Comments on: The Musically Gifted, Part II: How About Classical Education

By: Lucie

Lucie — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 20:43:57 +0000

Well, I can’t wait to see why you think that music is necessary for a classical education.
I shall fight that notion hard. ^_^ (I should like to learn how to play piano again though… but I haven’t enough time to add that on right now, and I suspect it will stay that way for quite awhile. Oh well.)

By: John R. Ahern

John R. Ahern — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 20:27:00 +0000

That’s excellent, Vicki. Now all we have to do is ensure that everyone gets a Bachelor of Arts.

Lucie, I’m afraid that was a bit of a presupposition of my post—that music was essential to (at least, a Classical) education. As Mom noted, I left that out of my post largely because it takes me down another path, but in the absence of further explanation, I can only offer you the comfort that I can’t write a fugue myself. :-P

By: Lucie

Lucie — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 17:48:56 +0000

Interesting. I agree that music students ought to learn how to compose their own music. Artists (I’m specifically thinking about the type that draw/sculpt here, but I think it applies equally well to musicians) don’t learn only by copying other artists. They have to create their own things. One can only become so good by copying others.

Now, I disagree that music is /necessary/ for everyone’s education. It’s good, but I don’t believe it’s necessary. (I’m sure this has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that if this were true, I would suffer a large deficiency in my education ;) But I’ll save my arguments for next time.

By: Margaret Ahern

Margaret Ahern — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 14:00:00 +0000

I’m not sure I understand your case for *why* music composition should be a part of the general requirements of a liberal arts education. Is your most fundamental basis the fact that music was a part of the medieval quadrivium? Oh. Just re-read your last paragraph where you tell us we must wait for some other time. Hope that’s sooner rather than later.

By: V. K. Blake

V. K. Blake — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 07:36:48 +0000

This is very interesting, John. I might come back and say something really brilliant at a more clement hour.
For now, I’m not sure your perspective is entirely foreign. I have had teachers who require theory all along–completely theoretical theory and analysis of what I was working on. (It was rather ghastly with one teacher, because I hadn’t theretofore had any theoretical instruction at all, and I was suddenly expected to know the theory to describe Chopin. ^_^)
Interestingly enough, at my school, there is a requirement for all Bachelor of Arts students to take a counterpoint class, which involves analysis and writing. For the final we had to make an invention, I think, not a fugue (and mine was awful). But the strange thing is, and I think that this agrees with your complaint, the Bachelors of Music Performance don’t have this requirement. Very odd.