Who will read this many-layered, fascinating and important book? The title might suggest that it would appeal solely to instrumental teachers within Birmingham itself. But its scope is much wider than that, offering food for thought to Music Service teachers and managers nationwide, and to freelance instrumental teachers, school curriculum music teachers, school managers, and community musicians, including those engaged in Music Hubs.
Loane outlines the development of instrumental music teaching, and the ensembles supporting it, across the UK from the 1920s to 2019, tracing the impact of national changes in political and professional values. Many music educators of today will have very little knowledge of this extraordinary history. It originated in the culture and pedagogy of the conservatoire – performing rather than composing, an overriding dominance of notation and rules.
The range of genres is wider now, but it could be argued that these values still shape much instrumental teaching. Until the ‘60s, they also dominated the school music curriculum. But from that time forward, some school teachers and advisers, inspired by Paynter, Swanwick and others, developed a very different, even oppositional, “creative” approach. There were at first unproductive tensions between these approaches, but Loane traces the steady development of a more positive interplay between them.
As the largest education authority in the country, based in a multi-cultural city, Birmingham Music Service included a significant minority of less conventional and more adventurous teachers. (Loane himself has a jazz background, as his book’s title suggests. An important thread, one which many instrumental teachers and Music Service managers will relate to, is the detailed description of his own professional career, illustrating a growing development of teaching and management styles.) A succession of Heads of Birmingham Music Service came to the role from school teaching. They were thus able to form strong relationships with their LEA music advisers. It became possible for Music Service staff as part of their Professional Development training to work closely with advisers and with external forces such as the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group.
Among many inventive projects, the Service was able to develop an outstandingly imaginative approach to the whole-class Musical Futures programme. Another significant national project involved six Secondary music teachers and four instrumental teachers working together for two years, with two LEA advisers in support, to develop new pedagogy for the KS3 National Curriculum. The results were transformative for all involved.
Behind these achievements lies a particular approach to management, which will be of interest to leaders of all Music Services. It evolved over decades, with each new Head of Service and the senior managers they appointed. Loane offers many insights here, but his particular focus is on Performance Management, moving from an initially top-down target-setting approach to a collegiate conversation, a sharing of issues.
At the heart of the book is the theme of interplay: classroom curriculum teacher sharing ideas with instrumental teacher – music notation running alongside playing by ear – classical repertoire side by side with popular – young people paying due homage to tradition but also free to develop their own musical ideas. Loane’s book points towards an authentic, three-dimensional model of music learning, complex but rich and powerful, one well worth fighting for.
Didactic rules-based teaching is superficial and ultimately sterile. But so are the loose structures and lack of rigour in much “creative” work. Yet both rules and creativity are essential to deep learning. There needs to be interplay between them, a merging of approaches, bringing teachers into closer dialogue. For all the variety of different practitioners’ aims and contexts, a unified basis for all musicians who work with young people is perfectly possible. At the risk of over-simplifying, we might say that instrumental teachers focus mainly on Performing, with an emphasis on progress, progression and technical rigour; classroom teachers of the more “creative” persuasion will focus mostly on Composing, experiment and individuality; and community musicians offer an opportunity for Listening to live music, relating music to its cultural and artistic purposes. All of these are precious and invaluable to good musical learning. They are of course the three pillars of the National Curriculum.
But the overriding vision of the National Curriculum is that the three are woven together as a single perception of what music means. Planning and teaching in this interweaving way are more complex, demanding a slower and deeper exploration of the repertoire being considered. Busy practitioners understandably feel significant pressure to follow a simpler approach. Yet the result is one-dimensional learning. The quality of teaching in UK Music Education is recognised at present as all too often mediocre. But if all practitioners come to share the same rich vision, to create a profession-wide conversation, an interplay, the results will activate and inspire both young people and those who teach them. This is the hidden message underlying the many layers of Loane’s book.
