ABSTRACT. Students who demonstrate poor quality practice, characterized by inefficient planning and strategy usage (Miksza et al., 2012), exhibit lower satisfaction ratings with their musical experience (Hallam et al., 2021). They also exhibit higher levels of frustration, lower levels of performance, and are more likely to quit playing their instrument completely (McPherson & Davidson, 2002). Presumably, music teachers would want to alleviate these concerns by supporting students in developing effective practice strategies. Indeed, music teachers often report advocating for, and teaching, a broad range of practice strategies. However, observations of teachers’ lessons and their students’ practice sessions (eg., Koopman et al., 2007), as well as the students’ self-reports, reflect a disconnect between teachers’ alleged practice instruction and students’ practice behavior. Despite some preliminary research in this area, a full picture of the relationship between instructors' behavior in lessons, and their students’ behavior in practice, does not yet exist. Many of the studies on teaching and practice behavior rely on self-report data (eg., Barry, 2007), which do not necessarily correspond to actual practice behaviors (Chaffin & Imreh, 2001). Other researchers have coded behavior in lessons (e.g., Duke & Simmons, 2006; Roesler, 2017) or behavior in practice sessions (e.g., Miksza and Brenner, 2022). However, relatively few studies have examined recordings of both lessons and practice sessions and compared instruction and student behavior outside of lessons. We coded in situ teacher and student behaviors during video recorded lessons and compared those behaviors with the same students’ practice behaviors during subsequent practice sessions. We applied Roesler’s (2016, 2017) frameworks for problem solving, teachers’ problem-solving-prompting behaviors, and teachers’ practice directives to students as described in Roesler (2013). We also open-coded any practice strategies and related behaviors that we were able to reliably observe. General findings and implications of this research will be shared at the conference.

ABSTRACT. The utilisation of video recordings has a long history within higher music education. In teacher training, video recordings have been employed in seminars to facilitate students' reflection on their own teaching activities during their practical semester (Herbst, 2019), to undertake reconstructive case work (Kranefeld et al., 2023) and to familiarise students with the conception of digital teaching formats such as tutorials and explanatory videos (Völker & Endres, 2021). In the field of instrumental and vocal pedagogy, video recordings have been employed to prompt reflection among university students on their learning processes in instrumental lessons (Heiden, 2018) and for the didactic training of instrumental and vocal teachers (Knodt, 2017). Against the background of this predominantly positive reception, this paper aims to shed light on the students' critical perspective. For this study, five group discussions with students of music education were conducted in order to gain insights into the students’ perspective on the use of video recording in applied piano lessons. Reconstructions with the documentary method (Bohnsack, 2021) indicate that, on the one hand, students regard the camera as a tool that supports them in fulfilling the perceived norm of practising, as videos enable them to remember, revise and reflect on lessons in detail. On the other hand, students associate the camera with subject-specific norms against which they measure their actions. Comparative analyses show that the presence of a camera does not only put students under pressure to perform well, but also strengthens their implicit logic of differentiating between those who are capable of acting and those who are not. This paper thus reveals critical implications of a wide-spread tool, stimulating the need for further discussion on the use of video recordings in music teacher education as well as vocal and instrumental pedagogy.

ABSTRACT. During the last decade, many music groups of Greece, mainly choirs and vocal ensembles, have adopted goals consistent with the principles of Community Music, like the promotion of members’ socialization and interaction. Since the beginning of the 2020s, a new trend has been observed, namely the establishment of Community Music instrumental ensembles concentrating on traditional music. These groups share many similarities. They are large ensembles consisting of many members, mainly amateur musicians of different levels. They focus on oral music traditions of Greece and the wider Eastern Mediterranean region, while noticeable is their preference for transmission methods that do not necessarily follow the well-established Eurocentric “canon” of learning through notation.

Our study investigates the cases of four groups of this type, based in Athens, Thessaloniki and Lesvos, focusing on members and teachers’ perceptions. More specifically, we conducted semi-structured interviews and focus group discussions with teachers and members respectively, while we attended rehearsals and lessons collecting ethnographic material that we used for triangulation purposes. Our main aim was to explore participants’ perspectives on issues such as: the value they attribute to their participation in a musical group, the difficulties they face, their relationship with traditional music, ambitions regarding their personal musical growth and group development, and finally whether a balance between the ensemble’s community character and high artistic goals can be achieved.

The present study can contribute to the better understanding of a new and dynamically developing phenomenon, proposing ways in which oral musical traditions can be used in the fields of Community Music and Music Education.

ABSTRACT. Nearly simultaneously with the “birth” of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the principle of Artistic Citizenship has become more prominent in the arts and the field of music education. The latest developments in terminology have led to a composition and recalibration of its meaning as Artizenship. This paper aims to explore which SDGs can be interconnected with Artizenship and why it is crucial to examine their synergies. Brief overviews of Artizenship, the SDGs, and Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) form the basis of this presentation. A word frequency analysis of associated relevant terms in selected articles was conducted to highlight and quantify interconnections between Artizenship, the SDGs, and ESD. In addition, the lack of results for several search terms is examined. The word clustering is aligned with the 5Ps (people, planet, prosperity, peace, partnership) of sustainable development, with particular focus on more arts-related terms. The word frequency analysis underscores the need to further extrapolate sustainability-related matters concerning Artizenship in the future. Meanwhile, the SDGs and ESD lack mentions of democracy-related topics in the literature. ESD shares common ground with Artizenship in terms of creativity and aesthetics, revealing a hidden potential for further exploration. This analysis indicates strong implications for Artizenship as sustainability. Artizenship, characterised by the active engagement of artists in societal issues, serves as a catalyst for social change and sustainable development. By leveraging creative expression, music educators can contribute to raising awareness, fostering dialogue, and engaging with diverse SDG-related issues, ranging from educational to social justice and cultural diversity. Furthermore, this paper advocates for expanded terminology in the form of Sustainable Artizenship, to highlight the urgency and relevance of incorporating sustainability-related matters into both theoretical fundamental research and practical approaches such as participatory music-making in the present and future.

ABSTRACT. Post the pandemic, online learning continues to flourish, and in a country with such vast distances as Australia, undertaking a tertiary study is often only possible via online learning in certain locations due to large distances, accessibility and affordability. This research investigates the perceptions and approaches that students have towards the application of Information Communications and Technology (ICT) in the tertiary context, specifically focusing on students currently undertaking a music degree (Diploma of Music and Bachelor of Music) at a Queensland University. A mixed methodology was employed to create a range of survey items which included demographic information, rating scales, and open-ended statements to facilitate a smooth process for participants to complete the anonymous online survey. After receiving ethical approval an anonymous link containing the Qualtrics survey and Plain Language Statement (PLS) was disseminated to all current students. They were invited to share their own perceptions and descriptions about their use of ICT and where suitable, provide illustrations of ways they integrated ICT in their own study as they were completing their degrees. Examining (n=84) student responses, the initial analysis of data via descriptive and thematic methods reports on the different ways that students are engaging with diverse technologies to facilitate and support their music study programs, with initial insights into their world of study within the ‘online learning’ context. This presentation identifies similarities and differences amongst students, through an exploration of participants undertaking different enrolment options, with various students completing 25%, 50%, 75% and 100% of their work online. Initial findings highlight the diverse technologies employed, and the adaptive ways students engage with ICT to facilitate and sustain their learning. Implications for the design of online music performance programs are discussed, combined with various considerations for sustaining engagement within the tertiary setting.

ABSTRACT. How do gender expectations and sexism affect creative development and creative practice in music? In a large study funded by Fulbright and the European Research Council, I explored enablers and inhibitors of creative development and creative practice in urban fieldsites in South Africa, the US, and Finland. This comparative ethnomusicological study used ethnography and in-depth interviewing as a primary research method. Additionally, a lengthy questionnaire was distributed to tertiary music students in South Africa, the US, Ireland, and Germany. In the qualitative interviews, gender emerged as an important issue for only a small minority of interviewees; it did not appear to be a significant influencer for most musicians in the study. However, a quantitative analysis of the 149 completed questionnaires revealed contrasting results: highly significant correlations with gender regarding creativity activities, especially composing, as well as with multiple pedagogical factors influencing creative development. Indeed, in the statistical analysis gender appears to be one of the most significant factors influencing composing and the development of creative skill sets. Interesting patterns of gendered practice also appear according to region and idiom, particularly Western art, popular, jazz, and one’s own style music. In institutions of music education in modern societies in which gender equality is a commonly held value, practices of gender inequality thus remain pervasive yet largely unacknowledged. This paper expands Phillip Ewell’s (2019) exposure of the myth of gender neutrality and Christine Scharff’s (2018) work on gender segregation and unarticulated sexism in classical music. Theoretical framing draws on Keller Easterling’s (2016) model of power hiding in infrastructure space and Sarah Ahmed’s (2017) critique of feminism as an “imperial gift” – indeed this paper reveals how the mechanisms perpetuating sexism in composition are disseminated within Western institutions and to other idioms and cultures.

ABSTRACT. Music teacher education is becoming an increasingly complex process to meet the continuing challenges of today’s society. Although teachers’ identity is crucial in the present context, little attention is paid to it from a socio-critical perspective. This symposium aims to reflect on and propose an alternative view about teacher professional identity construction. Over ten years of research in the field of teacher identity are presented. The professionalism of musician-teachers is emphasised by considering the viability of the postmodern model of teacher identity. Therefore, the simultaneity and complementarity of the modern and postmodern approach are supported by different authors presented in the following three papers. The first research discusses the features and results of the research carried out by our team since 2010, beginning from conceptions and instructional models, and evolving to the study of teacher professional identity (TPI). Specific aspects were studied: the origin of professions related to music, sociocultural contexts that exert influence on the TPI development, the role of ethics in music teaching, among others. The second paper, based on the embodied music cognition perspective, is a case study. It explores how the bodily music activities become a source of professional knowledge and teacher identity construction, involving student-teachers as participants. The third research presents case studies in which music TPI construction of in-service teachers from multiple institutional contexts is investigated through a mixed method design. The results show the construction of stable and long-lasting teaching identities, which encourage a transformational relationship with the environment. These three studies propose an alternative to the postmodern view, that has been shown both in research on the construction of identity through the communication of embodied and verbally explicit knowledge. The alternative is represented by the complexity approach, which could be further developed in future research.

ABSTRACT. In this keynote address, I will explore the application of Lucy Green’s concepts of “inherent” (which she also refers to as inter-sonic) and “delineated” musical meanings within the context of contemporary Chinese music education, highlighting the interplay between nationalism and globalisation. Green’s model elucidates the relationship between meanings derived from musical materials and those shaped by cultural contexts, offering valuable insights into how music education can cultivate national identity and social cohesion while also accommodating the complexities of Chinese political dynamics and fostering a global perspective. Through an analysis of official curriculum documents and approved music textbooks, this research will reveal how these dual meanings navigate the intricacies of China’s educational landscape. Ultimately, this paper argues that Green’s framework is essential for understanding how music education in contemporary China can effectively promote national identity and global awareness, thereby shaping informed and engaged citizens.

ABSTRACT. The increasing complexity of digital methods in musicology require students to master programming skills, creating a substantial learning curve for those with humanities backgrounds. While coding has become essential for tasks such as data collection and analysis in musicological research, conventional instructional methods struggle to address the diverse technical requirements of coding in digital humanities. This study explores a pedagogical approach that combines flipped classroom methodology with Large Language Models (LLMs) in teaching programming skills to musicology students. By implementing an AI teaching assistant, personalized, on-demand coding support is offered, while maintaining the rigor of traditional academic instruction. The research examines an implementation in a course entitled “Digital Methods in Historical Musicology”, where students utilized LLM assistance for developing web scraping scripts and metadata analysis tools. The study employed mixed methods research design, gathering both performance metrics and narrative feedback to assess the effectiveness of this approach. Analysis revealed that students using the AI-enhanced flipped classroom model demonstrated significantly improved coding proficiency, with a high reduction in basic task completion time. Qualitative data indicated increased student engagement and self-confidence in programming tasks, particularly during independent learning phases. Despite promising outcomes in technical skill development and student confidence, the findings identified important constraints, specifically in assignments requiring advanced algorithmic thinking or involving natural language. This research expands the current understanding of AI-enhanced pedagogy in digital humanities, offering empirical evidence for the effectiveness of LLM-supported instruction while acknowledging its limitations. The results suggest a viable model for scaling individualized coding instruction in humanities disciplines, contributing to the broader discussion of technology integration in humanities education.

ABSTRACT. The application of generative artificial intelligence (AI) in music education has led to innovative pedagogical approaches, leveraging students’ creativity while simultaneously acting as a driving force for curriculum change in response to its impact. While the effective integration of generative AI has been the tenor of debate in music education research, there is a lack of discourse about the ethical concerns underlying its broader applications in various teaching and learning contexts. To better inform the ethical use of generative AI in music education and ensure that the pedagogies adopted are socially, culturally, and pedagogically responsible, alongside the alignment with equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) and other universal values, this presentation outlines the conceptual underpinnings and discipline-specific considerations of responsible generative AI in music education. These considerations include the over-reliance of large language models (LLM) on huge training datasets, the lack of transparency in the generative process, unclear attributions in acknowledging source materials, and misconceptions of generative AI among teachers and students, all of which contribute to bias and limitations in the application of generative AI in the music teaching and learning realm. By addressing these issues in context, this presentation raises the awareness of ethical challenges associated with generative AI in music education and argue for the importance of responsible AI in fostering an educational environment that respects intellectual property, embraces diverse musical cultures, and adds values to established music pedagogies through technological integration.

ABSTRACT. Recurring studio music masterclasses (“masterclasses”) are common in applied music teaching settings, where applied instructors teach their own students in a group setting. While prior studies investigate guest-artist masterclasses, these more prosaic classes are largely unexplored. Given calls for reform within institutional music learning, we hypothesize that group, applied music settings are possible sites of ongoing innovation. Using practitioner-focused theories of reflective practice (Schön) and communities of practice (Lave & Wenger), this study uses questionnaires and semi-structured interviews to investigate masterclass instructors’ desired learning outcomes, teaching activities, and reflective processes. This study is part of a larger project also incorporating student focus groups and masterclass observations.

From the questionnaire, we conclude there is widespread agreement about the centrality of both musical skill development and community-building, but divergent frequency of less traditional activities. Interview analysis reveals two common themes: (1) instrumental culture: learning outcomes and activities are all filtered through the act of performing on a particular instrument; and (2) intentionality: teachers express a sense of control in shaping their class environments; and two divergent themes: (3) teacher vs. students as drivers of learning; and (4) past vs. present experiences as primary basis of teaching approaches. These results illustrate how applied music teachers are not a monolithic group, and that their high degree of autonomy has led to divergent approaches. These findings can both reveal and evaluate innovative approaches while driving teaching practices forward through dissemination.

ABSTRACT. Music performance anxiety (MPA) is a widely documented condition that can affect any musician at any point in their career. Physical outcomes such as a rapid heart rate, inability to focus, and shaky muscles commonly occur during instances of MPA, leading to difficulties when performing. In extreme cases, unalleviated and sustained MPA can result in musicians eventually leaving the profession due to persistent psychological and physiological stress. Converging evidence points to the use of mental training as an effective technique in ameliorating the detrimental effects of generalized performance anxiety; however, to date, techniques embedded within performance-based mental training research largely focus on preventative rather than reactive strategies. Examining the existing literature on MPA, we build on Ohki’s (2020, 2022) previous research on mental training for musicians to present a theoretical framework: Transformative Mental Training for Musicians (TMTM). This framework combines established mental training methods for musicians with new, reactive strategies to reframe MPA as a source of focus and excitement rather than stress and discomfort. The core components, activation regulation, motivation regulation, emotion regulation, and mental practice, originate from Ohki’s foundational model (2020); however, this revised model of mental training for the purpose of overcoming MPA introduces a novel aspect: the integration of reappraisal as an adaptive technique for real-time anxiety management. To conclude this paper, we offer specific recommendations on how TMTM may be practically applied for music educators guiding their students in navigating MPA as well as the professional musician.

ABSTRACT. Over the past decade, increasing numbers of schools in England have been following the lead of the acclaimed Michaela Community School, Wembley, in advocating ‘knowledge-rich’ curricula and ‘expertly-designed’ learning led by authoritative teachers. In their utopian vision of silent corridors and orderly dining halls, a ‘broadly traditional and academically rigorous’ education takes place in neat classrooms where ‘desks are in rows and the teacher stands at the front of the class and leads the children to new and exciting destinations’ (https://michaela.education). Yet within such a setting, the music classroom (if there is one) is conspicuously distinctive—a place in which noise, creativity, and participation often takes precedence over silence, conformity, and individualism. Such characteristics offer significant potential to challenge utopian, knowledge-rich approaches and broaden understandings of knowers, knowing, and knowledge. In Foucauldian terms the music classroom could therefore act as a counter-site—or ‘heterotopia’—in which wider institutional values are re-presented, contested, and inverted.

In this paper I draw on Foucault’s notion of ‘heterotopias of juxtaposition’ to frame the role of the music classroom at Sycamore Close Academy (pseudonym), a secondary school in southern England styled after the Michaela Community School. Heterotopias of juxtaposition bring together times and spaces that in themselves are incompatible: musical genres from across history or musical instruments from across cultures, for example. Using accounts from my recent ethnographic fieldwork at the school, I explore how juxtapositions of imitation and imagination and continuity and change emerge at the fragile boundary between the music classroom and the wider school, constructing sites of contestation from which to question conceptualisations of knowledge-rich approaches. I suggest that such juxtapositions open up spaces of vulnerability in which everyday acts of resistance and resilience can both foster meaningful music education at an individual level and challenge utopian constructs at an institutional level.

ABSTRACT. The term powerful knowledge has been applied to so called ‘knowledge rich curricula’ that variously prioritise lists of content, concepts and skills. This has been manifest in music education, for example, through national initiatives in the UK (e.g. the Model Music Curriculum, 2021) and social realist approaches to the curriculum (McPhail, 2022).

However, there is an alternative and recent heritage in the theory and practice of music education that rationalises (if without actually naming) the primacy of musical meaning as powerful knowledge (Swanwick 1988, Green 1988, Cooke et al 2023). It will be argued that the implications of this heritage have been weakly represented in recent workings out of powerful knowledge which have consistently failed to foreground musical meaning. Typically, various versions of powerful knowledge have demonstrated a hierarchical, conditional, weak or possibly absent account of meaning that has negative implications for social justice in music education.

In light of this analysis a framework will be proposed and exemplified for understanding the foundational ‘power’ and primacy of meaning as powerful knowledge in music education. The framework is constructed around the interplay between three ‘legs’: musicological (e.g. personal, cultural, semiotic meanings), structural (power, policy, access and meaning) and pedagogical (meanings made through critical, dialogic and agentic pedagogy).

Curricula and pedagogies that foreground meaning have important implications for the order of things in relation to knowledge priorities in the music classroom, and associated musical learning. In light of this, the relationship between meaning and other types of musical knowledge will be considered, inverting the assumption that musical meaning is contingent upon learning content, concepts and skills.

ABSTRACT. This piece of research is currently being developed at the University of York by Pete Dale in conjunction with Abi Evans. The core research question is what challenges, if any, music teachers and schools find when attempting to use DJ decks as a musical instrument in the classroom. Dale has been working on this topic for many years and this study builds on findings from previous work. In particular, previous research has suggested that the two major obstacles to the use of DJ decks are, firstly, teacher confidence and, secondly, IT challenges installing the necessary software on networked computers.

In relation to the first of these, eight music departments in eight different schools have been engaged across two major cities in the North of England. The teachers are being shown how to use the DJ decks and a range of approaches to supporting their learners with the DJ decks are being deployed, from in-service training to exemplar teaching through workshops with children or a series of lessons with a particular class. So far, data collection supports Dale’s previous finding that there is plentiful appetite for DJing among learners and some enthusiasm, although it is sometimes somewhat tentative, among teachers.

Regarding IT challenges, Evans’ expertise with human-computer interfacing is enabling support to school IT departments in understanding how the Serato music technology (which is the standard software for DJs across the world) can be installed effectively in schools with networked computers. Problems with such installation have been noted by Martin Ainscough and Fran Hannan of Musical Futures (in Dale et al., 2023, p.97) as a major obstacle for DJing in schools. Again, the current project is in its preliminary stages but findings so far suggest that ‘workarounds’ are achievable and indeed necessary if DJing is to become more available in schools.

ABSTRACT. This AHRC funded knowledge exchange project seeks to address an identified need to support teachers at key stage 3 (UK) in using a digital audio workstation (DAW) within classroom teaching. A collaboration between the University of Hull (UK), a national charity Technology in Music Education (TiME) and Leicestershire Music Hub a series of online resources have been created that will also be offered as part of a blended approach. Using a multi-strategy research design data has been gathered across two stages of an initial pilot study. The first stage was to identity the needs of the teachers through a questionnaire study of over 120 teachers to assess the challenges they face and steer the design of the resource. A series of resources were then designed in direct response to the feedback of the teachers. Two further studies with education professionals have taken place in 2024 and 2025 and over 150 tutors have signed up to access the resource. The study examines not only the continuing professional development but also the sustainability of such an approach compared to face-to-face delivery. This paper will outline the progress to date and share some of the findings of the study. It follows a previous successful project 'Connect Resound' that examined continuing professional development, online frameworks, and teacher behaviours comparing face-to-face and online delivery.