Creativity and Music Education- The Need for further Clarification

Toward a reconstruction of ‘creativity’ in music education

“…Should children who are less than compositional geniuses be taught to compose, when clearly their compositions will not meet a standard representing universal quality (or 'truth')? The elitist Western art music-derived philosophies of music aesthetics continue to blind some music educators to uses and values of music other than aesthetic ones, and at lower than world-class, eternal, somehow universal standards of quality (see Plummeridge, 1980). While some music educators and other musicians cling to elitist ideas about creative products (objects) in school music programmes, others deem any utterance made in a musical context as creative, an equally extreme contrasting view (Plummeridge, 1980).…”

“…The elitist Western art music-derived philosophies of music aesthetics continue to blind some music educators to uses and values of music other than aesthetic ones, and at lower than world-class, eternal, somehow universal standards of quality (see Plummeridge, 1980). While some music educators and other musicians cling to elitist ideas about creative products (objects) in school music programmes, others deem any utterance made in a musical context as creative, an equally extreme contrasting view (Plummeridge, 1980). Music educators David Hargreaves (1999) and Peter Webster (2005) have disputed this position, as did Igor Stravinsky (1936Stravinsky ( , 1970.…”

The Role of Music in Child Development

“…However, Phillips believes family and social influence play major roles in influencing ability to score well on all his tests. Plummeridge (1980) acknowledged the frequent call for curriculum activities that will foster creativity, and noted that music training or activities are often proposed as vehicles for stimulating creativity. Wingert (1972) found an increase in intelligence manifested by retarded children after exposure to a music enrichment program.…”

“…Most psychologists believe the kind of ability measured on standard IQ tests is largely genetic in character; consequently Phillips' (1976) work may be confounding intelligence and other kinds of information variables. However, Plummeridge (1980) believes one must distinguish between creative productivity and creative (or imaginative) thinking styles; he also indicated that substantial differences in perspective may lead discussions of music and creativity to focus on very different matters. Gardner (1983) has proposed a theory of multiple intelligences with music as one of the specific intelligence types.…”

Some features of children's composing in a computer-based environment: the influence of age, task familiarity and formal instrumental music instruction

“…Indeed, OÕNeill and Seddon (2003) argue explicitly that creativity in music cannot be reduced to the level of problem solving. This assumes that problem solving is based on logical processes that are not found in ÔcreativeÕ acts; however, it is clear from the problem solving literature that logic often plays very little part in human problem solving processes, and that creative acts can legitimately be conceptualised as examples of problem solving behaviours (Brinkman, 1999;McAdams, 2004;Plummeridge, 1980).…”