Inquiry Project Findings

Based on our student interviews, we found several themes common among all students. All of the students stated that they liked the music they heard growing up. They all said that music was played often at home, almost constantly, and they expressed a positive attitude towards this music. What they heard growing up also had a large influence on what music they listen to now. For example, when we asked Oliver, a saxophone player, what he would listen to if he could only listen to a single song for the rest of his life, he said it would be something that was “old school meringue,” which he listed as something his parents played in the house growing up. The music students heard growing was a factor in developing their musical identity.
When speaking about what kind of music they liked, it was important for students to be able to relate to something in the music. We asked Charlie, a percussionist, if their was any music he didn’t like. He said, “Country songs aren’t (pause, laughter)...‘cause I’m not from that side, down there, so I really don’t know [about it]...the songs has to relate to life.” Oliver said he liked a particular rap musician because, “He says things that happen in real life, that needs to be fixed.” The musician raps about issues that Oliver has personal experience with, and Oliver connects to that. In addition, we found that studying an instrument had allowed students to relate to a broader range of music. Based on what they had learned they were able to find value in different music. When we asked Oliver if studying an instrument had affected his appreciation of music, he said, “I used to hate jazz, classical, everything like that. Now, I’m more into it than the other kind of musics.” Beatrice, a piano player, said, “You find something different in every type of music that you can learn with.” We asked her if she thought she would feel this way without having studied an instrument, and she said, “No. Never, never in my life. You see, music really opens your eyes.” In other words, studying an instrument gave them more music they can relate to, expanding their musical identities.
All students stated that music was very important to them, and that it had significantly grown in importance when they started studying an instrument. When we asked Beatrice if she listened to popular music, she said she did not, and added, “I’m not ashamed of who I am.” This shows that she equates the music she listens to (or her musical identity) with her personal identity. Music is important enough to her that she uses it show who she is. Peter, a guitar player, said he snuck his iPod into school, against school rules, so that he could listen to music. Listening to music was important enough to him that he was willing to risk disciplinary consequences to do it. Reflecting this sense of importance was the fact that the students all seemed to share a sense of pride in being musicians. When we asked Peter if music was important to him, he answered by saying that he was in a band and that they would soon be recording. It was obvious from the way he brought this fact up that he took great pride in it. All of the students said that music was not this important to them before they began studying their instrument. Interesting to note is the fact that the importance of music seemed to develop relatively quickly after beginning study of an instrument. The students we interviewed had been studying their instruments ranging from two months to four years, and they all stated that music had become more important to them since they had started their studies.
Studying an instrument also changed the way the students listened to music, regardless of their instrument or how long they had been playing. Listening to music was no longer a passive activity, but one in which the students were actively analyzing what they were hearing. This was exemplified in several ways. When listening to music with vocals, students tended to shift their focus from the lyrical content to the musical content. For example, Charlie stated outright,“Now I don’t even care about the lyrics anymore.” He went on to elaborate that his attention was focused on the drums in any particular song. This increased attention to the instrument the student was studying was common among all students. For example, when we asked Peter what he liked to listen to, he said anything “...with the guitar in it,” and Oliver listed primarily saxophone players when asked the same question.
All the students also saw listening to music as a sort of tool to help them improve their musicianship. For example, Beatrice said, “...when I listen to different people playing, this is like, ‘Oh, he plays like that, and I like that part, so I want to try to do it just like they [did].” When she’s listening to music, she hears things that she wants to duplicate because she believes it will make her better. Oliver has an interest in jazz, and when asked what he likes about listening to it, he said outright that it makes him a better improviser. Peter took it one step further. We asked him if he payed more attention to guitar players since be began studying guitar, and he said, “Yeah, I want to be better than them... I listen to them...and I wonder how I can make that sound better.” So he not only wanted to learn from what he listens to, but improve upon it.
Students found music and learning an instrument to have a range of value outside of the musical domain. For example, Charlie said studying an instrument was a good experience:
I see it as...it takes time from after school, to keep the kids out of the streets. And then if
you like it...this is like another sport, really, I see it as. You can go far. There’s a lot of
colleges they told me, for it.
He saw studying an instrument as having multiple benefits. It had social value by keeping kids out of the streets, and thereby out of trouble. He was also able to connect it to educational opportunities, in that he saw it as a means to gain college admission. Beatrice said, “I think that music really helps you build your character,” referencing the story of a friend’s brother. The brother had trouble in school and acted out, and when he started studying an instrument, he stopped acting out and improved in school. Through her eyes, studying an instrument is not just studying an instrument. It has broader benefits that include personal betterment. Peter saw learning to read music as something that could help him become a professional musician, as it would allow him to play a broader range of music, as well as play with more musicians.
What we found to be most interesting was that all the students showed an ability to analyze and evaluate music on several different levels. Students were able to use analogies to describe music, something indicative of higher-level thinking. Charlie, who plays football, likened playing an instrument to playing sports. One of the first things he mentioned was the need for communication in both. This is significant because Charlie had only been studying his instrument for about 2 months. Communication within music is a fairly advanced concept. It is something abstract, beyond the technical aspects of playing an instrument, and is therefore much harder to grasp. Because of this, it is an idea that is not usually introduced until students have reached a fairly advanced degree of musicianship. He also said, “Reading the notes is just like reading a playbook,” in that certain actions must be executed at certain times. In this instance he is drawing parallels between concrete visual aspects of sports and music. Because of his ability to address both the concrete and the abstract, Charlie was able to build an analogy with a high degree of depth and detail. Beatrice spoke about how studying an instrument has given her a more concrete, logical understanding of music. She said, “...this teacher, he started teaching me some stuff... and then you say ‘oh,’ now I know why I do this... It’s like one plus one is two. There’s an explanation for music also.” Music has gained a more logical meaning for her. She is able to analyze music and communicate her thoughts about it on an intellectual level. Her use of an analogy shows that she truly understands what she is discussing.
The students were also able to evaluate music on several different levels. In addition to a purely aesthetic evaluation, they evaluated music on a technical and intellectual level. Charlie said, “You can’t have a good beat but then the lyrics is whack.” He also said good lyrics with a bad beat won’t work either. He is evaluating several different components of music. He is isolating components of the rhythm and the lyrics and evaluating them independently, as well as how they become a cohesive whole. To form an effective composition, not only does each individual component have to be good, but they must complement each other enough. Beatrice, describing a piano player she liked to listen to, said, “He’s just like going up and down the piano all the time... It’s like when you see it, you’re like, shocked... There’s like, a limit, and he passed the limit.” She is saying that the music is of high quality because of the technical facility of the instrumentalist. The reason she likes the music is because she understands what is required to play at that level.