AN ETHNOGRAPHY OF SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENT COMPOSITION IN MUSIC - A STUDY OF PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT WITHIN THE COMPOSITIONAL PROCESS by ALEX TSISSEREV B.Ed., The University of Manitoba, 1991 B.Mus., The University of Manitoba, 1991 M.Ed., The University of Manitoba, 1993 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF EDUCATION in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES (Department of Curriculum Studies) We accept this thesis as conforming to the required standard THE/UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA October 1997 Copyright, Alex Tsisserev, 1997 In presenting this thesis in partial fulfilment of the requirements* for an advanced degree at the University of British Columbia, I agree that the Library shall make it freely available for reference and study. I further agree that permission for extensive copying of this thesis for scholarly purposes may be granted by the head of my department or by his or her representatives. It is understood that copying or publication of this thesis for financial gain shall not be allowed without my written permission. Department of, I uxn coo The University of British Columbia Vancouver, Canada 'a I ft A — I I Date DE-6 (2/88) ABSTRACT This study deals primarily with the way secondary- school students use music to express their personal, inner feelings through composition. Because the topic of personal expression through music composition is an elusive one, my methodology borrows and combines analytical tools from the fields of phenomenology, hermeneutics, semiotics, ethnography and English language arts, and incorporates these tools in the exploration of student's processes, of self-expression through music composition. For a period of several weeks I worked with a sixteen-student sample group,in a Vancouver high school. Each of the students handed in a musical composition. Four of the students granted me interviews in which they shared their views of their compositional processes and the resulting musical works. • -.• By the conclusion of the study, the students had displayed the ability to communicate certain ideas, images and emotions, and express themselves by articulating their own unique sense of being through their musical compositions. Furthermore, the students demonstrated a level of musical awareness which has very little to do with the type of proficiency^based music learning that is prevalent in many of today's music education classrooms. Most importantly, however, this study spawns a methodology which examines students' compositional processes rather than their finished musical products. (Writer Yv ..-..•••• . W- CHAPTER 1 Unveiling of the Many Facets of the Problem . 1 A Focus on Students' Processes of Music Composition ...................... 1 Personal Involvement in Music Composition .. 2 Contemporary Music Composition Practices in Music Education ; . ................... 7 The Value of Music Composition 21 Self-Expression Through Language 26 The Ubiquitous Presence of Pop Music . ; 29 Composition Through Improvisation 36 CHAPTER 2 Exploring and Defining Some of the Roles of Composition As They Pertain to Music Education Programs,, Pop Music, and Language ... 40 The Composer and the Listener 47 Composition as It Stems from Improvisation . 51 The Role of Popular Music Within Composition 54 Composition in English Language Arts and Its Links to Music Composition .;......... 62 CHAPTER 3 About the Researcher and His Personal Experiences with Music .. 75 CHAPTER 4 Details of the Study of Student Music Composition ... 98 The Setting . .. 98 Equipment . 103 The Role of the Researcher and His Interaction with the Students 105 Analysis of a Pop Song . 113 CHAPTER 5 A Discussion on Problems of Interpretation and Analysis of Communications in Music and Language ... 121 CHAPTER 6 A Comparison of Music Composition with Composition in English Language Arts 152 CHAPTER 7 An Examination of the Data: Students' Processes of Music Composition, Student-Researcher Interviews, and the Synthesis of Data with Theoretical Perspectives . 173 The Interviews 194 An Examination of the Creative Processes of the Remaining Twelve Music Students in the Sample Group ....'• .."..• 236 Incorporating the Links Between Composition in Music and Composition in Language Arts in the Pursuit of Accurate Interpretation of Students' Creative Self-Expression 255 CHAPTER 8 Summary and Recommendations for Further Research. -....' '. * .' 276 WORKS CITED 286 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to acknowledge the tireless work of Dr. Robert Walker, whose wisdom, generosity, guidance and love of life constantly inspire, educate and humble me. Bob, the three years that I have spent under your tutelage have been, and will continue to be the most memorable and rewarding years of my academic life. Also, I would like to acknowledge Dr. Carl Leggo, Dr. Ron MacGregor and Dr. Eugene Wilson whose invaluable contributions helped to shape this document. Gentlemen, thank you for sharing your knowledge and your time. To my parents and my grandparents I owe infinite gratitude for their endless support and concern. To Kelly who teaches me about love, integrity and friendship, I dedicate my heart. Michelle, eternal thanks for the "Cage 4,'33" factor. Finally, I would like to thank 'Orpheus' for keeping the dream alive. ...in loving memory of Evgeny, Leon, and Maria. CHAPTER ONE: UNVEILING OF THE MANY FACETS OF THE PROBLEM A Focus on Students' Processes of Music Composition This study deals primarily with the way secondary school students use music to express their personal, inner feelings. It studies the processes students use in selecting musical materials during music com­ position. This study is less concerned with the final musical product than the journey students took to reach their musical products. Practically all studies of student composition to date have been psychological studies of cognitive strategies (e.g. Kratus, 1994; Bamberger, 1990; Webster and Hickey, 1995; Wilson and Wales, 1995; and many others). These studies are not concerned with the nature of individual expression. In view of this, no established methodology exists for this specific task. I have therefore attempted to develop a methodology based on a variety of ways of investigating the role of the individual in acts of personal expression. Because the topic of personal expression is elusive and 2 complex, my methodology borrows and combines analytical tools from the fields of phenomenology, hermeneutics, semiotics and ethnography, and incorporates these tools in the exploration of students' processes of self- expression through music composition. The Nature of Personal Involvement in Music Composition At the heart of this thesis are the case studies I conducted involving sixteen British Columbia secondary school students. I was particularly interested in studying the students as they were using popular idioms in the composition of music, and especially, the nature and role of their personal involvement in these processes. By personal involvement I am referring to involvement in which students engage their own, unique emotional faculties and their reservoir of musical knowledge in their own, unique, creative, musical experience. It is this journey of the individual student who engages in personally meaningful, personally expressive acts of music composition that I wish to highlight. 3 Since personal expression in language is one of the most powerful forms children use, I intend to present some information about students* expressive activities with language as a means for providing some reference points for the musical expressions. In addition, I conducted these case studies with a small group of students because a small informant group enabled me to better investigate the individual nature of each one's personal involvement in music composition and how this might be identified in the actual music they produce, since it is the nature of this involvement that I am particularly interested in. My interest is catalyzed by two factors. First, I am a composer. I recognize the difficulty that lies in being objective about my compositional processes and my composed works. When I am involved in the act of composition, I can not observe myself composing from a perspective external to me. I can, however, reflect on my inner mental activities during my composing. When my composition has been completed, it is difficult for me to evaluate it objectively because my involvement with this composition inevitably results in a sub­ jective bias - my own. Furthermore, the compositional 4 'path' (i.e., the sequence of explorations and choices within my process of composition) that I take towards completing a musical work is my path. I would like to find out what my path has in common with the com­ positional paths of the student composers I observed in this study. I am also hoping that in studying the processes of student composers as they compose, observing the processes of composition from an external perspective, and comparing the compositional paths of other composers to my own path, I might be able to locate objective points of reference for my own compositional manner. Second, as a music educator, I am worried about the current state of affairs in music education. I refer to reduced enrolments in music programs across North America, and British Columbia, in particular. I worry about the potential extinction of my field from the general curriculum and the societal implications I feel that such a loss would carry with it. Further in this chapter, I intend to