This review provides a summary and discussion of the 'Music Literacy' strand (day 1) of the Society for Music Analysis's OxMAC conference (University of Oxford, July 2023). The review highlights how the ever-expanding range of musics currently studied in higher education calls for an increasingly multifaceted understanding of the term 'music…

In music educators' endeavoring to integrate equity into our curriculum, adopting a rhizomatic approach could provide a valuable perspective for reassessing the Western classical tradition as the norm. From a philosophical perspective, the rhizome is perceived as an interconnected multiplicity, where various elements are intricately connected…

Although music education researchers often utilize music major status as a single-item proxy variable for musician status--and with this designation presume musical competencies or abilities of research participants--there is a lack of research demonstrating links between status as a music major and those assumed competencies. In this study, we…

The protests during the summer of 2020 were an awakening for many people to the realities of systemic racism. Music education had a full-blown reckoning with the insidious ways racism manifests in the profession. One way that systemic racism manifests in individual classrooms and programs, and one not always easily identified, is cultural…

Since post-war II, music education has advocated its presumed aesthetic benefits. "Aesthetic advocacy" became instituted through the abundance of publications by Bennett Reimer (e.g., 1970, 1989, 1995, 2003). That aesthetic meme is still influential. The debate about "Music Education as Aesthetic Education" MEAE may be…

This article examines and discusses the musical and artistic characteristics of Shaanxi folk songs, as well as how they can be more effectively disseminated in today's rapidly changing social environment. This also provides some beneficial information for the dissemination and development of Shaanxi folk songs, allowing them to be disseminated and…

This article develops the concept of "low-end phonographic pedagogies" through a life-long engagement with vinyl records and the Afro-diasporic music practices of reggae, dub, and dancehall. Approaching my record collection as a counter-archive of vibrational feeling and learning, I explore everyday practices of playing and listening to…

A liberal arts education for Christians is about finding God's truth; therefore, Christian students need to be educated in a broad range of subjects, including music. While a music appreciation course is thought to be about gaining knowledge of music, some music scholars have pointed out that a music curriculum should involve students in…

The purpose of this study was to investigate Hong Kong preschool teachers' music-specific professional development (PD) preferences and analyze the potential differences among teachers with varying levels of teaching experience (beginning, experienced, and advanced). A survey was developed to assess four music-specific PD preferences: content,…

In this article, the author offers a perspective on why humans like music and what it means for music education. The author builds his discussion around the following five basic premises: (1) since the dawn of civilization, humans have used their voices and the musical instruments they invented to express emotions in sounds that vary in pitch,…

It was not long into the author's career as a music educator that they noticed a considerable drop in their own recreational music listening. Any wisp of recreational music listening was typically an accompaniment to an activity or task rather than the main event. This changed dramatically around seven years ago, when a few of their colleagues…

The Burmese arched harp, known as "Saung Gauk," is the national icon of the Southeast Asian country of Myanmar (once called Burma). It is both ancient and contemporary, and its music frequently carries stories that are threaded with long-standing philosophical principles of the Burmese. The music of the Saung Gauk consists of five…

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to explore the experiences of one music teacher (the researcher) and two intact classrooms of 3- to 6-year-old children who engaged in world music lessons as a pathway to developing empathy. Participants in each of the two classes engaged in a 30-minute world music lesson once per week for 8 weeks,…

In a report commissioned by the Society for Music Analysis to address a gap in music literacy, McQueen (2020) identified instrumental teachers as an important part of music education both within schools and in the community. This article takes as a starting point McQueen's (2020) proposal that 'it is through instrumental tuition that music…

Parents and guardians inherently become involved in diverse aspects of the music learning process and retain the potential to foster a musical home environment, influencing the musical growth, attitude, and level of participation of their children. Research suggests a relationship between parental support and successful development of music skills…