La juventud como construcción social

All music performance students perform in recitals at the end of each semester as part of the assessment for practical music units. A panel of teachers assesses these recitals. Students tend to find these performances quite stressful due to the public nature of the assessment. They often struggle to choose, rehearse and perform music repertoire that they may not have been familiar with, or even like. Recital week tends to be a festival of anxious faces, nervous laughter, forgotten lyrics, and malfunctioning amps; of sweat and tears, laughter and fear.

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‘John’ was a second year diploma music student who had just completed his recital. As the panel broke for lunch I noticed him sitting alone at the back of the performance hall. John was slumped in the chair, head hung low. I went over to him and asked how he felt about his recital. He hesitated before replying. Sucking in air, he replied that he thought he’d played well enough to pass, ‘Maybe with a bit of luck…’ After a moment he added that he was thinking about withdrawing from the course anyway. I suggested a coffee and a chat.

I asked John why he wanted to leave the course. He said that he didn’t think the course was right for him. John told me that he loved ‘progressive rock’ and played regularly in his own band. They’d been practising in his mate’s garage for the last three years, had played at their friends’ parties and had even been offered gigs at the Tote. But John said he’d never done well at school – never got into the ‘whole classroom thing’. This included music. He went on to paint a rather bleak picture of drab fibro portables, filled with bored High School students struggling to rehearse yet another performance of ‘Oklahoma’; Of chaotic percussion workshops with a cacophony of mistimed, angry strikes to the drum. John could never remember which scale had what sharps or flats or all those fancy Italian words that were meant to tell you how to play the music. He’d ended up in the TAFE music course, but really didn’t know why. ‘I love playing music with my band’, he said ‘but music at school, even here, you know maybe isn’t for me. John said that ‘all this theory and Classical and Jazz stuff’ just wasn’t what he was interested in, that he didn’t like the music, found it difficult to practise. It eventually came out that John felt that playing this repertoire didn’t allow him to express how well he could play.

I tried to explain to John that learning ‘all that Jazz’ was an important part of contemporary music education. This was why his teacher recommended different styles and Jazz standards as part of the student repertoire. I explained that learning the theoretical aspects – the melodies, the chords, the fundamental improvisational aspects of all music – were crucial to a well- rounded player. This advice went down as well as an ABBA song at an AC/DC gig. John seemed to slump further down into his chair.

Trying to maintain a positive tone, I added that becoming familiar with varied repertoire and music technique would help him become a better rock guitarist. I

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said ‘You’ll know lots more chords and have more rhythmic and harmonic ideas to use with your music…’ John looked dubious. At least he didn’t slump further into his chair – a good thing too, otherwise he would have ended up on the floor.

We chatted for a while and it became clear to me that John had some good points. He had enrolled in a contemporary music performance course. He felt Progressive Rock was certainly contemporary but he was not being encouraged to play that style of music. I asked him how he had chosen his repertoire for the recital. He told me that his instrumental and ensemble teachers had selected all his pieces.

‘Why not play some of your pieces for the end of year recital, as well as some of the other stuff’ I suggested. He sat up. ‘Could I do that?’ he asked. The subject outlines didn’t prohibit alternative repertoire, progressive metal or any other original music - it was merely the convention that music teachers chose, from some students’ perspective, more ‘traditional’ repertoire. Most teachers had graduated from Classical or Jazz institutions themselves. They were teaching what they knew and trusted. I suggested that John talk to his instrumental teacher and suggest some different repertoire approaches.

I sat on the panel for John’s end of year recital. He began with a Bach study, moved onto a few Jazz standards and finished with three original pieces, accompanied by his rock band. He sang as well as played guitar. I hadn’t even known that he could sing. He played with confidence and obvious pleasure, relishing the opportunity to showcase the music that he called his own. The band ended with a howling, swirling original piece that had them all jumping wildly around the stage. The audience loved it, appreciating the joy and energy in their performance. The panel felt that the recital programme was appropriate and that he had also performed the ‘traditional’ repertoire with greater technical competence than he had done in the mid-year recital.

John approached me after the recital. He was breathless and beaming. ‘That was awesome’, he told me. ‘You rocked’ I replied. He said he felt he had played well, but that he also felt more comfortable up on stage. He told me that maybe all the ‘Jazz and other stuff’ was helping his playing, and his song writing skills.

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John finished his diploma of music a year ago. I received an email from him last week, inviting me to his band’s album launch. I’ve never been a huge fan of Progressive Rock but I think I’ll go and give it another try…