LWuxic in education
fundamental musical concepts’ (extract from the Berlin Ministerial
Decree of 2 May 1925).
We can easily see that music education, in this sense, has no beginning
and no end-that in this field, we shall always be both pupils and
teachers. We must therefore avoid making distinctions and classifying
achievements according to their excellence ; instead at every level we
must devote ourselves to exalting the soul to transcendental heights.
Immediately after the first world war the reform of music education
began. The decisive factors which brought this about were social in
origin. These new forces could be seen in action in workers’ move-
ments, youth movements and-closely related to these-in develop-
ments in educational psychology and music teaching. Our sources of
inspiration were the ideas which Jean- Jacques Rousseau set forth,
prophetically foreseeing the value of improvisation in music edu-
cation, as well as the work of Jaques-Dalcroze whose method is
centred around movement and the eurhythmic interpretation of
musical themes. There is much else that should be mentioned in an
account of the foundations of musical education truly worthy of the
name, but here it is only the inner essence, the structure, of musical
education in Europe with which we have to deal-something which
really defies all outward definition but which we can approach through
the idea of freedom. It is gratifying to find this freedom in all the many
experiments in new, practical music education which are now being
made in different forms in the kindergarten, the primary school, the
secondary school, the university and adult education. Everywhere we
find new approaches, new methods and new systems, which have been
developed out of rhythmics, ear-training, solfa, sing-songs, the Rural
Music Schools in England, recorder-making in Switzerland, France
and England, musical and choral clubs in West Germany, Jeunesses
Musicales in Belgium, various experiments with music in remedial
education, and so on. All these new efforts, which indicate active
developments in our particular field throughout Europe, are rapidly
making progress and promise well for the future. Any methods are
acceptable except the tyranny of dictatorial dogmatism and the im-
position of a single system for all. I fully realize that I have given
above only a short and arbitrary selection, and I ask pardon for the
fact that my list of examples is far from exhaustive.
Having thus considered on the one hand the thesis of artistic crea-
tion and on the other the antithesis of technical musicianship, we shall
now aim at uniting the two in a synthesis, culminating in music
education.