Compositions of elementary recorder students created under various conditions of task structure

Abstract

Cultivating and nurturing young composers has its beginnings in school and private study settings. Helping students to develop as composers is a task that benefits from research that identifies the structures that assist that process. Structure issues are of concern to teachers who nurture young creators. Too much task structure can inhibit creativity and personal expression (Wiggins, 2002); however, too little task structure can cause students difficulty because of too many choices (Folkestad, 2004;

Preservice Music Teacher Perceptions of Mentoring Young Composers

“…Contemporary research in the musical creativity of children has often focused on examination of creative musical processes (Burnard & Younker, 2002; Kennedy, 2002; Webster, 2013; Wiggins, 2007) and assessment of the creative musical product (Hickey, 2001; Menard, 2009; Smith, 2008). Smith (2008) investigated the relationship of task structure with the musicality of recorder compositions by elementary students, finding that presenting composition tasks with more structure (i.e., composing based on a poem) led to pieces evaluated as more musical. Kennedy (2002) analyzed compositional process in four high school musicians identifying a model including four steps: listening as preparation, listening as stimulation, experimentation, and finishing off.…”

Group music composing strategies: A case study within a rock band

“…The aims of this research project are to define the main composing activities of a rock group as they compose a new piece for their repertoire. In many prior compositional research projects, the task was defined by the researcher (Smith, 2008) and the results were correlated to the imposed task. When actions are driven by the researcher, the participants are not free to express all possible behaviours.…”

Schulische Musiklehrkräfte im Interkulturalitätsdispositiv

“…Da die Kompositionsaufgaben als Teil eines regulären Curriculums gestellt wurden, liegt zudem der Verdacht nahe, dass Lernende die voraussetzungsreicheren Formate wählten, um ihr angeeignetes Wissen nicht bloß anzuwenden, sondern auch zu demonstrieren. In einer Studie von Janice Smith (2008) kam es zu einer vergleichbaren Auswahlsituation. Smith stellte jeder bzw.…”

“…Ungeachtet der individuellen Präferenzen stuften Expert:innen, die über die Musikalität der Produkte befinden sollten, die (textlosen) Gedichtvertonungen als musikalischer ein als die Produkte, die in offeneren Aufgabenformaten entstanden waren. Smith (2008) schlussfolgert daraus, dass die Gedichte durch ihre Periodizität die Musikalität der Vertonungen vorstrukturiert haben dürften. Insofern verhalf das vorgegebene Material den Lernenden zu einer ihren Produkten zugesprochenen musikalischen Qualität, die ihren freieren Kompositionen nicht zugesprochen wurde (S. 171).…”