International Society for Jazz Research

The first part of the essay explains the term socialization and outlines the latest state of discussion in the common research of it. The problems of conception and theory finding concerning musical socialization are pointed out and the (few) statements hitherto made are being discussed, followed by the attempt to define the conception of musical socialization and its explanation in the form of a schematic diagram. This way of explanation distinguishes four levels:

1. Starting from the individual and socio-ecological conditions, which are formed by various social authorities and organizations as well as by economical, social, political, technological and cultural structures in an existing social system, it describes not just a theory of musical socialization, but it includes a network of essential factors for it in a systematical manner which can be used as a guide for empirical research.
2. The second part begins with the investigation of the development of children’s musical abilities. Usually these essays concentrate on the examination of the basic perception and basic ability to reproduce and produce music, i. e. they study capabilities which are not based on teaching. The kind of essays discussed depict the development of musical abilities and show a number of interesting details but altogether they yield a blurry picture and offer little help for finding a systematic description of musical socialization.
3. The example of how to learn playing an instrument serves scientists, who study the socio-musical acquisition of a task and its psychological contribution, as well as others, who investigate the purposeful development of musical skills. I have compared the results of various essays in order to answer the following questions: i) which factors are decisive for learning an instrument, ii) what are the conditions for teaching, and iii) what forms of autodidactic learning exist. It should be added that a direct comparison will remain problematical due to the very different, random samples and the different methods of research and interpretation (the aspect of practicing and of playing in an ensemble, which are also related to the subject, had to be dropped for reasons of space).
4. It is necessary to examine the conditions of playing and teaching an instrument under two aspects: the point of view of the student/teacher and the style of music being played. Only in this way musical socialization can be evaluated critically. Further questions arise concerning the specialization in a certain field of music – not limited to the classical one. Here, looking at music lessons and practice is not sufficient because autodidactic learning has to be taken into account too.