There has been a change in how we view children, and this affects how we create art for children (Forland 2024, p.32). A common view when creating performances for children is that the performance is about raising children to become educated and responsible adults. In other words, our tradition of communicating art and music to children is based on a pedagogical approach in which the child is seen as an object to be moulded by adults as part of the child's development (Forland 2024, p.31). If you look at art for children from this pedagogical perspective, you can discuss whether you are talking about art and music, or the dissemination of culture and music, tradition and history (Forland 2024, p.31). Thus, it can be argued that art is not for children when it is about cultivating instead of experiencing.
This view is changing and many have rejected the view that art and music for children is about educating the child, and with this new view of art and music for children, the goal of a music performance for children changes. The goal is now to offer an aesthetic experience to the children, in the same way that adults have an aesthetic experience (Forland 2024, p.33). Through this view one could argue that music and art also are for children.
That said, we still tend to think of children's music as a specific genre, which is due to educators, teachers and cultural mediators in children's art institutions (Forland 2024, p. 34). Professor of children's art Beth Juncker believes that if traditional children's art institutions began to question their pedagogical approach and the question of what art and music for children is, it would be easy to argue that children have the same right as adults to have a diversity of aesthetic experiences (Forland 2024, p. 34).
The idea of revitalising the way we teach music to children in non-musical institutions is not new. In 1972 Brian published an article called ‘Experimental School Music" Here he states that if you show and listen to new music in a school lesson, it is usually the pieces that use the same language and notation as the music of the past that come to mind (Dennis, 1972, p. 754). If you always do this, a dilemma arises, because the music that we say represents the present will always be music that resembles the past. When speaking of music that reflects on our present, would it not be more interesting, and relevant for today's society to look into the music that differs the most from the music of the past? (Dennis, 1972, p. 754).
The idea of teaching experimental music can also be linked to politics. In the article Experimental music with young beginners: Politics and Pedagogy, musician and educator Adam Tinkle explains his experimental music-based pedagogy for beginners with no musical background, and how this work is linked to several political reasons. Beginning in 2010, he created and led educational music workshops with youth at a community centre in a poverty-stricken area of San Diego County, with students who lacked resources due to economic hardship (Tinkle, 2015, p. 30). Inspired by experimental music, he encourages the children to create their own notation system and instruments that they practice and perform with. This way of thinking and teaching can be linked to Christopher Small's idea of Musicking, because the way of exploring the grounding of experimental music practice does not require any prior musical knowledge and is therefore accessible to everyone.
Making the act of music-making more accessible can help to free art music from its elite stigma. This way of teaching and thinking about music requires minimal equipment, such as instruments, and therefore also changes the way we think about sounds and music, because as Tinkles puts it: ‘Who's to say that an eight-year-old can't discover the optimal way to play a bicycle, or that he can't document a beautiful, unnoticed sound from the music stand?’ (Tinkle, 2015, p. 31). This way of approaching music goes against traditional music history and aesthetics, but rather helps students discover their own music using the sounds of their surroundings and everyday life (Tinkle, 2015, p. 31).
These ideas are all linked to what we as individuals and society believe art and music should be. What is the value of art and music to humanity? Why do we still cling to the old traditions? Are we teaching music or are we teaching music cultivation and tradition?
Inspired by experimental music, I want to go against traditional music's idea that art and music are about cultivating and reproducing. Of course, it is of great value and importance to be able to cultivate our musical history because it reflects us humans and our history, but with this project I would rather focus on people today and go into the core of music making and the importance of being able to participate in music.
This project is based on the idea that children, in an art and music context, are just as capable as adults to participate, in other words, this project is based on the idea that art and music are for children. All of this is related to the fact that I believe art and music is expression, and is an important way for us humans to be able to express ourselves in a way other than words. This project differs from Dennis and Tinkle's projects in that it's not about following a group of children over time, but about creating an aesthetic experience of between 30 minutes and an hour with a group of unknown children. You can ask the question of what can you achieve in such a short time, but the goal is not to teach and educate, it is about the importance of being exposed to different types of expression, to understand or not to understand, but to accept, experience and explore.
There are a number of existing projects that are based on similar topics as this research. I decided to look for similar projects for children that do not require prior musical knowledge of the audience as part of the development of my project. In my list of references I refer to some projects that have also been an inspiration, such as Eldbjørg Raknes' “From Baby Concert” and a project “Vi komponerer!” ("We compose!") by ensemble BIT20, but I chose to dive deeper into two other projects, one in The Netherlands and one in Norway.
The first project I looked into was the SoundLAB workshop the Muziekgebouw in Amsterdam. The Muziekgebouw has a collection of 100 unique instruments, that everybody can make music with, that you get to explore through these workshops. They offer both public workshops and workshops for school classes (Muziekgebouw "What is SoundLAB?"). After getting in contact with them they invited me to come and supervise two of the workshops for middle school children on the 16th of February 2024. My biggest takeaway from this visit was that you can never predict which group of children you are meeting. Every child has their own personality, making every workshop as meeting a new person. The workshop leaders were very flexible, always trying to adapt to the group and their behaviour. It struck me that no matter how much you prepare for these interactive situations, experience is the best way to learn.
"Digital musicking can be understood as participating in musical performance by performing, listening to, experiencing, practising, composing, improvising, dancing and making other bodily expressions and creating new and other musical expressions with, in and through digital devices."(Sæterdal 2019, p. 27)
The second project I took a closer look at was “Digital musicking” by Iselin Dagsdotter Sæterdal. In this project, she looked at what happens if you bring a loop station into the kindergarten, and what kind of musicking can occur in these encounters (Sæterdal, 2019, p. 2). The project started as a master's thesis project in children's culture and art education, where she worked with children aged 3 to 6 years. The project has now developed into a PhD project where she is looking at some of the same things, but with the youngest children in kindergarten aged one to three years (Sæterdal, 11.04.2024, p. 2).
In April 2024, I was lucky enough to have a conversation with Iselin about her project, where I also got to talk about my project and questions I had related to it. By the time I had this conversation with Iselin, I had completed the first four workshops. The great thing about this conversation was that I was able to hear from someone with a similar project but who was much further along in the process. After the conversation, I was left with the same impression as after the SoundLAB workshops, namely that you can read as much as you want about these things, but that practical work is what makes the project develop.