Maximizing Musical Fellowship

Some Thoughts on Music Appreciation, Private Lessons, and More

A Hundred Years Ago

A few generations ago, one would have had the opportunity to make music more than we do today. Sure, today, we have more music, but others mostly make it for us, and we get to enjoy the fruits of it on a playlist, device, or through a set of earbuds or headphones. One hundred years ago, television was in its infancy. Radios were becoming pretty widespread. Still, there was a void that could most readily be filled by live music. You would hear someone playing on their fiddle, guitar, or piano. Maybe they would be singing around the fireplace. The church services they attended would have had singing all around them instead of primarily up on a platform by a select few. There were music-making opportunities by necessity that are not as commonplace today. This means that we must be purposeful in putting ourselves in a position to sing and make music together. We no longer can expect that our culture will provide these opportunities. Many people may go their entire week and never sing or play an instrument for themselves or with others. One hundred years ago, that would have been far less likely.

Being Purposeful

Well, we have to sprinkle back in active music-making. We must be okay with singing together at home even though we could find better recordings of others singing. We should see the joy of musical fellowship that making music together can bring. It won’t happen accidentally in 2023 like it might have happened in 1923. Here are some things you could do to make sure that your home, family, and community are making music together and maximizing the fellowship that music can bring:

• Sing at church—no matter how you think you sound.

• Sing for fun at home! Singing is not merely a formal activity.

• Enroll in group music classes or choir—for you or your children.

• Find skillful and cheerful music teachers and sign up your children for at least 5-7 years of study. (Pick one instrument. Don’t constantly change to new instruments)

• Find a musical friend—their interest and ability could slowly rub off on you.

Musically Appreciate by Making Music

Music appreciation classes, by nature, are typically stop-gap classes for high school and college-aged people to understand the history and culture of music-making outside the present era. But these classes alone will not give you music any more than familiarizing yourself with all the parts of human anatomy will make you a physician. Sure, it could be an excellent start or extension of music literacy. But it cannot be the central core of it. Instead, in the short term, we should have classes in “Musicianship.” These classes are part class voice, choir, aural skills, dictation, music history, theory, and form and analysis.

Ultimately, what does it matter if students know all the essential biographical information of Byrd, Bach, Beethoven, or Brahms but cannot read a simple music melody any longer than a sentence? It’s one of those give a man to fish versus teach a man to fish moments. Schools could have fine arts surveys that tell students about music and the best musicians and composition of the past few hundred years. They could play “drop the needle,” where students have to “name that tune” from a great work of western music. Sure, that seems like a great way to engage students with the music of past eras. But that does not get to the heart of music literacy.

Why not, instead, sing them through the great pieces of vocal and choral music? Why not have teachers who could isolate the melodies and themes in the best of art music and have the students “do” it instead of just “hearing” it played for them while they doze off? After all, music is a background activity in most of our daily routines. It’s on in the background while we shop, ride the elevator, fill the car at the gas pump, and more. The Pavlovian response to music is to shift it to the background. But, if we sing what we are listening to, it then enters our bodies and comes back out. We get to taste and see for ourselves.

Instrument Lessons for Your Five-Year-Old?

“Should I put my five-year-old in piano lessons?” is the question I get asked from time to time by a parent wanting for their child what they likely missed out on—music education that left a lasting music literacy. My usual reply is, “No, your child does not have to be in private lessons in piano or some similar instrument that young.” I usually follow that with, “they must find their singing voice first.”

Many adults who took lessons as a child don’t play anymore. Maybe they didn’t take long enough. Perhaps they were not dedicated. Maybe they did not have the right kind of instruction. What is often lacking in private lessons on instruments is building musicianship between the ears along with the mechanics of button pushing the particular instrument being learned. A student can be instructed in all the positions of an instrument. They can be shown the proper technique for playing scales. But it is a hollow endeavor if they are not taught the language of music that all those buttons seek to reverberate. We must prioritize musicianship as much as we do instrumental mechanics and technique. This should guide our approach to training our students. Search for group lessons in piano or strings. Maybe the fellowship side of playing together will help bond the love of playing music with your student.

Conclusion

The point is that we don’t neglect music’s communal or fellowship qualities, whether in private lessons or a music appreciation class. We must actively engage with music, preferably with others doing the same thing. This musical fellowship can foster joy and continued growth in understanding music.