Abstract
Policy changes and higher education reforms challenge performing musician programmes across Europe. The academisation of arts education means that classical performance programmes are now marked by strong expectations of research paths, publications, and the standardisation of courses, grades and positions. Drawing on interviews with ten teachers and leaders within the field of higher music education, this article discusses notions of mandate, knowledge and research in classical performance music education in Norway. Against the backdrop of academisation, the aim of this article is to illuminate central tensions and negotiations concerning mandate, knowledge and research within higher music education. The problem concerns issues of who should be judged as qualified and who should have the authority to speak on behalf of the performing music expertise community. The study is part of the larger study Discourses of Academisation and the Music Profession in Higher Music Education (DAPHME), conducted by a team of senior researchers in Sweden, Norway and Germany. Through an analytic-theoretical reading of the empirical data, informed by Foucault’s power/knowledge concept, two discourses on mandate are identified (the awakening discourse and the Bildung discourse) as well as three discourses on knowledge (the handicraft discourse, the entrepreneurship discourse and the discourse of critical reflection) and two discourses on research (the collaborative discourse and the ‘perforesearch’ discourse). The latter of the two research discourses pinpoints a subject position as a musician/researcher with knowledge, craft and skills in both music performing and research.
Highlights
Ever since the 17th century and the foundation of conservatoires, the vocational training of orchestra musicians in most European countries has taken place at conservatoires, Citation: E
The awakening discourse builds on an understanding of art, musicianship and higher music education as fields that might reveal something new about humans and the world, whether it be a new form of expression, mode of knowledge or way of thinking. This discourse constructs both artists and art forms as subjects with agency, while it envisions society and the world as objects open to the possibility of change. It suggests that good artists and art are responsible for bringing about this change, and it relies on the acceptance of a mystical element as essential to good artistry.The discourse on awakening as a mandate for musicians and higher music education is based on what we found to be a view of musicians, shared by those interviewed for this study
We have identified and discussed central discourses surrounding mandate, knowledge and research in the interviewees’ reflections on classical programmes in higher music education
Summary
Ever since the 17th century and the foundation of conservatoires, the vocational training of orchestra musicians in most European countries has taken place at conservatoires, Citation: E. Notions of Mandate, Knowledge and Research in Norwegian Classical Music independent academies and music colleges. Such institutions traditionally emphasise artistic practices, such as instrumental or vocational studies, typically in the continental European tradition, training the students for the performing music profession. According to Mills (2002) and Gaunt (2008), it is common to place a high value on individual development Even if both a university and a conservatoire education can lead to a bachelor’s degree, a conservatoire is more likely to focus on disciplines such as strings, piano or vocals than universities, which have a stronger focus on academic issues, such as analysis, harmony and the philosophy of performing arts
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