Why We Love Music

by Carl E. Seashore

One of the happiest ways of spending his leisure time may be in the enthusiastic pursuit of musical activities. When he gets into college, these opportunities are more restricted; when he gets into his job, they are still more limited. Whatever the line of pursuit, these extracurricular activities are indulged in as a form of play. Nobody, however, can express in play all his intellectual, artistic, and social dreams or urges. Therefore the gentleman of leisure in the high school is forced to make a selection, and, in doing so, he rightly follows his natural bent of mind. If he casts his lot with music, he will train hard, and have the social satisfaction of supporting his musical group. Music becomes a game, involving contests with defeats and victories. It becomes a topic for conversation in social leisure. While the high-school program and the junior-college program do not emphasize rigorous technical training as a part of the academic curriculum, the majority of students get their musical satisfaction from the way in which they utilize their leisure for music. It is significant that at this age the stress is not on the hearing of music but rather on participation in musical performance. This period is the age of action, perhaps the best type of preparation for the listening stage since it follows the educational principle of learning by doing.

MUSIC FOR YOUTH

During the present century most extraordinary progress has been made in the provision of musical facilities for youth by the recognition of music as an academic subject, by the early and vital training in the grades, by the development of group activities in voice and instrument as a dominant extracurricular activity, by the motivation of training through opportunities for public performance and contest, and by the popularization of music through phonograph and radio.

Up to the end of the past century youth had had no significant opportunities for music in the scheme of things. Music had to come through the taking of private lessons, often a drudgery without regard to likes or dislikes. The approach was purely technical. The mastery of the scales, though technically significant, was not inspiring to the emergent musical mind and did not reveal the vast vistas of opportunity for self-expression in music. Music lessons were limited to those who could afford to pay for them. Few people had heard any good music. It had no significant status in the program of public education. Youth had no chance. Music for youth has been discovered in the past forty years.

Music, an academic subject. When music gained recognition on a par with the three R's in primary and elementary education, America entered on a new era. National music organizations of teachers developed. These began with the slogan, "Music for every child at public expense." Realizing the futility of making every child musical, they modified this slogan to, "Music at public expense for every child in proportion to his natural ability." The market was flooded with educational music books and systems. Time for musical training was set aside in the regular curriculum of the schools. It was recognized that only a person who has musical ability and training can teach music effectively. Scientific principles from other subjects were adopted. Specialized training for musical supervisors was provided in teachers' colleges. Teaching was improved. Groups of children were segregated into vocal and instrumental organizations, both for curricular and extracurricular activities. Instruments were furnished at public expense. Credit for music gained current coinage on a par with history and chemistry. The introduction of principles of educational psychology led to selective admission and elimination and gave the teachers a basis for the administration of praise or blame in achievement. Few public school subjects can point to a similar epoch-making stride. These achievements today give youth a chance in music.

Orientation in the grades. For the musical life of youth at and soon after the high-school age, the training in the grades was most significant, and that, in turn, was rooted in a national awakening to the possibilities and the responsibilities of music in the earliest years in the home and the kindergarten. This awakening was strengthened by the recognition given art in general. Music early became associated with the speech arts, the dance, and other games. The development in the graphic and the plastic arts, though slow, was somewhat parallel with music for these early years. In the eight years in the grades there developed a process of selective opportunities for the pursuit of music so that freshmen entered the high school as a group fairly differentiated on the basis of abilities, opportunities, likes and dislikes, and ambitions for music.

This differentiation had a twofold effect on the high school: First, the elimination of pupils who, on various legitimate grounds, did not qualify for musical training at public expense at this stage and, second, the beginning of specialization for those who had previously found themselves or who at this stage made a happy decision. Thus the development of music in the high school has followed logically on the early development of music in the grades, and in like manner the development of music at the college level is now beginning to follow the development of music in the high school.

Group activities in voice and instrument. Youth is the age of learning by doing. This principle has been implemented in high-school education by the development of group activities, both in theoretical and in practical music, both in the curricular and in the extracurricular activities. Throughout, the emphasis has been on action. Instruments are supplied at public expense; opportunities are given for participation in programs of entertainment; and a stimulus has been climaxed by the introduction of local, state, and national contests for groups and for individuals.

The adoption of the principle of group instruction at this level has had many significant advantages. It draws large numbers of pupils into group activities for the social value of the activity in itself and for the social value of participation in public life. It has lessened the cost of musical education many times over by training ten or a hundred pupils in a group as effectively, in many respects, as they could be trained by individual instruction. Group instruction has, perhaps, been the strongest leverage for the motivation of musical pursuits in the school. It has increased the pursuit of individual instruction on the basis of discovered needs, for example, in the mastery of a particular instrument for participation in the band or orchestra or in the development of a voice discovered in the group. The individual instruction has thus been motivated and made to fit into particular niches in the musical groups or in the choice of vocational pursuits in society.

Contests. The development of contests both in individual and in group performance has had a profound effect on the development of music in youth and is destined to serve in large part as a clearinghouse. Educators recognize many drawbacks in the plan of contests. Preparation for the contests requires excessive time and highly trained teachers. A contest becomes an occasion for the revelation and the objectifying of differences in individuals and groups. It involves some little expense. It tends to discourage the pupils who cannot qualify.