of the stone, the other facets reflect it back to the eye. This reflection causes the sparkle that we value so highly in gems. The value we assign to these precious
Exploring Relationships among the Arts
77
stones is evident in the way we use them as tokens of love and affection, and in their price.
The arts, too, are gems with many facets. Their facets provide manifold ways for us to peer into works of art so that understanding can be reflect- ed back to us. Indeed, the multifaceted nature of art forms is what makes our experience of them so rich — it is what makes them “sparkle” for us. It is from an exploration of these facets that revelations about relationships between or among the arts may emerge. Some of the facets of any partic- ular artistic expression can be revealed by answering these questions:
~ Who created it?
~ When and where was it created?
~ Why and for whom was it created?
~ What does it sound or look like?
~ What kind of structure or form does it have?
~ What is its subject?
~ What is being expressed?
~ What techniques did its creator use to help us understand what is being expressed?
Who created it?
Figure 5.2
Facets of an Artistic Work
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Sound Ways of Knowing
Let’s apply the facets model to a well-known composition, “Variations on Simple Gifts” from Appalachian Spring by Aaron Copland. Imagine three people — a music teacher, a fourth-grade classroom teacher, and a composer — sitting around a table. The music teacher has featured “Variations” in past lessons. The classroom teacher has heard the compo- sition before but was not particularly familiar with it. The composer has studied the composition in great depth and has performed it many times as a bass player in an orchestra. Together they listen to a recording of the music, watch a film of the ballet, read the liner notes to the recording, and generate a list of ideas in response to the questions posed in the facets model. Here is their list:
~ It was written for a ballet choreographed and danced by Martha Graham.
~ The story of the ballet concerns preparations for a pioneer wedding.
~ It was written by Copland, who wanted to write music that was uniquely American.
~ It was completed and first performed in 1944.
~ It is based on the Shaker tune “Simple Gifts.”
~ It is in major mode and duple meter.
~ The texture is primarily linear and contrapuntal.
~ The music is in the form of theme and variations.
~ It begins simply then gets more active and complex, like a sunrise before an active day.
~ The accompaniment to the tune in the opening section features the interval of a fifth, which evokes associations with country fiddling.
~ The pauses in the music are relaxing.
~ Watching the ballet distracts my attention from listening.
~ Watching the ballet enhances my listening.
~ The tune is used in a television commercial to sell cars.
Upon examination of this list, the various facets identified for “Variations” fall into three interdependent categories: (a) facets that relate to the properties of the work itself, (b) facets that relate to the context in which the work was created, and (c) facets that relate to an individual’s experience of the work. From these facets emerge new insights about how “Variations on Simple Gifts” from Appalachian Spring might serve as a springboard for interarts explorations.3 Here are some ideas:
Exploring Relationships among the Arts
79
~ The piece is in the form of theme and variations. How is the theme and variations technique used in other art forms?
~ Copland wrote the music in collaboration with Martha Graham. How does composing music for movement influence a composers choices?
~ Does the choice of the tune “Simple Gifts” have any symbolic meaning when considered in light of the story of the ballet? What symbols of the pioneer myth can be found in the choreography and stage set of the ballet?
Applying the Facets Model to Music
Now use the facets model yourself. Choose a piece of music, perhaps the same piece you explored in the “transport” exercise in Chapter 4, and see how many of the questions posed in the facets model you can answer. Some of the questions will require you to consult reference materials such as the liner notes of recordings, music textbooks, biographies, music dictionaries, and encyclopedias. Other questions can be answered only as a result of careful listening and reflection on your part. Does investigating the questions posed by the facets model help you understand the piece more fully? Do facets of the piece sug- gest links and intersections with other art forms, either with particular works or through general concepts?
Exploring the Intersection of Facets
As we have seen in the discussion of “Variations on Simple Gifts” from Appalachian Spring, the facets model can be very helpful in exploring the multiple dimensions inherent in any work of art. It can also be helpful in pointing toward potential relationships between and among the arts. These relationships can occur on several planes. Singing a song about rain and then reading a poem about rain demonstrates a simple intersection of facets on the topical plane. When you compare the balanced, symmetri- cal form of the architecture of the Cathedral at Reims or the U.S. Capitol with the ABA form of a Mozart minuet, you are exploring intersections of facets on the structural plane. Additional planes of intersection may be the context of history (such as studying the political messages conveyed by paintings of the American Revolution or by various versions of “Yankee Doodle”) or culture (such as studying the relationship between the geography of Andean countries and the kinds of instruments and weavings made there).
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Sound Ways of Knowing
Discovering relationships, even when they appear to be confined to only one plane of intersection, can open possibilities for expanding knowledge and understanding. Even more exciting and rich possibilities present themselves when we look for additional planes of intersection beyond those that are most obvious at first glance.
As an illustration, consider the poem “I Am Growing a Glorious Garden” by Jack Prelutsky (1990, pp. 12-13).
I Am Growing a Glorious Garden
I am growing a glorious garden, resplendent with trumpets and flutes,
I am pruning euphonium bushes I am watering piccolo shoots, my tubas and tambourines flourish, surrounded by saxophone reeds,
I am planting trombones and pianos and sowing sweet sousaphone seeds.
I have cymbals galore in my garden, staid oboes in orderly rows, there are flowering fifes and violas in the glade where the glockenspiel grows, there are gongs and guitars in abundance, there are violins high on the vine, and an arbor of harps by the bower where the cellos and clarinets twine.
My bassoons are beginning to blossom, as my zithers and mandolins bloom, my castanets happily chatter, my kettledrums merrily boom, the banjos that branch by the bugles play counterpoint with a kazoo, come visit my glorious garden and hear it play music for you.
Jack Prelutsky
It is obvious that one of the facets of this poem is its topic of musical instruments. Is the author really planting instruments in his garden? Of course not: The instruments in the garden are metaphorical. Why is this
Exploring Relationships among the Art
8l
metaphor so pleasing? One reason is that music and flowers are both prized for their life-enhancing qualities. They both are often present at important life events such as graduations, courtships, weddings, funerals, and civic occasions. Why is this metaphor so amusing? Although we know no one would really plant instruments in a garden, the power of the author’s imagination and description allows us to envision the improbable garden of “staid oboes in orderly rows” and bassoons “begin- ning to blossom.”
This connection between gardens and instruments can be explored further. Often gardeners artfully “orchestrate” their flower beds to create a harmonious mix of colors, shapes, and sizes of flowers. They choose flowers not only for their individual beauty but also for the way they coor- dinate with other flowers in the garden. Each variety of flower has its own particular presence and power: Some flowers, like hollyhocks, are partic- ularly striking so that only a few are needed in a garden, whereas other flowers, such as tulips, create a better effect when planted in abundance. This process of planning a garden is similar to the process a composer undertakes in orchestrating a composition. In a symphony orchestra, the strings are often the predominant “color,” while the wind and percussion instruments provide striking aural contrasts. Although a single trumpet can be heard over many string instruments, a single violin would get lost if many trumpets were playing. Just as red roses, orchids, and chrysanthe- mums can each convey a different message from the sender to the receiv- er, so can the composer convey particular moods or messages to the lis- tener through careful orchestration. Certain instruments may conjure up specific images, such as the horn with its hunting and pastoral associa- tions. If a composer wants to create an exotic atmosphere, the melody might be given to the oboe instead of the flute.
When trying to find just the right word for a poem, the poet consid- ers not only what the word means, how many syllables it has, and its potential for rhyme, but also other aspects of its sound. In “I Am Growing a Glorious Garden,” Prelutsky takes great care in selecting words for how they sound, using the poetic devices of assonance (the rep- etition of vowels sounds with varying consonant sounds) and alliteration (two or more words begin with the same sound). Assonance is featured in the lines “an arbor of harps by the bower” and “there are violins high on the vine.” Alliteration is found in the lines “My bassoons are beginning to blossom” and “sowing sweet sousaphone seeds.” The way a poet chooses particular words for their sound qualities is similar to the way a compos- er chooses particular instruments for their timbre, or tone color.
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There is yet another important facet of “I Am Growing a Glorious Garden” that intersects with music. That facet has to do with how the poem itself is constructed. The first line of the poem has an accent scheme ofxxxxxxxxxx, which is analogous to musical meter in three, with two unaccented beats preceding the accented beat. The meter and the rhyme scheme are part of the architecture of the poem; they help pro- vide the structure that holds the poem together.
Celebrates the musical aspects of poetry
So, as we can see in this example, by digging beneath the surface of what at first seemed a single facet of intersection between “I Am Growing a Glorious Garden” and music — that is, the subject of musical instru- ments— we can discover even richer and more satisfying relationships. The more planes of intersection shared by two art works, the more power each has to illuminate the other. In Chapter 6 we will explore in greater depth those facets that relate to the qualities inherent in a work itself, and in Chapter 7 we will show how explorations of those facets can lead to lessons that help children discover relationships among the arts.
Exploring Relationships among the Arts
83
References
Arnheim, R. (1989). Thoughts on art education. Los Angeles: Getty Center for Education in the Arts.
Best, D. (1995). The dangers of generic arts: Philosophical confusions and political expediency. Journal of Aesthetic Education 29 (2): 79-91.
Cole, A. (1993). Color. New York: Dorling Kindersley.
Consortium of National Arts Education Associations. (1994). National standards for arts education: What every young American should know and be able to do in the arts. Reston, Va.: Music Educators National Conference.
Gross, T. (May 19, 1995). Radio interview with Sharon Olds. Fresh Air. Philadelphia: WHYY. (Originally aired June 29, 1988.)
Haack, P. A. (1970). A study involving the visual arts in the development of musical concepts. Journal of Research in Music Education 32: 195-204.
Laughlin, J. (1988). Martha Graham. In L. Morrison (ed.), Rhythm road. New York: Lothrop, Lee 8c Shepard.
Prelutsky, J. (1990). Something big has been here. New York: Greenwillow.
Thomas, T. (1991). Interart analogy: Practice and theory in comparing the arts. Journal of Aesthetic Education 25 (2): 17-36.
chapter 6 j*
Perceptions, Patterns, and Processes
Celia McCarthy attended an unusual concert at Big Rapids High School at the invitation of her former student , Jason. First a string quartet played a fugue while four other students danced the interplay of the instrumental lines as the fugue subject passed from instrument to instrument. Then a trumpet player performed a composition in the form of a theme and variations while a collage she had constructed to demonstrate theme and variations was dis- played. At the end of the concert, Jason read a poem he had written about the high school football teams learning ballet. He explained that the scenario in his poem was inspired by the humorous nature of his double bass solo, which he then performed.
By watching and listening to the ways the students demonstrated aspects of their understanding of the music in conjunction with other modes of artistic expression , Celia found that her own experience of the music was heightened. She was fascinated by the discovery of the many ways the arts parallel each other. “Music, poetry, and art already play an important role in my classroom, ” she mused. " How could I design experiences that would help my students under- stand how the arts relate to each other ?”
In Chapter 5, the facets model was proposed as a way to examine a work in depth and to explore productive intersections between it and other works or forms of art. The facets model encourages us to look at works of art (music, dance, visual art, literary arts, and theater) from dif- ferent points of view and to consider the aesthetic qualities inherent in the works, the context of their creation, and our reactions to them (see Figure 6.1).
In this chapter, we will discuss in greater depth those facets that relate to the aesthetic qualities inherent in the work itself. These facets are rep- resented by the following questions:
~ What is its subject?
~ What is being expressed?
85
86
Sound Ways of Knowing
Figure 6.1
Facets of Artistic Expression with Emphasis on Structural and Expressive Facets
Who created it?
~ What does it sound or look like?
~ What kind of structure or form does it have?
~ What techniques did its creator use to help us understand what is being expressed?
The answers to these questions can be a starting place for discovering analogous relationships between and among the arts and identifying ways that the various art forms share artistic principles or processes.
Applying the Facets Model to Other Art Forms
In Chapter 5, you were encouraged to apply the facets model to a musi- cal example of your choice. Prelutsky’s poem “I Am Growing a Glorious Garden” showed how the facets model could be applied to poetry as well. In this chapter, the concepts and terms used to refer to analogous relationships in the arts will have more meaning and clarity if you also select and examine a work from another art form, such as a painting, sculpture, play, or dance, for possible comparisons with music. Surround yourself with interesting examples to consider, and compare your perceptions of artistic elements with others, when possible.
What Is the Subject and What Is Being Expressed?
For some artworks, the answer to the question What is the subject? may seem readily apparent. When we see a rose portrayed in a painting or lis- ten to a poem or song about a rose, we will answer the question by say-
Perceptions, Patterns, and Processes
8?
ing, “The subject is a rose.” Artistic representations, however, are not slav- ish copies of an actual rose or simply exact descriptions of a rose. “Artistic representations give us insights that actual things do not. They have an ‘aboutness,’ which of course actual things do not . . .” (Parsons & Blocker, 1993, p. 84). When we consider this “aboutness,” a new level of thinking about the subject may reveal itself. As we begin to look deeper, beyond what on the surface may present itself as the subject, we may find alter- native subjects as possibilities. “Paintings are not about concrete objects so much as about what can be thought or felt and must be apprehended inwardly. They express aspects of experience, states of mind, meanings, emotions; subjective things. . . . Often, we call them feelings; often, ideas or points of view” (Parsons, 1987, p. 70).
What is the subject of music that doesn’t have any lyrics? Sometimes a subject is implied through the use of a “program,” that is, a title or description that accompanies the work. Music of this type is therefore referred to as program music. When one listens to the first movement of Vivaldi’s concerto for three violins, Spring , one may hear suggestions of twittering birds, flowing streams, and thunderstorms. Someone listening to the music without knowledge of its tide, however, might not interpret the music in the same way at all. The tide predisposes us to hear the extramusical associations in the music. A similar phenomenon exists in ballet. With prior knowledge of the story of Swan Lake, the actions and interactions of the dancers will be seen to tell a story, but without that knowledge, and without clues provided by costumes and sets, the subject of the ballet may be less apparent.
Sometimes the subject of an art work is more abstract: The elements of the art form and their manipulation become the subject. The subject of a symphony by Mozart, for example, is the elements of melody, rhythm, and harmony and their development within a particular form. Music of this type is referred to as absolute music. Some examples of program music and absolute music are listed in Table 6.1. Notice that the tides of the program music examples suggest a scene or story whereas the tides of the absolute music examples refer to the musical form or genre.
|
I Program Music |
Absolute Music |
|
Vivaldi, The Four Seasons |
Bach, Prelude and Fugue in D Minor |
|
Beethoven, Pastoral Symphony |
Mozart, Symphony No. 41 inC |
|
Debussy, La Mer [The Sea] |
Brahms, Quintet for Clarinet and Strings |
|
Mussorgsky, Night on Bald Mountain |
Stravinsky, Octet |
|
Saint-Saens, Carnival of the Animals |
Zwilich, Concerto Grosso 1 985 |
Table 6.1
Examples of Program and Absolute Music
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Sound Ways of Knowing
Analogs to absolute music are found in all of the other art forms as well. The subject matter of a dance can be “pure” movement unrelated to a story or theme. The subject for a sculpture can be the relationships of texture, line, form, and space rather than a recognizable object. There are even some analogous examples in poetry, such as poems by Gertrude Stein in which the sounds of words, rather than their meanings, are of primary interest.
What Does the Work Sound or Look Like?
In Chapter 4 we discussed the process of moving from “without” to “within” a work. Part of this process includes developing a deeper per- sonal understanding of the work, then finding ways to share that under- standing with others. This involves learning to see what there is to see and hear what there is to hear, and learning how to verbalize those per- ceptions. Each art form has a specialized vocabulary that helps us com- municate about that art form. There is a mutual relationship between our ability to use this vocabulary with care and precision and our abilities to perceive with greater clarity and depth.
Imagine you are looking at a painting and are being asked to describe what you see. You probably would respond first with a description of the paintings subject. With further prompting, you might comment on the colors that are used or the types of lines or shapes that are prominent in the painting. You might also begin to notice how the different compo- nents of the painting are grouped. Continued examination would yield new discoveries that were not apparent in the initial viewing and descrip- tion. The same is true in all of the arts. The outlines in Table 6.2 suggest some of the basic elements that can be perceived in music, dance, visual art, and poetry. The elements in the dance list were derived from the chart of skills and concepts for dance formulated by Adshead, Briginshaw, Hodgens, and Huxley (1982); the elements for visual arts were derived from a similar chart formulated by Ralph A. Smith (1989).
Let’s look at the elements of music in greater detail. As you examine Table 6.3, see if you call to mind music that illustrates the characteristics of the elements that are described. Could you provide similar elaborations on the elements of dance, poetry, and visual art listed in Table 6.2? If you need more information to be able to do that, the resource list at the end of this chapter will point you toward books that will help you and your students become more familiar with how artists, dancers, choreographers, and poets use these elements in their work.
Perceptions, Patterns, and Processes
89
|
Music |
Table 6.2 |
|
|
melody |
rhythm |
Elements of |
|
contour |
beat |
Music, Poetry, |
|
interval |
tempo |
Dance, and |
|
register |
meter |
Visual Art |
|
range |
duration — melodic rhythm |
|
|
melodic sequence |
accent |
|
|
articulation |
tone color |
|
|
staccato/legato |
vocal tone colors |
|
|
attack/sustain/decay |
instrumental tone colors |
|
|
dynamics |
harmony |
|
|
static dynamic levels |
chords |
|
|
changing dynamic levels |
tonality |
|
Poetry |
||
|
sounds of the words |
rhythm |
|
|
rhyme |
accents |
|
|
alliteration |
meter |
|
|
assonance |
line length |
|
|
consonance onomatopoeia |
figures of speech simile |
|
|
metaphor |
|
Dance |
|
|
movement |
dancers |
|
spatial elements |
numbers and gender |
|
shape |
role — lead, subsidiary |
|
size |
|
|
pattern/line |
visual setting |
|
direction |
set |
|
location in performance space |
light |
|
dynamic elements |
costumes and props |
|
tension/force |
|
|
speed/tempo |
aural elements |
|
duration |
sounds |
|
rhythm |
spoken word |
|
clusters of movements |
music |
continues
9°
Sound Ways of Knowing
Table 6.2
Elements of Music, Poetry, Dance, and Visual Art, continued
Table 6.3
A Listeners Compendium of Musical Elements
|
Visual Art |
||
|
shape |
complexes (clusters of elements) |
|
|
size |
line |
|
|
line area |
||
|
position |
boundary line |
|
|
color quality |
broken line |
|
|
hue lightness/darkness |
depth |
|
|
saturation |
movement |
MELODY— relationships of pitch RHYTHM— relationships of time
Contour— upward, downward, same
Interval — stepwise, skipwise movement (con- junct, disjunct)
Register — relative highness or lowness of pitches
Range— the distance from the highest pitch to the lowest pitch in a melody
range
Scale or Tonal Set — the number of pitches and their relationships to other pitches in the tonal set (major, minor, pentatonic, modal scales)
Melodic Sequence— patterns in the melody repeated at various pitch levels
Beat— a steady underlying pulse
I I I I I I I I I I I I I I
Tempo — the speed of the beat steady and slow
steady and fast
lllllllllllllllllllllllllllll
getting slower (ritardando)
III I I I I I I I I
getting faster (accelerando)
I I I I I I I I III
Meter— how beats are grouped into sets as you feel strong and weak beats
Sets of 2s — Duple Meter
I I I I I I I I I I I I
Sets of 3s — Triple Meter
I I I I I I I I I I I I
Other groupings
Duration: Melodic Rhythm — sounds that are short and long to match the melody or words of a song
The farm-er in the dell— Accent — rhythmic pulses that are stressed
Perceptions, Patterns, and Processes
91
|
TONE COLOR— |
|
|
the quality of sounds |
HARMONY— "vertical" pitches |
|
Vocal Timbres |
Chords |
|
solo or ensemble |
(major, minor, diminished, augmented) |
|
classifications: |
harmonic progressions |
|
soprano, alto, tenor, bass |
harmonic rhythm |
|
Instrumental Timbres |
"Key" Feeling — Tonality |
|
by specific instruments (flute, guitar, |
feeling of a key or tonal center (tonal) |
|
piano, trumpet, violin, snare drum) |
1 |
|
by families of the orchestra (string, |
\ 1/ |
|
woodwind, brass, percussion) |
|
|
by Sachs-von Hornbostel system: |
/f\ |
|
aerophones: vibrating column of air chordophones: vibrating stretched strings membranophones: stretched |
1 no feeling of key (atonal) |
|
membranes |
y / |
|
idiophones: unstretched vibrating |
|
|
substances |
|
|
electrophones: electronically |
|
|
generated sounds |
shifting key feelings (modulation) |
|
DYNAMICS — volume or intensity |
ARTICULATION |
|
Dynamic Levels— pp (very soft); p (soft); mp (medium soft);mf(medium loud); f (loud); ff (very loud) Changing Dynamic Levels — crescendo (gradually getting louder); decrescendo (gradually getting softer) |
Legato— smoothly connected path from one pitch to the next Staccato— pitches detached from each other Attack/Sustain/Decay |
As you examined the elements of the various art forms, you may have noticed that some terminology in the music section of Table 6.2 appeared again in the poetry, visual art, and dance sections. Shared terminology in the arts is quite common. Sometimes the use of the same terms points to similar phenomena across the arts, but as was demonstrated in Chapter 5, the terms can sometimes represent very different phenomena.
Even though differences in media make it impossible to draw direct parallels across art forms, many elements can be understood by way of interarts analogies. The properties related to the broad category of
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Sound Ways of Knowing
rhythm are a logical starting place. Most music, dances, and poems have a sense of steady pulse that serves as the reference point for all other aspects of rhythm. Some of those pulses are stressed or accented more than others. When we discover a pattern of stressed and unstressed beats, we become aware of meter. A couple dancing a waltz performs a regular repeating pattern of three steps. The beats of the music to which they dance (also called a waltz) are grouped in threes. In a waltz, or any other piece of music in triple meter, a stronger beat is followed by two weaker beats. We may perceive the first beat as being stronger because it is loud- er than the other beats, because it is higher or lower than the other beats (the oom-pah-pah bass of a waltz, for example), and/or because the har- mony changes. Poetry, too, has meter. In poetry, metrical “feet” are orga- nized around accented syllables. Poetry’s equivalent of the waltz is dactylic meter: x x x. Poems written in dactylic meter often evoke a phys- ical response of swinging or swaying. It was no accident that Robert Louis Stevenson chose that meter for his poem “The Swing”: “How would you like to go up in a swing?”
Tempo is the term used to indicate the speed of the beat in music and the speed of movement in dance. In music, the tempo for performance may be indicated by a metronome marking showing the number of beats that are to be performed in a minute (mm = 120), or it may be indicated more generally by words (often in Italian) that designate a range of tem- pos from slow (adagio) to very fast (presto). Poems, like music and dance, also have a range of tempos. These tempos, however, are implied, rather than specified. Speak these excerpts of poetry aloud:
Clickety-clack / Wheels on the track, /
This is the way / They begin the attack1
Slowly the tide creeps up the sand /
Slowly the shadows cross the land2
Did you read the second excerpt more slowly than you read the first? Seeing the word “slowly” probably influenced your choice of tempo. Now try this experiment: Read the first excerpt slowly and the second excerpt quickly. What happens? Does your tongue become impossibly tangled when reading the second excerpt? The poet used a combination of vowel and consonant sounds that must be spoken slowly to be enunciated. Thus, through his use of phonetic sounds, he established a tempo that enhances the literal meaning of the words.
When we speak the excerpts from “Song of the Train” and “Slowly,” the ways we use our mouth, tongue, and teeth to articulate are very different. In “Song of the Train,” the articulators create consonant sounds of c, k, and t.
These sounds have a crisp, explosive, detached quality. In “Slowly,” more liquid sounds are created by the s, sh, l, n, and w consonants. These differ- ences in word articulation are analogous to the articulation of tones in music that may be characterized as staccato and legato.
Let’s explore further the musician’s and the poet’s use of the sensuous quality of sound. The musician selects instrumental or vocal tone colors to convey a particular mood or feeling. The poet, too, is concerned with the quality of sound and uses devices that emphasize the interest and meaning inherent in the sounds of words. These devices include rhyme (words with final syllables that have the same or similar vowel and con- sonant sounds), alliteration (repeated initial consonant sounds), asso- nance (repeated vowel sounds), consonance (repetition of similar or identical consonants or words whose main vowels differ), and ono- matopoeia (word sounds that are similar to the actual sounds they repre- sent). Can you find examples of each of these four devices in the lines from “Song of the Train”? Here are some instances you may have identi- fied: (a) rhyme {clack, track , attack), (b) alliteration (dickety-dack), (c) assonance (ch'ckety, this, begin), and (d) onomatopoeia (clickety-clack). These devices, along with meter, suggest the sound and movement of the train. If you wanted to imitate the percussive articulation of the words of this poem in music, what kinds of instruments would you use? How would those instruments be played? Percussion instruments would be an obvious choice. A violin would also be a possibility if it were played with the wood instead of the hair of the bow (col legno) or if it were plucked with the fingers (pizzicato). Now contrast how the violin might play to imitate the words of “Slowly. ’’The player would slowly draw the hairs of the bow across the strings to play smooth, legato phrases.
In music, dance, and visual art we speak of shape and direction in lines. Making a connection between lines in music and lines in painting and sculpture is tempting, but also fraught with difficulties. Musicians may refer to a “rising” melodic line or a bass voice that sinks down for a “low” pitch. The spatial connotations of these words are simply a convention, though. Pitches that are “high” differ from “low” pitches in that they have more sound cycles per second. It would be more true to their physical properties to say that “higher” pitches have a greater frequency of cycles per second. But even the terminology that is used to refer to the acoustic properties of tones makes reference to “high” and “low” frequencies. So, it appears that even when speaking in acoustical terms we cannot escape the reference to high and low.
Musicians and music educators regularly draw on the association of pitch level with high and low. Imagine watching the great operatic tenor Luciano Pavarotti ending an aria on a high note. What would he be doing
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Sound Ways of Knowing
with his arms? He would probably raise them as he ends the aria with a flourish. Now imagine that his aria ends on a low note. Where would his arms be? We would probably find it incongruous if he raised them. Sometimes composers use pitch direction to create the effect of “tone painting.” In the Christmas carol “Joy to the World,” for example, Handel symbolizes the descent of Jesus to earth by beginning the song with a descending scale. The musical line would be represented in notation by eight notes descending from a high position on the staff to a low one. That graphic representation of high to low might be echoed physically by a teacher coaching a group of singers who traces the descending melodic line with her hand to remind them of the melodic contour of the phrase.
What Kind of Structure or Form Does the Work Have?
A fragment of melody may be beautiful, a gesture graceful, or a metaphor evocative, but these bits of raw material do not become art until they are manipulated and combined with other bits in a meaningful way to create a coherent, expressive whole. In music, the concepts that are related to how musical elements are combined to create the coherent, expressive whole of a composition are texture and form. (See Table 6.4)
Texture in music is manifested in the way that musical fines are per- formed either alone or in simultaneous combination with other musical fines. The terms that are commonly used to describe the basic musical textures are monophony, homophony, and polyphony. When a single singer or a group of singers performs the melody of “Row, Row, Row Your Boat,” for example, a monophonic texture is created. If a pianist were to accompany the singing of the melody with chords, that texture would be described as homophonic. If one singer began singing “The Farmer in the Dell” while another sang “Row, Row, Row Your Boat,” the result would be a polyphonic texture. If one singer began singing “Row, Row, Row Your Boat,” then another began the same song four beats later, a special variety of polyphonic texture, known as a round, results. If the pianist were to add chordal accompaniment to the performance of the round, a hybrid of polyphonic and homophonic texture, or mixed texture, would be created.
In composing “Farandole” from L'Arlesienne Suite No. 2, Georges Bizet made use of all of these types of textures. Listen to the “Farandole” while following the descriptions in the listening chart in Table 6.5. You will notice that Bizet saved the most complex texture for the climax of the composition.
Analogs to polyphony in music can be found in dance and poetry. The relationship of two or more dancers through time can reflect the rela- tionship of polyphonic musical fines; music and dance share the same
Perceptions, Patterns, and Processes
95
TEXTURE— simultaneous FORM— design or
combination of musical lines organization in music
Monophonic texture — single melody line
Homophonic texture — melody with chordal accompaniment
Polyphonic texture — two or more melodies performed simultaneously
Mixed texture — two or more melodies with chordal accompaniment
Same/different
Only one section Verse-refrain Call and response Repeated ideas Introduction/interlude/coda
Form of entire sections: AB, ABA, AABA
Form of phrases within sections: ab, aba, aaba
Sectional forms
Theme and variations (AA'A"A"') Minuet and trio (ABA)
Rondo (e.g., ABACADA) Sonata-allegro (exposition, development, recapitulation)
labels for these relationships. One example of such a relationship is osti- nato, where an individual or a group performs a repeating pattern in movement or sound that underlies the ongoing movements or sounds of the other performers. Another is canon, in which everyone performs the same movements or melody, but each performer or group of performers begins at a different time. The characteristic of simultaneity that is the essence of polyphony is rare in poetry, but it can be found. If, for exam- ple, a poet wants you to consider two different points of view simultane- ously, those points of view might be expressed in two parallel poems placed side by side. Paul Fleischman (1988, 1989) has written two books of poems for two voices, some of which are nearly canonic. One such poem is “Whirligig Beedes,” which is the focus of a lesson plan present- ed in Chapter 7.
Table 6.4
Texture and Form in Music
96
Sound Ways of Knowing
Table 6.5
Listening Chart for Texture in Music3
|
Farandole from L'Arlesienne Georges Bizet (1838-1875) |
|
|
1 :00 Theme A; minor mode |
4 1 .28 Theme A; minor mode |
|
Homophonic texture |
Monophonic texture |
|
' ' '< 1 1 1 ' ' '( 1 1 1 1 1 1 |
5 1:38 Theme B; transformed to |
|
minor mode |
|
|
2 :17 Theme A; minor mode |
|
|
Polyphonic texture; canon |
6 1:44 Theme A; minor mode |
|
Begins in monphonic texture, |
|
|
becomes homophonic |
|
|
7 1:54 Theme B; minor mode |
|
|
8 2:1 6 Theme A in major mode and |
|
|
Theme B in major mode com- |
|
|
3 :34 Theme B; major mode |
bined with harmony |
|
Homophonic texture |
Mixed texture |
|
9 2:46 Coda |
One of the overarching principles in artistic form is the interplay between similarity and difference. Artists walk a tightrope between sim- ilarity and difference to achieve cohesiveness and maintain interest in their work. The process of variation is one way artists negotiate that tightrope. In the process of variation, similarity and difference exist simultaneously as some elements of a theme or idea remain constant while other elements undergo change. A dancer, for example, can perform a basic series of movements — a theme, if you will. That movement theme can be varied by making it larger, smaller, higher, lower, stronger, weaker. It can be inverted (high becomes low, forward becomes backward) or per- formed in retrograde (reverse order). Parts of the movement series can be subdy changed or ornamented. Through all of the variations, however, the relationship to the original theme should be discernible.
Perceptions, Patterns, and Processes
97
Artists also employ the principle of variation in their work. Sometimes a series of variations on an object or abstract pattern is presented within the context of a single work. Sometimes variations are achieved through a series of works in which the presentation of a single subject is varied across works. Study the photographs of the series of bronze reliefs, Back I, Back II, Back III, Back IV by Henri Matisse (Figure 6.2). What is the theme of these reliefs? How is that theme varied? You’ll notice that the theme, a woman’s back, becomes increasingly abstract.
Figure 6.2
Henri Matisse. Back I, Back II, Back III, Back IV. ca. 1959-1960. Bronze relief.
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Sound Ways of Knowing
Table 6.6
Music in the Form of Theme and Variations Suitable for Young Listeners
In music, composers achieve variation by ornamenting a melody; pre- senting it in a different mode; inverting it; changing its tempo, rhythm, and meter; setting it in different textures; and using alternate harmoniza- tions. The more familiar the listener is with the original theme, the greater the possibility for delight in tracking the ways the composer manipulates the theme. Many of the compositions listed in Table 6.6 use familiar songs as the basis for variation, which makes them especially appropriate for initial experiences with theme and variations.
|
1 Composer |
Composition |
|
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart |
Variations on "Ah, vous dirai-je, Maman" (same tune as "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star") |
|
Aaron Copland |
Variations on "Simple Gifts" from Appalachian Spring* |
|
Charles Ives |
Variations on America |
|
Morton Gould |
American Salute* |
|
Benjamin Britten |
Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra |
* A lesson plan that features Copland's Variations on "Simple Gifts" is included in Chapter 7; a lesson plan that features American Salute can be found in Chapter 1 0.
Like theme and variation, the compositional device of motive consists of a core idea that undergoes successive transformation. A line or shape, gesture, or brief musical idea can constitute a motive that is repeated and developed to create larger structures. In Seurat’s Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, for example, the arc is used as a motive through- out the painting. We see the arc repeated in the shape of umbrellas, dogs’ tails, women’s bustles, a monkey’s arched back, the crook of a cane, hats and heads, sails, and a bit of a cloud. In music, undoubtedly the most famous use of motive is the initial four notes of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5 in C minor. The melodic shape and rhythm pattern of those four notes provided Beethoven with enough raw musical material to sustain an entire movement. The motive is presented in various guises: at higher and lower pitch levels, inverted, augmented (twice as slow), with altered pitches, and with pitches added or subtracted.
Another way that similarity and difference come into play in artistic form is in the repetition of ideas and the juxtaposition of those ideas with contrasting ideas. Repetition and contrast can occur on both small-scale or large-scale levels. In poetry, for example, repetition and contrast occur on a small scale when final vowel and consonant sounds are repeated to create rhymes. Those rhymes are contrasted with other lines of the poem to cre- ate rhyme schemes that contribute to the larger architecture of the poem.
Perceptions, Patterns, and Processes
99
Repetition and contrast contribute to the sense of balance in a work of art. That balance may be achieved through the equilibrium of exact or similar elements in symmetry, or through the use of unequal parts or ele- ments in asymmetry. The most common type of symmetrical balance is characterized by ABA form whereby identical or similar parts frame a contrasting part. In music, the sections may consist of only a few phrases or many phrases that combine to create a larger section.
Let’s examine how the elements of repetition and contrast, form, and balance operate in the simple song “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.” The lyrics of the song follow an aabbaa rhyme scheme (see Table 6.7)
a Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
a How I wonder what you are. b Up above the world so high, b Like a