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Internationalising and entrepreneurialising music curriculum in higher education: An India – Australia collaboration. (K.Kelman & A.Greig)

The traditions of music education are quite different between India and Australia. The West has an ostensibly ‘scientific’ approach to education since the turn of the 20th century and tends towards homogeneity, standardisation, and a deeply literate ‘mind’. India retains much of its oral past and is far less standardised and homogenised.

While Australia has a strong conservatoire tradition in higher education, there is a comparable master-apprentice tradition that sits outside of mainstream higher education in India, these educational models lack industry engagement and don’t encourage an entrepreneurial approach, often leaving students ill-equipped for their future careers.

It is no longer sufficient for music degrees to teach students virtuosity on their chosen instrument. The larger challenge is teaching students how to make their way in the world as professionals. They also need to think globally, connect globally, and be aware of opportunities on a global basis.

This conference presentation reports on a project that has been ongoing since 2015, between A.R. Rahman’s KM Music Conservatory (established in , India in 2008) and the Queensland University of Technology (QUT), Australia. The project aims to assist music students in equipping themselves for the global economy, through a collaborative initiative that aims to internationalise and entrepreneurialise music education, at both institutions. The project is also supported by industry partners, Earthsync (organisers of Chennai’s IndiEarth Xchange, a trade event for independent music, film and media) and QMusic (producers of the music trade event, BIGSOUND, held in Brisbane, Australia every September).

The institutions presented the Indian version of QUT’s highly successful Indie100 program at IndiEarth XChange in November 2015 and 2016. The event involved staff and students from KM Music Conservatory and QUT, and high-profile Australian and Indian producers. Twelve bands were recorded and produced throughout the conference and delegates had an open invitation to attend the recording sessions.

The final stages of the project involved QUT and KM Music Conservatory students working together online to launch, promote, and distribute the recordings on both local and international platforms using the extensive networks of all project partners.

There are significant benefits resulting from this project, including the establishment of an ongoing exchange program that will feature parallel programs running at both QUT and KM Music Conservatory. Both programs are in constant dialogue allowing the programs to evolve, cater to both local and international needs, and facilitate ongoing student and staff exchanges.

The project was supported by The Australia-India Council, established on 21 May 1992, to advance Australia's interests by supporting activities, which enhance awareness and understanding between the peoples and institutions of Australia and India.

Background to the INDIE 100 project

Presently our HE systems, at least in the developed world, undoubtedly perceive themselves to be in the “upperground” category, which in fact is undoubtedly the case for the time being. Our approach to the problems currently facing music pedagogy is tested and annually developed and refined in a “classroom,” which is actually a large- scale event, that takes the production of new art as one end and its global distribution and promotion as the other (Independent Music Project [IMP] 2014). The event, called Indie 100, began life as a research project and annually produces one hundred new songs in one hundred hours over six days. It involves local and national indus- try figures, between three hundred to four hundred local musicians, and around seventy students from music, management, marketing, law, and entertainment industries.

As a pedagogical exercise, the aim of the event is to bring students into personal contact with professional producers and local artists, to introduce them into a high stakes production environment, and to showcase their efforts through live events and online distribution globally. The project encompasses all the successes, failures, and challenges of professional musicianship, which offers valuable opportunities to build new relationships, and to better understand student motivations and potential.

The Indie 100 recording event is followed by a year-long effort to promote and distribute the material recorded during the event. This work is managed by students in collaboration with staff and industry mentors.

Aside from the high energy and public visibility of the recording event itself, it brings together three major functions of the contemporary university—research, teaching, and industry engagement. Most importantly it shows students the links between the production of art and also the steps required for its commercialization.

(Key learnings from Indie100 on the following slide)

• Indie 100 began in 2011 as a research project to investigate how emerging independent (of major labels and publishers - not a genre based def) artists in SEQ develop sustainable careers in the face of declining revenues at the local level • Aims to connect local artists and labels with national and international industry, business, and audiences • Makes a sharp distinction between industry (making and doing useful things – “use values”) • And business (buying and selling those things to make money - “exchange values) • >650 new works over 7 years • 625 in Brisbane 2011-2015 and 25 in India 2015-16 • Making aspect is heavily compressed • 6 days for 100 new songs in Brisbane • 2 Days for 12 new songs in India • Over 4,000 musicians involved over 7 years, dozens of producers, hundreds of student assistant engineers. • National and international business partners, most notably MGM who distributes for the project • APRA, Mushroom, EMI, Island, Sounds Like Brisbane, Music Sales Australia, Bella Union • Distributed worldwide • Business cycle takes a full year compared to the making of the music • Currently attracting 329,567 streams per quarter across all platforms ($2063.34). Almost no sales. • Over 4 million streams during the life of the project (under 20,000 in revenue) • From – Argentina, Angola, Argentina, Austria, Australia, Belgium, Bangladesh, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, China, Cook Islands, Chile, Cameroon, Columbia, Costa Rica, Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Spain, Finland, France, Great Britain, Guatemala, Honk Kong, Honduras, Hungary, Croatia, , Ireland, Iraq, Iceland, India, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Korea (S), Kazakhstan, , Lithuania, Luxembourg, Latvia, Macau, Moldova, Malta, Mauritius, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, New Zealand, Panama, Peru, Phillipines, Poland, Portugal, Paraguay, Qatar, Romania, Serbia, Russia, Sweden, Singapore, Slovenia, Slovakia, Senegal, El Salvador, , Turkey, Taiwan, Ukraine, USA, Uraguay, Veneuzuela, Viet Nam, South Africa • Over 5 Million social media impressions during the life of the project

• The event connects generally inexperienced, largely uneducated, young musicians with national and international audiences through an event based research approach (Graham, 2016) • Theorises the event as exposing emerging vernaculars to a global audience using a “spectacle” approach. • Integration of theory, research, engagement, and pedagogy. The event is WIL and Production assessment and staffed by a team of students from Entertainment Industries • Organisers, researchers, and business partners form an Epistemic Community (Haas, 2013; Sunderland, Graham , and Lennette, 2016). • Have jointly developed integrated curriculum, policy, and research agendas and applications, including innovative undergraduate and postgraduate programs

Indie100 in India 2015 – 2016

This project builds on the success of a QUT-funded project held in Chennai and Brisbane during 2015. It centres on an Indian version of Indie 100, an intensive music recording program that produces 100 new songs in 100 hours; focuses local, national, and international attention on the music of emerging artists; generates data about emerging online music markets; and feeds into entrepreneurial pedagogies. This application aims to establish ongoing links between KM and QUT Music to embed the project in the curricula of both institutions and facilitate ongoing exchanges through the NCP. Students have the opportunity to work in event management, marketing and promotion, administration, recording, performance, and production. Like the 2015 collaboration, this project also partners with Earthsync XChange and BIGSOUND. It enables QUT staff and students to travel to Chennai and participate in XChange and for KM staff and students and Earthsync representatives to participate in BIGSOUND.

• We investigate how the digital artefacts produced as part of the event have made their way through the world, interweaving global and local networks, digital platforms, and established distribution networks to become part of the global mainstream of major label musics and, simultaneously, part of an emerging global “underground”. • National print media http://www.thehindu.com/features/metroplus/Music-for- the-soul/article14410289.ece • Rolling Stone India https://www.facebook.com/rollingstoneindia/posts/10153607233196471

Results so far:

Case Study #1

Bjorn Surrao - Yeah, [the Indie Scene] has changed a lot actually. In 2011, there were no venues – even promoting music, there were hardly any bands that were putting out their music. Only in the past three years, this idea of like, bringing about EPs and recording your music and bringing out music videos has become a trend in the independent scene over here. And only of late the independent scene is growing. You know, people are recognising it. Otherwise, until now, until today, commercial music prevails. … I think in order to be in the scene, you have to be a part of the scene. That’s how it works. That’s how it grows. That’s the independent scene. If you don’t support the scene, then it’s not going to grow.

Result 1: Education partners have signed an agreement aligning them with the NCP to allow Australian QUT students to gain semester credit for undertaking educational experiences at KM Music Conservatory (via NCP) and vice versa.

Impact: Funding via New Colombo Plan for the 2018 year will see 15 Australian students per year from the Creative Industries Faculty at QUT register for international study tour at KM through the NCP.

Currently an articulation agreement is being worked on for Indian students to finish their degree in Australia at QUT.

Result 2 : Industry partners (Earthsync and Qmusic) make multi-year commitment to the partnership.

Impact: New opportunities are being created for industry-based internships during NCP student exchange, work-integrated- learning and creative projects in India, collaborative projects between Australian and Indian musicians, showcasing of breakthrough musicians at IndiEarth XChange each year. Indian and Australian students experience real-world learning by working in various roles including event management, marketing and promotion, administration, recording and production, and artist development. The flow-on benefits for both the university and the broader community are skill acquisition, industry engagement, revenue generation, knowledge transfer, and new market opportunities.

Result 3 : Integration of industry and education across partner sites. Education Partners consolidate the Indie100 pilot program (delivered in 2015) through a process of cultural embedding in the local context of Chennai and formally establishing parallel programs at undergraduate levels. Industry Partners to formally establish a pathway for artistic exchange through dedicated contra showcase performances in Brisbane and at Indiearth XChange.

Impact: Deeper, multilayered cross-cultural understanding between project participants, between education partners, industry partners, and between creatives and musicians involved in public showcase events; greater public awareness of the sophistication of Australian and Indian contemporary cultures.

Final Discussion

As project coordinators and learning designers, we believe that an experience economy for the future of HE relies on a system of experiential facilitations that lead to the development of “epistemic communities” among teachers and students alike: “In the art world, they drive the creation of new styles or genres. In the world of science, they drive the creation of new disciplines, new schools of thought or new fields of study. In the world of technology, they drive the creation of new discoveries or breakthroughs. They are, in fact, at the origin of major changes or revolutions in many domains, whether artistic, scientific or technological” (Cohendet et al. 2014: 930). In the context of this project, in respect to any future experience economy, the HE sector can position itself as a “middle- ground” for the localities in which they are situated: institutional media forms that facilitate the uptake of radical innovations while providing a means of harnessing the energies of radical creativity through the deliberate and systematic facilitation of new personal and professional connections:

“The dynamics of creative ideas in a given agglomeration rely on an institutional process that connects an informal “underground” of creative individuals with formal institutions of the “upperground.” . . . These two layers of a city or region rarely interact with one another, which is why the local process of knowledge creation often relies on what can be referred to as a “middleground,” consisting of inter- mediary platforms for groups and communities linking the informal underground culture with the formal organizations and institutions of the upperground” (Cohendet et al. 2014: 930).

The project itself can also be described as “intensive teaching mode,” compressing what would typically take months to achieve pedagogically into two weeks. It exposes early career artists to industry, to an annual audience of millions, and in many cases to airplay and other promotional opportunities. For local culture, the event provides a living history of locally emerging talent that would otherwise go unnoticed or possibly disappear. For both educational institutions involved, the event delivers cultural capital and cultural relevance, ensuring that in this highly competitive HE market, our institutions remain at the forefront of cutting edge education. References

Britto, David. “Entrepreneur Ritnika Nayan Announces Music Business Management Course”, Rolling Stone India. March 13, 2019. https://rollingstoneindia.com/entrepreneur-ritnika-nayan-announces-music-business- management-course/

Cohendet, Patrick, David Grandadam, Laurent Simon, and Ignasi Capdevila. "Epistemic communities, localization and the dynamics of knowledge creation." Journal of economic geography 14, no. 5 (2014): 929-954.

Dumlavwalla, Diana T. “The piano pedagogy scenes in India and the Philippines: An introductory cross-cultural comparison.” International Journal of Music Education (2019).

Graham, Phil, Michael Dezuanni, Andy Arthurs, and Greg Hearn. "A Deweyan experience economy for higher education: The case of the Australian Indie 100 Music Event." Cultural Politics 11, no. 1 (2015): 111-125.

Manuel, Peter. Cassette culture: Popular music and technology in North India. University of Chicago Press, 1993.

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