International Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities Reviews Vol.7 No.1, April 2017; p.24 – 34, (ISSN: 2276-8645) REVAMPING THE UNPOPULARITY OF MUSIC AS A SCHOOL SUBJECT IN NIGERIA THROUGH INDIGENIZATION: A PROPOSAL M. C. ANYA-NJOKU (Ph.D) Department of Music University of Nigeria, Nsukka Email: [email protected] Abstract A research carried out at some Federal Government Colleges in the Enugu Education Zone of Nigeria (Anya-Njoku, 2014) affirmed that music education fell short of students’ expectations. Students’ exposure to music was limited and contents of lessons disparate from what they appreciate as music. Making bleak their hope and expectation of being functional and useful members of their society via the study of music. The teachers disclosed that western-oriented curriculum and their western-oriented training are major impediments to equipping Nigerian learners for careers in music. Through empirical processes to propose for the upgrading of the number and usage of indigenous instruments and repertoire in schools and colleges for better appreciation and application of musical knowledge and skills for the teachers, the learners, the profession and the society. The writer recommends seminars and workshops at both the state and federal levels to sensitise music teachers (especially the teachers of the new Cultural and Creative Arts Curriculum) on the pedagogical potentialities of indigenous instruments and repertoires. Introduction Educational programmes are expected to equip the learners to become responsive citizens of their societies. People nurtured and groomed to play their parts in the drama of the society in which they live according to the dictates of their chosen careers. As a cultural manifest, graduates of music programmes are expected to feature prominently and effectively in the musical culture of the society. In other words, granted there are various areas of specialization in the field of music study- theory/composition, musicology, performance, education, technology, production, among others; Africa’s music pervaded society expects school music graduates’ impact in the various musical accompaniment of daily, ceremonial, ritual, festival and entertainment activities. The society expects that music graduates from the schools should be able to contribute their quota to the musical culture like graduates from the other disciplines in the school system. Medicine has produced all the categories of medical personnel needed in the health sector- surgeons, paediatricians, opticians, orthopaedics, gynaecologists, nurses etc. Pharmacists are producing drugs from local and imported resources to meet the prescriptions of the Doctors for the cure of their patients. Home Economists/Food and Nutrition graduates have succeeded in modifying all most all the local foods-types into modern dishes (local, continental, and so on) fit for all categories of fast-food joints, restaurants and hotels. The proliferation of fast-food joints all over the towns and cities give credence to the attainment of the goals and objectives of their programmes in the schools. The list could go on. Sadly, though, music education in Nigerian schools has failed to produce the expected upshots. There is no visible evidence of musical exposure on the learners from the basic education levels to the tertiary level either as music in education or music as a subject (Okafor, 1988:9). The singing, dancing, and/or playing of improvised instruments that children are expected to bring home from schools which should prepare them for greater tasks in the field of music is non-existent. Similarly, investigations on West African Examinations, NECO and JAMB records reveal that music has the lowest enrolment ratio of all the school subjects in Nigeria (Anya-Njoku, 2014). According to the study, most of the students at the secondary schools refer to music as the “white man’s subject” because the music teachers have not been able to make music come alive in the classrooms. They are proffered theories without practice- music lessons without the sound of music, regrettably, when music examples are used, they are English songs that have no bearing to the musical background of the learners. Likewise, a survey of the educational backgrounds of selected prominent popular musicians in Nigeria disclosed that ninety-seven per cent (97%) of them did not study music as a career in schools. Rather, they learned their craft informally as apprentices to senior artists or from ‘friends’. These are the people who make the music the society needs 24 International Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities Reviews Vol.7 No.1, April 2017; p.24 – 34, (ISSN: 2276-8645) and fill their pockets with money made from music while the school music graduates scamper for teaching employment in private schools for five thousand naira salary per month. There is a problem. This problem is not from the graduates but from the music education profession. This profession in Nigeria is still under the aegis of colonization. The system is propagating the music tutelage system of the colonial masters which they operated just to raise performers who provided their types of music needed for entertainment, parades and religious services. In this system of music education, they taught the learners to play their form-controlled music, rudimentary theory, performance ethics and practices; instruments and repertoires. This system and objectives were vividly portrayed by Vidal (2008:5, 30) in these words: Local schools were founded and they served as reservoir for recruiting boys at divine service ... Singing classes were organized for children of mission houses ... Nigerian children continued to learn English man's music to the detriment of indigenous music. The objective of missionaries was two-fold. Firstly, it aimed at propagating the British Christian religious system and secondly, it aimed at spreading the Anglo-version of European musical tradition and culture. Our people learned the art and were able to supply the necessary music for the musical needs of their masters. Fifty five years after independence our schools are still producing graduates for the colonial masters who have gone back to their country with their musical needs. The issue here now is that the music education profession unlike other professions in the country is yet to accept independence. While school music education produces teachers and church musicians, jobless people from other professions tap into the rich rhythmic background of African music and furnished with modified traditional system of education (apprenticeship system), have taken over the musical position meant for the music graduates in the society. The situation is aptly expressed by Emeka (2006: 12) Let us consider for a moment the place and contributions of these people (academic musicians) to music educational social commitment in Nigeria. The curricular of the music schools in Nigeria tilt very heavily in favour of western art music, less in favour of popular music and little in favour of traditional music. When this is projected on to the multiplier process of teachers, pupils, and pupils-turned teachers and still more pupils, we see that the imbalance tends towards perpetuation. When we place this against the minimal appreciation of classical music in Nigeria as a whole, we find that the masters of this idiom (classical music/education) cannot really help in massive social commitment to the study of music. The verity of the above testament in the situational description of school music education in Nigeria is indubitable. The questions then are: does it mean that Nigerian music educators have not realized that their graduates turn back to schools? Does it not bother them that their products are not servicing the musical culture as the society expects? Are they not aware that music is a people’s art and so culturally bound? Or are they retaining the western system because concepts in the form- controlled music of Europe are easier to master and/or manipulate than the more intricate and wholesome African concepts? Are Nigerian music educators oblivious of the inadequacies and plight of their job-hunting graduates all these years? Is the profession not worried that the music industry/scenes in the country are devoid of school music graduates but a haven of drop-outs of other professions? Many scholars have reacted to some of these questions at different forums and journals. Nzewi (2007:117) and Okafor and Okafor (2009:18) reported that the curricular are western and that those who underwent the programme were wrongly oriented and trained to rely solely on Western concepts and models of music and music education. This fact is reiterated by Abiodun (2008: 80) who decried that our school music programmes produced many ‘African-Western Musicians’ who after training as pianists, flutists, violinists, etc. are still the apostles of such western instruments in all over the places in Nigerian classrooms and music industry. The resultant effect is that Nigeria musical instruments are not taught in Nigeria classrooms since their teachers and educators have little or no knowledge about the teaching and the musical practices. These among other reactions indicate that individuals are irked by the situation of the profession. Their submissions clearly indicate that the school music programmes are still western-oriented in process and product. They also agreed that music education should be society-oriented so that the graduates of Nigerian school music programmes would be able to serve Nigerian music culture while fending for their selves through music. This paper advocates a remedial action through the indigenization of the curricular of all the tiers of the nation’s educational strata, instructional strategies and materials- instruments and repertoires, and the re-orientation of serving music teachers so that the teaching and learning processes will 25 International Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities Reviews Vol.7 No.1, April 2017; p.24 – 34, (ISSN: 2276-8645) be akin to what obtains in the society. This way the learners can be guided by the musical presence in their communities outside school hours to better achievements.