Waldorf
Music Education: Living the Musical LifeJason
Child
Each child in the lower school at a Waldorf
School makes
beautiful music every day. With their class teacher, in
chorus,
in strings or in music class, they are gaining not only musical skills
and knowledge but also a strong sense of musicality.
Naturally,
we want the children to be musical, but in Waldorf music education the
intention is that their musicality goes beyond melody, harmony and
rhythm. The music instruction is presented in such a way as
to
encourage musical living.
Open the paper and browse through the classified ads for
jobs.
The sought after job-specific skills vary. The qualities
sought,
however, are fairly consistent.
“Listener”,
“team-builder”, “flexible” and
“good
communication skills” are among the litany of qualitative
demands
placed on job applicants today. Perhaps you’ve had
the
misfortune of working with a colleague who lacks these
skills.
However knowledgeable or skilled they may be, nobody can stand to have
them around the office! These unfortunate individuals lack
music
in their lives. Perhaps not music per se, but the
“transformed music” that our music program strives
to bring
to EWS students.
In grades 1 – 3 at Emerson Waldorf School (EWS) for
example, the music instruction is almost wholly qualitative.
The
students spend their time in music class playing their flutes, the
lyres or specially designed Choroi instruments that are unique to
Waldorf music education. Through their exploration, they
experience the essential qualities of music: high, low, fast, slow,
long, short, etc. This work is really only the vehicle,
though. The real goal is to help the students become
sensitive,
active listeners. They gradually become stewards of tone, and
their faces shine in wonderment when they discover how much more
beautiful their music-making is when the whole roomful of students is
really listening actively and intently, with a will. They
play
games such as “passing the tone” with their flutes,
or they
may try to imitate exactly what they hear on the lyre. With
the
Choroi instruments, they create wonderful shimmering sounds that
capture a picture or story that they’ve heard. Most
importantly, they don’t make music the entire time.
Classes
are always divided in the activities so that some of the students are
involved as listeners while the others are the creators of
music.
In these early grades, the students are learning very tangible lessons
in careful listening, and the effects that willful listening
has.
Imagine if the world had more adults who had had the opportunity to
become careful, intentional listeners. This is where the
musical
activity of listening first becomes “transformed
music”,
when the children can begin to generalize their activity as listeners
in the music classroom to their lives in the outside world.
In the middle grades of the lower school, classes 4 and 5, the music
education sets its sights on literacy and more standard
music-making. The children learn to read and write music, and
they learn the names for all of the fundamental music
concepts.
They also begin playing a string instrument, and have their first
experience of needing to practice and work at learning this new,
awkward skill. They also have the experience of really making
music as a group of students playing different instruments.
Although the children are enthusiastic when they begin their string
instrument, some of them begin to experience a real antipathy as they
realize just how difficult it is to actually read music and make a
pleasing sound. This is a critical juncture. Those
students
who can muster the determination to overcome the difficulties in
learning an instrument as challenging as a violin, viola or cello have
learned a critical life-lesson in perseverance. We as adults
know
what they’re discovering; anything difficult will seem the
most
impossible and trying just before one makes a breakthrough.
In the fifth grade, every child also joins the chorus. Chorus
class is a focused, rather intense rehearsal. Once again, the
children are learning valuable lessons in perseverance. Some
challenging pieces may take our group of 40+ choristers four months to
learn. In the end, though, they always succeed. In
addition
to their lessons in perseverance, the children experience something
extremely subtle in chorus. They must sing and listen at the
same
time. They learn that everyone must do their best for the
whole
effect to be successful. They learn that overzealous
participation spoils the whole effort. They learn to be a
part of
the group and to play their part appropriately and responsibly within
in the group. The feedback is immediate. The child
who
wants all the attention spoils our sound by being too loud.
Those
who wait for others to lead before following are caught with their
mouths closed while everyone else is singing.
What’s more,
the experience of singing in harmony offers profound lessons.
Sometimes one sings the lead melody part, while sometimes one has the
harmony part. Whether in the primary or secondary role, doing
well is critical to the outcome of the group’s overall
effort,
and one must be constantly aware of the role their effort is playing,
whether leading or supporting. Most of the selections we
perform
demand that the lead voice changes between groups of
students.
Here the children learn the subtle interplay of passing leadership
gracefully between members of a group.
In the middle and high school, the children have an intense need to be
creative and express themselves. If this isn’t
immediately
clear, please go out into the culture at large and simply observe some
of the clothing adolescents favor! At its worst, teens go so
far
as to actually create cliques or even gangs for themselves.
Here
is where the arts offer a true outlet and antidote. Teens who
are
engaged in performing groups have a safe, productive outlet for their
need for creative expression. Last year, Emerson Waldorf
School
adopted a plan that would ensure that every child plays an instrument
through eighth grade. Over time, the music program will
evolve so
that the students are all in performing ensembles during their middle
and high school years. The training in both subtle and
practical
music skills of the early years will come to fruition in middle school
performance ensembles and, ultimately, the high school orchestra.
The Waldorf music curriculum is as rich and subtle as every other facet
of this remarkable approach to education. While it has the
ability to produce fine musicians, its true aim is to help produce fine
human beings. These Waldorf graduates go forth into the world
with the tools our age so desperately needs for cultural
renewal.
They are active listeners, able to really hear not only what meets the
ear but also the impulse and intentions that are truly behind the mere
physical sound. They understand that working in the physical
world takes effort, perseverance and a refinement of skills.
They
have experienced the dynamics of working within a group of peers with
differing abilities in order to produce something fine, beautiful and
meaningful. At our school, the students have had the chance
to
experience the finer, subtle aspects of music-making. As the
graduates leave the school, it is our hope that they are able to allow
those aspects to blossom in every aspect of their lives so that they
may experience the fulfillment of truly living musical lives.
Jason
Child is the
Director of Music at Emerson Waldorf School in Chapel Hill,
NC.
He teaches music classes for grades 1—8 and directs three
choirs
grades 5—12. Mr. Child holds a Master’s
in Music
Education and has been teaching vocal and general music in public and
private schools since 1992.
