Undergraduate World Music Ensemble Offerings

Résumé du livre

Performing music ensembles are concrete, aural, and visual representations of a university's culture and collective values. American university music schools offer a range of ensemble opportunities, most often including traditional band, orchestra, and choral offerings (Snyder, 2021). Students who participate in performance-based music ensembles often strengthen social bonds with their peers, experience personal enjoyment and enrichment, and grow in their musical abilities, all of which help to cultivate a lifelong love of music making (Enz, 2013; Kokotsaki & Hallam, 2011). For many university students, their group musicmaking endeavors in school are some of the most impactful experiences of their time spent in school (Enz, 2013; Snyder, 2021). College and university music programs frequently focus on the study and performance of Western classical music (Belz, 2006; Kindall-Smith et al, 2011). The vast majority of these music programs continue to center their curriculum around the same European conservatory music education model that has been in place since the nineteenth century (de Villiers, 2021; Kratus, 2019). The Eurocentric music education model includes a focus on training students to perform in traditional large ensembles (i.e., band, orchestra, and choir). Students who participate in these types of large music ensembles report many positive social, personal, and musical benefits, reinforcing the value of a school continuing to support the traditional model (Enz, 2013; Kokotsaki & Hallam, 2011).