International Society for Jazz Research

Beiträge einer Tagung, veranstaltet von der Internationalen Vereinigung zum Studium Populärer Musik (IASPM) vom 10. bis 12. Oktober 1984 in Hamburg

Approximately one hundred music teachers, journalists, editors, music organizers and musicians took part in a conference entitled "Pop Music and Learning", held at the Steilshoop Comprehensive School, which was financially supported by the Hamburg Cultural Department. The lectures addressed questions concerning the teaching and the historic dimensions of Pop, Rock, and Jazz on college level. In workshops, means and methods of conveying Pop, Rock and Jazz in schools and colleges, via the media, and through cultural activities were discussed.

The articles printed here show the variety of themes and questions about popular music, which continues to increasingly gain wider public interest. The lively, frequent and thoroughly controversial discussions revealed a large interest in the conference. They are, however, not included in the papers. It is our opinion, that the articles printed here contain enough interesting ideas to stimulate and trigger further discussions about popular music elsewhere.

The articles are arranged according to subject divisions:

1. Pop Music and Cultural Politics
2. Pop Music in the School. Chances and Limitations of Impartation
3. Popular Music and Jazz. Educational Aspects on the College Level
4. Popular Music and Its Social Context
5. Popular Music in Cultural Activities
6. Pop Music and Music Criticism
7. Pop Music and Music Theory. Pop Music and Science Fiction.

The theme of the conference is, closely examined, really a question. Nevertheless, just as a question mark was not placed at the end of the title, just as little did the majority of the participants seriously pose the question and doubt that Pop music can be taught. In all the conference's workshops and discussions, the unasked question was silently answered in the affirmative: Pop music is learnable. It is teachable in colleges, in schools, in workshops and in cultural activities. And so the question really no longer centered on the "If", but on the "How", as well as on the "Why".

Some may wonder at this questionless affirmation of a "Pop Pedagogy".

A few years ago, in Hamburg, initiatives for establishing educational opportunities in Popular music at the College of Music, and in cultural activities were attacked by numerous critical opinions. American Blues musicians, who withouth knowledge of music and its theory achieved fame and developed individual stylistic tradition, were quoted to saying: Never go to school! A warning was given against the incorporation of the adolescent sub-culture into the dominant adult culture. The attempt was caricatured to integrate a short-lived protesting and reactionary youth culture into the existing unwieldy curricula. At that time, the prevailing nonchalance in dealing with musical crafts and skills, by members of the Pop culture, the apparent rejection of qualifications in music, and the anarchistic approach of many musicians towards alleged "holy" music traditions, was classified as an affront against any serious pedagogic and scientific analysis of Pop music. Have we really overcome and refuted this criticism, or are those who came to word at the conference only party liners from the other side - out of whatever material or educational-political reasons?

In the course of the conference, at least four aspects of the theme illustrated that, for good reasons, the question is increasingly answered in the affirmative.

1. The historic and aesthetic viewpoint considers Pop music as a coherent phenomenon, as an artistic means of expression, with its own history of styles, its own aesthetics. Commercial and fad dependent changes are means of expression, deeply embedded in the communication and trade-in relationships of our society. It is a mistake, however, to consider this activity as a mere commodity and fashion phenomenon, which alone through marketing strategy could be achieved. May we allow ourselves to exclude the art und social history, the aesthetics of Pop music from our scientific and educational concerns?
2. Pop music outgrew its children's shoes long ago, shoes in which one believed to be able to leave it. It is not a phenomenon of adolescence only, nor an immature fermentation process of descendants, before growing into the mature culture of "serious" music. For more and more people it is a life long profession, permeating - as it appears, increasingly - every fiber of our daily cultural life. Do we really want to deny that it matters to qualify for it, that it is worthwhile to acquire knowledge and skill?
3. Long since, Pop music has grown out of the dimension which labelled it merely as a sub-cultural phenomenon. Hundreds of thousands of people in the Federal Republic of Germany earn a living with its production and distribution. Its share in the national economic production ranks right alongside that of the large industries from which we live. International competition for markets and returns rages with increasing fury. May we allow ourselves, without any fundamental research, without any educational concept to try to keep pace in this artistic-economic race?
4. The critics' allegation against Pop music, that it is based on an immanent animosity towards school, its subversity against everything academic and institutional - closely examined - applies to all music. No more than there are educational programs which systematically are capable of training/developing successful top pianists, just as little may one expect educational programs to produce Hitparade stars. On the other hand, no matter how much many a genius in "classical" music developed in spite of, and occasionally against the provided standard education, so only through a well established educational program in the sector of "popular" music can chances be opened up for young musicians to individually discover their own artistic direction confronting music. May we resign ourselves to cynicism, by joining in the secondary school chorus "We don't need no education", arming it, deceptively, not against all schools, but only against Pop culture? In short: Only very few conference participants still questioned the learnability of Pop music. There are enough and good reasons to consider this question as being answered. The number of those, who have grasped this insight and are consistently working towards its realization, is increasingly large.