Electronic music for school music lessons
Electronic music for school music lessons could very likely be a key to saving music education in schools according to a thought provoking article on the Guardian.
Music programs in modern public school systems all over the world have been cut out of most curriculums. The reason for this has been due to budget cuts in schools. Normally, the first programs to go when looking at budgets is music education.
Craigmount high school in Edinburgh, Scotland is one of these schools where teachers are swapping the traditional classical-based curriculum for Ableton and YouTube tutorials and we can’t help think how well this could work in South Africa considering the burgeoning Afro house music talent we posses.
The Future
Only 22% of the pupils who completed their A-levels during the years 2010 to 2015 had music on their subject list.
With the use of the internet and Ableton, electronic music for school music education could be the future.
This could be a great way to engage a new generation of young people in music production. Musical stimulation has also proven to be beneficial for intellectual development. With this in mind, it makes sense to keep electronic music for school music education as part of a general curriculum in schools.
Ableton Initiative
Last year, Ableton asked DJs and producers to return their old machines in exchange for a discount on new equipment. They received around six thousand of the Push1 units and as part of a new educational initiative they are sending the refurbished machines to schools that had applied for them.
“The idea materialised slowly, around two years ago, when we accidentally stumbled across teachers doing stuff in the classroom with our products already, and we spoke to them about it and observed some of the lessons. We started looking at what it would take for us to support this. We found that some teachers had the desire, but not the money to do it. Others don’t know how to use the technology, so we’re offering training to them.” Said Chris Woods, director of communications at Ableton
