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How Popular Musicians Learn

Bernie Holland, Terry Ollis, Rob Bums, Nanette Welmans, Brent Keefe, Peter Williams, Will Cragg, Steve Popplewell, Andy Brooks, Simon Bourke, Michael Whiteman, Emily Dicks, Richard Dowdall and Leo Hardt

A Way Ahead for Music Education

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LUCY GREEN Professor of Music Education University of London, Institute of Education

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ASHGATE

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Contents

© Lucy Green 2002 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher. The author has asserted her moral right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

< Foreword by Robert Fripp Acknowledgements 1

Published by Ashgate Publishing Limited Wey Court East Union Road Farnham, Surrey GU9 7PT England

Ashgate Publishing Company Suite 420 101 Cherry Street Burlington, VT 05401-4405 USA

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\ Ashgate website: http://www.ashgate.com

What is it to be musically educated? Research methods Concluding thoughts Skills, knowledge and self-conceptions of popular musicians: the beginnings and the ends The 'beginnings' Professional musicianship: the 'ends' Some self-conceptions of popular musicians

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Reprinted 2003, 2005, 2008, 2010, 2012

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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Green, Lucy How popular musicians learn : a way ahead for music education. - (Ashgate popular and folk music series) 1. Popular music - Instruction and study I. Title 78 l .6'3'.071 Library of Congress Catag-in-Publication Data Green, Lucy. How popular musicians learn : a way ahead for music education I Lucy Green, London University, Institute of Education. p. cm. - (Ashgate popular and folk music series) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-7546-0338-2 - ISBN 978-0-7546-3226-9 (softcover) 1. Music-Instruction and study-England. 2. Popular music-Instruction and study-England. I. Title. II. Series. MT3.E5 074 2001 781.64'07 l-dc21

2001033362

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ISBN 978 0 7546 3226 9

Learning to play popular music: acquiring skills and knowledge The overriding learning practice: listening and copying Peer-directed learning and group learning Acquiring technique Practice Acquiring knowledge of technicalities Summary

59 60 76 84 86 93 96

Attitudes and values in learning to play popular music Discipline and osmosis Enjoyment Valuing musicianship Valuing oneself Attitudes to 'other' music Summary

99 99 104 107 117 121 124

Popular musicians in traditional music education Classical instrumental tuition Traditional classroom music education Summary

127 127 135 148

Popular musicians in the new music education Popular music instrumental tuition The new classroom music education Popular music in further and higher education

151 151 155 167

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Printed and bound in Great Britain by the MPG Books Group, UK

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CONTENTS

C The musicians' views of popular music in formal education Summary

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The formal and the informal: mutual reciprocity or a contradiction in ? The neglect of informal learning practices in formal music education Informal learning practices, attitudes and values: their potential for the formal sphere What can teachers do?

Appendix: Summary profiles of the musicians Bibliography Index

172 175

177 177 185 214 219 221 233

General Editor's preface The upheaval that occurred in musicology during the last two decades of the twentieth century has created a new urgency for the study of popular music alongside the development of new critical and theoretical models. A relativistic outlook has replaced the universal perspective of modernism (the international ambitions of the 12-note style); the grand narrative of the evolution and dissolution of tonality has been challenged, and emphasis has shifted to cultural context, reception and subject position. Together, these have conspired to eat away at the status of canonical composers and categories of high and low in music. A need has arisen, also, to recognize and address the emergence of crossovers, mixed and new genres, to engage in debates concerning the vexed problem of what constitutes authenticity in music and to offer a critique of musical practice as the product of free, individual expression. Popular musicology is now a vital and exciting area of scholarship, and the Ashgate Popular and Folk Music series aims to present the best research in the field. Authors will be concerned with locating musical practices, values and meanings in cultural context, and may draw upon methodologies and theories developed in cultural studies, semiotics, poststructuralism, psychology and sociology. The series will focus on popular musics of the twentieth and twentyfirst centuries. It is designed to embrace the world's popular musics from Acid Jazz to Zydeco, whether high tech or low tech, commercial or non-commercial, contemporary or traditional. Professor Derek B. Scott Chair of Music University of Salford

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Visit Project Pop: http://www.salford.ac.uk/FDTLpop/welcome.htm

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Foreword ( May we trust the inexpressible benevolence of the creative impulse. The formal musical education available to one of my generation (born 1946) was clear: the music of Old (preferably Dead) White Guys From Europe was the only music to be taken seriously. In the 1960s, to wear Jong hair signified proof of delinquent musical talent, aberrant moral values and an implicit threat to society; the electric guitar was not quite a proper musical instrument; and improvisation - or 'making it up as you go along' - not quite an intentional musical act. Today, the world of music is a world of musics, each with their own traditions in the transmission of musical discipline, performance conventions, repertoire and usages of music, both sacred and secular. Customarily, the aspirant player seeks an 'elder' in their tradition for instruction, whether formal or informal. The European conservatory is only one form of response, at a particular time in a particular culture, to addressing this need. Dr Lucy Green's work deserves a wider readership than academics and music educators. Her first two books are directed primarily towards an academic readership, but they are also valuable to a working player willing to engage with the vocabulary of academe. I read Music On Deaf Ears in the Starbucks opposite the Beverley Center, Los Angeles, while on tour with King Crimson in June 1995; and Music, Gender, Education in the coffee shop of the University Hotel in Seattle during May 1998, while recording Bill Rieflin's 'Birth Of A Giant' and Rieflin-Fripp-Gunn's 'The Repercussions Of Angelic Behaviour'. Dr Green's arguments on fetishization in those books have since moved into Crimspeak. On the US G3 tour of 1997, in the staff restaurant of the Las Vegas Hard Rock Hotel, engineer and producer R. Chris Murphy learnt this wonderful phrase: 'Why do you feel the need to radically fetishize the inherent and delineated meanings of Robert's music?' Chris would, on occasion, approach fans who were more interested in autography than music, and present his question. This present book is more immediately inviting, available and of direct practical interest to the working player in popular music, particularly those who also instruct students. Music is a quality organized in sound and in time. The musicness of music is eternal, the forms of musical organization evolve within a culture. How we acquire a taste for music is largely determined by our cultural environment, including our educational institutions. But fundamentally, we are called by the music that calls to us. Music works where it will, where it can, where it is welcomed. The musician, with discipline, creates a bridge for music to enter our world. Some of the bridges are funky, some constructed from the vernacular, some are superb statements of form which persist through time, some are

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FOREWORD

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commentaries directed to the narrow moment. Sometimes music leans over and takes a musician into its confidence. Then, music directly irrstructs its representative in that time and place as to what is required, and a tradition is born, renewed or restored. Within any culture, music speaks through many voices, in many dialects. In popular culture, the musician calls on the highest part in all of us. In mass culture, the musician addresses the lower parts of what we are. In mass culture, our singers shout what we want to hear. In popular culture, our musicians sing to us in our own voice. May that voice be true. Robert Fripp 2001

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Acknowledgements Charlie Ford, who was with me every step of the way. His input to the book is extensive, and amounts to much more than reading and commenting upon two complete drafts, for that was preceded by over twenty years of talking about music, listening to music and making music together. His experiences as a young popular musician in the past, and as a classically trained musicologist have by those means entered the core of my discussions. The series editor Derek Scott, who carefully and critically read the penultimate draft, and provided encouragement from start to finish of the project. Rock guitarist Robert Fripp who unfailingly expressed his during an email conversation over a lengthy period, when he read no Jess than three drafts of the book, and then took time away from his demanding touring schedule to provide the Foreword. My colleagues and friends at the London University Institute of Education, Keith Swanwick, Charles Plummeridge, Robert Kwami, Anton Franks and Pauline Adams; those at other universities, Sarah Hennessy, Sara Cohen, Vic Gammon and Kyoko Koizumi; my brother Tim Green; and my friend Jen Moseley, all of whom read and commented upon all or part of the text with care, encouraged me and generously gave me many kinds of ideas, information and materials. Dave Laing who gave me a variety of materials, information and references, and discussed the project on many occasions with his customary acumen and vast knowledge of popular music; Donald Ellman who constructively brought the perspectives of an experienced classical piano teacher and lecturer to bear on an early proposal; and Jan Banks who helped me to understand more than I can say. Jilly Dolphin who carefully transcribed hours of interviews with musicians and questionnaire responses from teachers, as well as providing istrative and moral in a host of other ways. Rachel Lynch, who was consistently courteous and efficient in seeing the book through all its publication rites of age, and everyone else who made things run so smoothly at Ashgate. Chris Atton, Julian Costello, Anton Franks, Jane Kirby, Allan Moore and Sarah Moore for kindly putting me in touch with musicians. The teachers who responded to a questionnaire many years ago in 1982, and those who responded to another one in 1998, often giving far more help and information than requested, in the spirit of commitment to their work, which is typical of teachers. A number of people for generously making available photocopies of articles, dissertations and other useful materials, including Anna Barnett, Charlie Beale, Mary Ann Clawson, Maria Efpatridou, Heloisa Feichas, John Finney, Simon