A REVIEW OF JAZZ EDUCATION IN SCOTLAND A REPORT AND STRATEGIC PLAN FOR THE SCOTTISH JAZZ FEDERATION by
Nod Knowles Productions in association with
EKOS Ltd Research and consultation conducted January to August 2011 Report September 2011
This report was commissioned by the Scottish Jazz Federation with funds made available by Creative Scotland from the Youth Music Initiative
NOD KNOWLES PRODUCTIONS 13 Southville Terrace Bath BA2 4LZ 01225 423708
EKOS Ltd St Georges Studios 93-97 St Georges Road Glasgow G3 6JA
07880 703518 nod@nodknowles.com www.nodknowles.com
0141 353 1994 info@ekos.co.uk www.ekos-consultants.co.uk
NKP & EKOS: A REVIEW OF JAZZ EDUCATION IN SCOTLAND
A REVIEW OF JAZZ EDUCATION IN SCOTLAND Index Page
1. A review of jazz education in Scotland - executive summary
3
2. A review of jazz education in Scotland - introduction
7
3. The case for jazz education
8
4. Our methodology
9
5. Glossary of terms and abbreviations
10
6. About the sections in this report
11
7. The formal statutory education sector
12
8. Teaching jazz
21
9. Youth jazz orchestras
26
10. Informal sector – including all-age provision
34
11. Young musicians
41
12. Listening to jazz live
43
13. YMI
44
14. Some comparators
46
15. Strategic planning
49
16. Appendices
55
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1. A review of jazz education in Scotland - executive summary
This survey is the first comprehensive review of the scope of jazz education in Scotland. It comes at a time when the importance of youth music education in general has been recognised more widely, especially with the establishment of the government-funded Youth Music Initiative. The past twenty years have seen an increase in the number of Scottish professional jazz musicians who have themselves benefitted from higher education courses in jazz. Until very recently they had no choice but to study outside Scotland if they wanted to take a course dedicated to jazz alone but the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland has now inaugurated its degree course in jazz. The increase in professional jazz musicians has meant an increased pool of expertise on which jazz education projects in schools or other settings can draw. The case for jazz education - at all levels, from nursery school to post-graduate studies - is as compelling as the now widely-accepted case for creativity in education - and the value of jazz has the added dimensions of individual discipline and the responsiveness of improvisation. This report underlines the need for the proponents of jazz education to be at the forefront of making the case for jazz in all areas of public policy-making. The review found that in the formal education sector there are a number of jazz initiatives happening in schools and local authority areas across Scotland. In fact there is jazz education activity of some kind in the majority of the 32 local authorities - but there is no consistent pattern of provision, nor is there consistent information on planning and methods of delivery. All of Scotland’s specialist music schools provide opportunities for their pupils to learn and play jazz. Personal, informal contacts exist between those who work in jazz education, in whatever context. There is an absence of any wider contact or communication network through which activists can share ideas and information or make collective explorations of the subject. Similarly, there is no central or comprehensive information resource through which those who teach or those who wish to learn can direct their enquiries or extend their contacts. The take-up by local authorities of opportunities for jazz work under the additional funding provided to them by YMI has been varied, with a mix of long and short-term projects. There have been a few projects relating to schools and local authorities for which informal sector jazz organisations have accessed funding - but in general the take-up of YMI funding opportunities by the informal sector has been very limited. The survey of local authorities indicated that there is a distinct shortage of music teachers who know the music well-enough to be confident in teaching jazz in their school. There are more instrumental instructors with some jazz ability. Class teachers and peripatetic instructors provide the majority of in-school teaching - but the majority of special project work in local authorities and schools is led by jazz musician/educators - and there are only a limited number of them available. There is a need for teacher training and CPD for teachers and instructors to cover jazz to a greater extent in order to inject more jazz expertise into the formal sector. At the same time, more training and CPD would help jazz musician/educators to develop the scope of their abilities in education work.
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Jazz education is at an early stage in general. Teaching methodologies and approaches to jazz education have been developed by a small number of experts. There is still a need, however, for greater diversity in pedagogical approaches to reflect the diversity of the music. There is also a permanent need for those who want to learn more about and teach jazz to have better opportunities to both listen to the music live and play it themselves. The majority of the work in jazz education in the formal sector happens in secondary schools. There is activity in primary and even pre-school age groups but it is less common. Work on creativity and improvisation is immensely valuable at these earlier ages and jazz can contribute a great deal and there needs to be more focus on the younger age groups and on teaching methods appropriate to them. There has been more provision for jazz studies in higher education over the past few years but the places are limited in number. With the exception of the new RCS jazz course, undergraduate jazz studies in Scotland are options within general music degree courses rather than full jazz specialisms. One of the most common methods of delivering jazz education is through youth jazz orchestras. The review discovered 65 such groups - in schools, in local authority areas and a small number of regional and national bands. Nationally, NYJOS have also taken on a wider role of jazz education provider in regional/local workshops and school visits. There are a small number of regional YJOs with similar wider aspirations. With further organisation and the building of a more formal network structure, their role could be that of jazz development organisations, spreading to cover a wider area of the country and joined together by NYJOS as a central hub. Provision of education opportunities by organisations in the informal sector is generally in the form of short-term projects or ‘summer-school’-style short courses. These projects can be organised by festivals providing opportunities for schools or supporting short courses for all ages. Informal sector projects are not networked or planned out in any kind of annual pattern. The informal sector has a limited track record in initiating projects and accessing YMI funding for project work. The young musicians surveyed in this review demonstrated a great deal of enthusiasm and interest. Their introduction to the music most often came though music teachers - but there are insufficient sources of information or referral to help young players make choices about how and where they can move forward in their own playing. Young musicians are also very keen to hear more jazz of different kinds and expand their opportunities for playing. This review made contacts with various jazz and music organisations outside of Scotland and outlined how they worked. Many of the issues they face are similar to those encountered in the Scottish jazz education scene. Regular networking and sharing experiences and ideas with these and many other organisations will undoubtedly be of mutual benefit. The review’s conclusions form a set of recommendations to the SJF and others partners in jazz education, which, it is proposed, should be put into a strategic plan of action over a long-term period. The key recommendations are about the development of the jazz education sector and come under the following headings.
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Dialogue and partnerships SJF and the proposed network/forum and youth jazz development organisations (as outlined below) should develop long-standing dialogue and working partnerships in various areas, including the entire jazz sector, the music and general education sectors and the jazz and music education sectors in other countries. Infrastructure SJF should take a direct and active role, with strategic partners, in building a stronger and sustainable infrastructure for jazz education in Scotland. Its key areas of activity should be:
Direct intervention to initiate jazz education, to identify specific ‘blank’ areas of the country and encourage, advise and assist local contacts to begin jazz education work.
Acting as a catalyst for creating a structure for a permanent national network/forum of jazz education activists, via an initial conference.
To help create youth jazz development organisations - working with NYJOS and others to explore the potential for NYJOS to operate as a strategic national development organisation (YJDO) and a small number of YJOs developing the role of regional youth jazz development organisations with the national organisation at its hub.
To explore the creation of an annual national Scottish youth jazz ‘convention’ and self-help opportunities for young players to being in contact with others and create their own gigs.
To encourage promoters and others in the development of a long-term pan-Scotland scheme for more access to jazz gigs by under-18s and a programme of bands playing in schools.
Training & CPD As well as advocating for training and CPD opportunities to be created in the formal system, SJF’s should consult with potential partners on developing CPD programmes for jazz musician/educators , aiming to set up a first year pilot course, then a long-term regular programme with possible routes of validation. Research and information
Better and more detailed information must be collected from around the country, disseminated and regularly updated.
SJF should conduct research in further detail to create a comprehensive contact and information database and resource on jazz education, including an interactive archive of evaluation and analysis.
SJF and partners should plan for the widest possible dissemination and use of this information resource.
SJF and partners (including YJOs) should explore the possibility of helping young players to set up a contact network and information exchange between themselves. 5|Page
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Advocacy SJF, the proposed jazz education network/forum and YJDOs should act as advocates for jazz education, covering these issues and ways of working:
Studying and using the arguments for music and jazz education. Developing awareness of the value of jazz/improvisation/creative expression. Maintaining dialogue and networks with other organisations in Scotland and other countries. Advocating for diversities of approach and styles and experience. Encourage the expansion of the scope and methodologies of jazz education.
In the formal sector the advocacy should focus on:
The development of local plans for jazz education. Teacher and instrumental instructor training and CPD. Coverage across the age groups. Sustained learning opportunities rather than one-off projects. The expansion of the number of jazz higher education places. Teacher training/apprentice modules within higher education jazz courses. Jazz work within teacher training courses for music teachers. National and international networking. Links across all levels of the formal and informal sectors.
In relation to YJOs, SJF should advocate particularly for:
A diversity of opportunity. Improvisation and small group work. YJOs to develop sustainable structures and support groups.
Within the informal sector, SJF should work to encourage:
Promoters to develop sustainable education programmes. Promoters to include concerts for school age audiences. The development of all-age courses around the year. Organisations to take opportunities presented by YMI.
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2. A review of jazz education in Scotland - introduction In a country that could produce inspired musicians like Sandy Brown, Joe Temperley, Bobby Wellins, Jim Mullen and Jimmy Deuchar without access to formal jazz education – and then support another generation personified by Tommy Smith to find such an education outside Scotland – the growth of indigenous jazz education structures to match and enhance the natural creative talent of such players and their successors has been a slow and largely uncharted affair. The Scottish jazz scene overall - and the number of talented and skilled players - has grown markedly in size and confidence over the past 25 years. More musicians have studied the music - but until recently they had to leave Scotland if they wanted any form of higher or conservatoire education in jazz. The increase in the numbers of schooled jazz players, alongside the self-motivated efforts of committed individuals in developing of youth jazz orchestras, has contributed to a growing awareness of what jazz education can achieve. This awareness has begun to spread and make an impact - creating pockets of interest - further afield in the education system and amongst music promoters. In undertaking this project, this was our starting point. Although anecdotally it seemed that the amount of people playing and learning about jazz in Scotland had been on the increase in recent years, there was no documented overview about how or where it was happening. Without that overview – and in the absence of any co-ordinated information on current activity – it would be difficult for a national organisation like the Scottish Jazz Federation to plan how it could best contribute to and support the work being done to give opportunities to people across the country to experience the pleasures and skills of this extraordinarily flexible and creative area of music. This research project has attempted to make progress in three main areas: o
To produce a map, or perhaps more accurately a gazetteer, of what is known to be happening in organised jazz education around Scotland, at all levels of engagement and skill and for all ages of musicians – and by this survey also to identify the areas of information which are still unknown but which it may be useful to discover.
o
To gather the views and ideas of the people involved in jazz education, in jazz playing and promotion and in more general music education, in order to identify common interests, concerns and ideas about how the development of a broad spectrum of jazz education can be pursued.
o
And to identify issues on which action can be taken by the Scottish Jazz Federation as part of their long-term strategic plan to help support and develop the opportunities for those who want to learn more about playing jazz and those who want to help teach them.
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3. The case for jazz education In recent years an increasingly convincing body of evidence has been amassed to prove the benefits to the individual and to society of music and musical participation. The evidence adds to the importance placed on creativity in general. There is no need to rehearse this case here - but it is necessary for those advocating for jazz education to study and be aware of the arguments that they must adopt to support music education in general. The case for fully incorporating jazz within music education is twofold. Firstly, it simply forms part of the ‘menu’ of styles and genres of music to which any young person should have fair access if music education is to be comprehensive and inclusive. Secondly, the combination of improvisation and collective playing that is essential to jazz gives the widest possible scope to creativity and self-determined expression - attributes that are seen as so valuable to the modern musician as well as to any well-rounded individual. Whilst our survey in general indicates that the messages about the inherent value of jazz (of course in more detailed and sophisticated terms than the summary above) are being taken up by many music teachers and tuition services, there is still a need to advocate and promote this value across the education sector. Interest in the role of creativity and cultural development in education has increased steadily in the past decade or so. The most recent Scottish Government policy on the subject, endorsed by three ministers - those for Culture, Education and Skills and Lifelong Learning - is a forceful statement not only of the importance of creativity and culture but also a practical action plan that can support young people in the educational progress. This plan - Education and the Arts, Culture and Creativity - is predicated on an unequivocal commitment, stated in the document thus: Creativity Our vision is that all children and young people will be empowered as well-rounded individuals to develop their imagination, demonstrate capacity for original thought and understanding of meaningful innovations, contributing effectively to the world at large We believe the following conditions should be developed in education to help achieve this:
Creativity is recognised and valued at the heart of all learning; All learners and practitioners are supported to be creative and innovative; The vital role of Creativity is advanced in each of the 4 capacities of Curriculum for Excellence supporting children and young people to be successful learners, confident individuals, responsible citizens, and effective contributors.
Creative learning and teaching is a necessary part of enabling young people to develop as:
Successful learners with openness to new ideas and thinking, able to think creatively, flexibly and independently; Confident individuals with ambition, able to develop and communicate their own ideas, using multiple means, and live as independently as they can;
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Responsible citizens with commitment to participate in political, economic, social and cultural life, able to make informed choices and decisions; Effective contributors with resilience, an enterprising attitude, able to apply critical thinking in new contexts, to create and develop ideas and to solve problems.
This section concludes by saying: Well planned teaching and learning through the arts and culture plays a key role in developing these attributes and abilities. The entire vision and statement could not be better suited to the qualities that jazz and improvisation can bring. Creativity, innovative thinking, openness, communication, confidence, responsibility, enterprising attitude - where better to find these attributes than in a flexible, responsive musical environment where young people are being specifically encouraged to express themselves through individual acts of imagination within the disciplined framework of collective action? The proponents of jazz education, across the spectrum of organisations covered in this review, can be sure that making the case for jazz will be doubly effective if it relates to the wider aspirations of an education system and public policies. 3.1 Recommendation:
Throughout the recommendations and strategic planning of this report, it is essential that SJF and others in the jazz sector should study and absorb the evidence and arguments for music and jazz education and use them to good effect in networking, planning and advocacy.
4. Our methodology The research for this review took place over a period from January to August 2011. The methods used were a mix of interviews, surveys and desk research. We conducted an online survey of local authority music services, contacting a total of 57 people holding music or arts education briefs in Scotland’s 32 local authorities. The results of the survey are given in various parts of this report and in full in Appendix 5. We conducted a questionnaire survey of young musicians through their youth jazz orchestras and received 99 replies. The results are covered in this report, mainly in section 11 and also in full in Appendix 6. In one-to-one meetings (or occasionally small groups of 3 or 4) we interviewed 62 individuals from relevant areas of education and jazz education. These interviews, all in significant depth, were the source of much factual information but, most importantly, were the source of the views and concerns that the report identifies as areas for future development. In addition to our survey contacts and interview discussions, we reviewed documentation on the web, in published reports and in unpublished internal reports offered to us from organisations which share our interest in jazz education. We would like to take the opportunity to thank all of those people who contributed so helpfully to the review. The full list of contributors is detailed in our appendices but special thanks should be given to the members of the Scottish Jazz Federation’s Education Steering Group; to staff at 9|Page
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Creative Scotland and the Youth Music Initiative and at Scottish Music Centre for their assistance and information; and to SJF’s tireless and committed administrator, Cathie Rae.
5. Glossary of terms & abbreviations in this report Education, even more than many other specialist areas of work, is full of acronyms, titles and descriptions of activities and jobs that have specific meaning in specific contexts. For the avoidance of misunderstanding, the following are the key terms that are used consistently throughout this report: Formal sector: the statutory education system, encompassing local authority provision, schools, colleges, universities, teacher training. Informal sector: organisations not part of the formal sector but which are active in providing or supporting music education - e.g. summer schools, workshops, festivals, arts centres, independent youth orchestras, privately run classes. Teacher, class teacher, music teacher: all refer to those who have formal teaching qualifications and whose main occupation is as a class or subject teacher within a school. Instrumental instructor, instrumental tutor, peripatetic tutor: refer to those whose main job is to teach people to learn a musical instrument, usually within the local authority education sector - who may also lead group sessions but are linked with various schools in an area and not to a single school or class. Jazz musician/educator, musician/educator: refer to those whose main occupation is as a professional performing musician - or those established as professional musicians even if they have another occupation - but who undertake music education work in various settings. YJO leader: a person who leads, organises or directs the activity of a youth jazz orchestra (whether musically, organisationally or both). Activist: in this document, any person who is actively involved in organising or providing jazz or jazz education work in whatever way. Promoter: person or organisation whose main activity within jazz is to organise gigs, in whatever context (club, concert, festival etc). YJO - youth jazz orchestra - with first initials giving the specific name e.g. FYJO = Fife YJO NYJOS, NYOS: National Youth Jazz Orchestra of Scotland, National Youth Orchestras of Scotland YJDO - youth jazz development organisation (a term coined for this report) SAME: Scottish Association of Music Educators - members join from any aspect of interest in music education HITS: Heads of Instrumental Teaching Scotland: members are those who head up local authority music services, plus others with contingent responsibility in a local authority or organisers with direct connection with these music services 10 | P a g e
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YMI: Youth Music Initiative, the funding and development agency funded by the Scottish Government and operating within Creative Scotland. CPD: continuing professional development SMC: Scottish Music Centre MU: Musicians’ Union
6. About the sections in this report Our study looked at the elements of jazz education from a number of perspectives: schools, higher education, teaching, youth orchestras, the informal sector, young musicians and the opportunities for listening to jazz. It also looked at the context of the Youth Music Initiative and in outline at some comparator organisations. Most sections of the report are laid out with information divided into: o o o
The findings of our research and analysis The issues raised in the area under consideration Our recommendations relating to the findings and issues raised
6.1 Important note on recommendations Since so much of the jazz education world is intertwined, some of the findings and some of the extended recommendations may be duplicated and appear in more than one section of the detailed report - this is deliberate, to demonstrate the relevance to the issues being considered. But the recommendations are then summarised without duplication under broad strategic headings in the last section (15.1) of the document: Proposed ten year strategy for SJF in jazz education. It is these recommendations that embody the actions within the long-term strategic plan.
6.2 Appendices The appendices to this report carry detailed information and analysis on the results of our questionnaire surveys and information gathered through interviews, as well as the contact information that we have been able to amass during the course of this study.
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7. The formal, statutory education sector 7.1
Schools and local authorities
The school sector, providing compulsory, statutory education for all young people from 5 to 16 years, is naturally the single largest provider of general music education. Music education is increasingly recognised as offering not only the inherent value and satisfaction of music to the individual but also fostering positive social and personal characteristics such as motor skills, self-confidence, self-discipline, co-operative working and creative thought. Making a comprehensive survey of any element of music education provision in Scottish local authorities is, in itself, a difficult task, and our research encountered difficulties that are already understood. The structure of each local authority’s music service is different, and the responsibility for planning or policy-making in music may lie within the job descriptions of a variety of teachers or officers. Information on jazz-specific education may or may not be collected within the authority – there is no standard pattern – and where it does exist it may be at varying levels of detail and come from different sources – for example a Youth Music Initiative Co-ordinator or a Head of Instrumental Teaching service. 7.2
Local authority survey
Our on-line survey was directed to the members of Heads of Instrumental Teaching Scotland (HITS) and other key local authority personnel – contacts provided by Creative Scotland’s YMI. The 56% response rate (18 authorities from a possible 32) is a sufficiently large sample to give some general indication of the scope and scale of jazz activity across the country. Urban as well as rural populations were covered by this sample. There were, however, a number of authorities that did not respond where we know activity is taking place, from information collected by the YMI team and from individual interviewees. In our survey of local authority music services, 85% of respondents believed jazz to be ‘important or very important’ in their overall music education. Only three authorities, however, had a clear plan for the way they incorporated teaching jazz and improvisation and another three said that they did not provide opportunities for any other kinds of improvisation. Of our 18 respondents, only three reported that they did not provide jazz education. (Curiously however, one of those authorities was recorded by YMI as receiving a specific grant towards starting a jazz ensemble in 2010/11). On the evidence of our respondents and of the other information collected by other means, the majority of local authorities (at least 26) do have some provision for jazz education at some level. Information on primary-school level education in jazz and improvisation was very limited. Six authorities said there was some primary provision, five said there was not and four, tellingly, replied that they did not know.
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Only three respondents were able to give more detailed information on the number of their primary schools which did involve jazz and improvisation – from 20 in the first to 151 in the third. Across the three respondents who gave information on the number of primary pupils involved there were a total of 1,360 pupils reported to be receiving this form of education. In our survey and in general information gathering, jazz education activity was far more prevalent in secondary schools and with secondary age pupils. Out of a total of 218 secondary schools in the combined areas of those who responded to this question, 118 were reported to have known jazz education available. The numbers of pupils involved in jazz activity varied very widely – in the ten local authorities who responded to this question they were numbered from as few as 19 pupils in one authority to 1,500 in another. The total of pupils in jazz activity recorded across these nine authorities was 3,065. (This finding would give an average of 306 pupils per local authority. If that were multiplied by our 26 authorities known to be making some jazz provision, it would give us a total of 7,956 school pupils involved in jazz. These figures, however, cannot be used as fully proven statistics - but perhaps give us some order-of-magnitude intimation of jazz engagement across a total Scottish state school population - in 2010 - of 673,140.) The wide variation in reported pupil numbers may partly be accounted for by the way in which the jazz education offered via the formal sector is delivered. Some schools or authority-wide music services will run just one kind of provision - a YJO(s), for instance, or school visits or one-off special projects - others will offer a mix of ways in which pupils can enjoy jazz education. Overall, responses about how jazz education was delivered showed almost twice as much being given out of school hours compared to within mainstream class music lessons. Setting up jazz bands was confirmed as the most familiar way of continuing to provide jazz education. Of our jazz-providing respondents, 14 reported that there were set-piece jazz groups in their local authority. 12 respondents gave us the number of bands – a total of 39. These bands were most commonly organised within schools – for 69% of our respondents. But 62% of the respondents also had a band or bands created for the whole local authority and 15% had bands that were organised across just part of the authority. 7.3
Local authorities and the Youth Music Initiative
From studying the reports collated by YMI, we learned more about some of the local authorities who did not respond to the survey but who have used some of their YMI formula funding1 for jazz specific developments. There were eight of these additional local authorities. And apart from those who responded to our survey and those in the YMI reports, we can add a further three local authorities with no other documentation but in which NYJOS reports it has presented jazz workshops in the past two years. The projects charted in recent YMI formula funding reports are as diverse in scale and scope as the work described by respondents to our survey. 1
The major part of the YMI funding – additional to core education budgets - is distributed to each local authority on a per capita basis of school pupils with some adjustment for special factors such as rural isolation.
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They range from work with existing secondary age jazz groups to the initial setting up of a jazz ensemble in a local authority with attendant introductory workshops - and from after school or weekend workshops for all-comers to an authority-wide programme of visits to primary schools by a jazz musician/educator giving ‘taster’ sessions designed to be followed up by the class teacher. There is also the first example in jazz work (planned in Dumfries and Galloway) of the development of a video-link project in which pupils from rural areas can be connected to tutors by video conferencing technology. The YMI-funded NYJOS outreach programme to local authorities of the past two years (funded in addition by the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation), has three aspects: o
Tutors from NYJOS take a series of workshop sessions in specific schools with pupils who have shown an interest in jazz.
o
They also arrange one-day workshops with established youth jazz ensembles (occasionally combining these with the process of recruitment and auditioning for the NYJOS summer school and ensembles).
o
And in several of the local authorities connected with the programme, NYJOS tutors take training/CPD masterclasses with local music teachers.
In 2009/10, for example, activities as described above took place in Aberdeenshire, Perth and Kinross, Highland region, Western Isles, Glasgow and Edinburgh. 7.4
Specialist music schools
Information on Scotland’s specialist music schools is simpler to assimilate because their numbers are small and music is at the heart of their operation. The City of Edinburgh Music School (at Broughton High School), for example, accommodates a total complement of approximately 50 specialist music students and has been running opportunities to learn jazz for over 15 years. On average three pupils per year may decide to major on jazz specifically. City of Aberdeen Music School (at Dyce Academy), St Mary’s Music School (Edinburgh) and The City of Edinburgh Music School all offer their specialist students opportunities to study and play jazz with experts, whatever their instrument. (St Mary’s, for example, allocates two days per month to the jazz element of their programme.) The experts are all jazz musician/educators - professional musicians with teaching experience. There are occasional masterclasses by invited guest musicians. The schools also run their own jazz groups (of various sizes, including small combos) drawing on music specialist students but also incorporating some of the non-music-specialists from the wider intake of the school. The majority of these schools’ specialist pupils go on to undergraduate music studies. For example, in the past year three pupils from City of Edinburgh Music School were accepted on conservatoire jazz courses. The Centre of Excellence for Traditional Music at Plockton High School has also hosted workshops for its specialist pupils with NYJOS tutors. 14 | P a g e
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7.5
Issues in the schools sector
Our research has been able to assemble this range of information on jazz activity in or affiliated to Scotland’s schools. But the sources and nature of the information are disparate and uneven. What is evident is that there is more activity now than had been generally assumed and certainly far more than would have been the case 10 or 15 years ago. Of the local authorities (the majority of Scotland’s 32) on which we have been able to collect at least some information, we know that 26 do offer or support some form of jazz activity – a cause for considerable optimism. We have been able to at least make a list – our ‘gazetteer’ - of all of the activity known to us. In reality, however, the information is not sufficiently detailed to make an accurate estimate of the numbers of school-age children who are currently being given the opportunity to explore jazz and improvisation. There is no central repository/resource of information on the activities across the country. Local authorities, whilst needing to be independent and self-determining, have no consistent method of sharing information on projects, tutors, best practice or resources in jazz education. The HITS group and the Scottish Association of Music Educators (SAME) groups both make every effort to keep their members informed of activities in music education – but since they are not fully inclusive organisations and their members have such varied remits within the education sector, their ability to collect and disseminate detailed information is limited, perhaps doubly so when it relates to just one genre of music. The evidence suggests that most projects in local authorities are not planned in relation to the opportunities or provision in the wider picture of jazz education in Scotland – how could they be when that information is not yet available? There is therefore a danger that projects might either duplicate provision or miss opportunities to take advantage of existing work or potential partners. The general level of skills and experience of class music teachers and peripatetic music tutors, and their availability, discussed in detail later, presents a significant issue. There is similarly an issue of the limited available number of skilled and experienced jazz musician/educators whose expertise appears to be the mainstay of the majority of jazz teaching done in schools and local authorities. A steadily growing interest in providing jazz education has clearly prompted a number of new initiatives and special projects. The influence of and financial support offered by the YMI – and Creative Scotland’s jazz development funding - has encouraged local authorities and others to create practical projects in their area. The documentation (of YMI applications) and evidence from our interviewees offered some examples of projects that are built to ensure a legacy of jazz skills with teachers and tutors and the sustainable provision of further opportunities for young people. Other projects, however, are designed to provide one-off or ‘taster’ sessions in specific locations or schools.
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Although one-off or short-term projects can be important in stirring interest and enthusiasm in pupils and their teachers for jazz, it is self-evident that regular and sustained learning opportunities are the ones that produce the best long-term results. Factors such as the short-term nature of annual project funding schemes, the prevailing economic environment of cuts and the concomitant uncertainty of planning may militate against the creation of sufficient long-term schemes. But factors that are not so immediate – and can be addressed by the music education and jazz communities over a period of time – also limit long-term development. There is a need to incorporate jazz activity as a core part of music education within long-term strategies in local authorities – clearly not a current trend from the evidence of our survey. This can only be done in parallel with broadening the pool of teachers, tutors and musicians with the confidence, knowledge and skills to continue to provide opportunities for pupils as the interest in jazz and improvisation grows from the initial stimulation of introductory projects. 7.6
Primary school issues
Alongside the low level of response that our survey recorded about primary school involvement, we can look at the collective experience of our individual interviewees. In the absence of a music specialist in most primary schools, and the limitation on the availability of peripatetic teachers, primary school children do not receive a consistent level of music education. Yet the techniques of ear-training and creative improvisation that jazz musician/educators employ with primary (and even pre-school) children provide significant stimulus for an interest in music at an early stage. Such techniques are inclusive - any and every child can be involved - and also have the ‘added value’ of developing social/personal skills and other educational benefits. YMI has identified early years and primary ages as priority areas for music education work. And although the number of practitioners in the area of music learning through play and improvisation has not been quantified, there appear to be very few and the best known of them would seem to be jazz musicians. Tom and Phil Bancroft of ABC Creative Music (with their AppleBananaCarrot methodology), Richard Michael and Raymond MacDonald all emphasised the value of starting music education at this early age and removing some of the barrier or mystique that is often created when children start on an instrument with formal lessons and notation at the outset. Raymond MacDonald, an improvising musician whose ‘day job’ is as an academic in the area of psychology and music therapy, points out that children over the age of seven are in the process of developing a ‘theory of mind’ which begins to inhibit their inclination to play freely and unselfconsciously with music. Although their methods may differ, each of these practitioners takes the view that the most important elements here are fun, no sense of ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ playing, listening and ‘making up’ your own music. The word jazz or even its more recognisable structures may not necessarily always be used – but the skills the children are learning are essentially no different at root from those that all jazz players have in their armoury. 16 | P a g e
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Whilst pupils at secondary school clearly have more opportunity on average to become involved in jazz playing, and primary school music teaching does exist in some areas, some interviewees noted that even in circumstances where these opportunities are present there is often still a gap in provision for young people in the transition years of late primary and early secondary. 7.7
Recommendations:
Better and more detailed information must be collected from around the country and regularly updated in order to enact much of the strategic planning proposed by this report.
SJF should take information from this current research, seek further detail and work to create a comprehensive contact and information database for every known school programme, project, YJO and activist in Scotland.
This database should be extended by collecting information on relevant jazz organisations furth of Scotland, particularly in the UK.
In developing this database SJF should seek to work in collaboration with others - for instance NYJOS, SMC, HITS and YMI.
The database should (subject of course to legalities of data protection) be made available online from one website (which, subject to discussions, financial and other detailed arrangements, could possibly be part of SMC or SJF sites).
Links with other key jazz organisations and the comprehensive database should be made with all other relevant websites and organisations active in jazz education.
SJF should use current information and the subsequent detailed research (as above) to identify specific ‘blank’ areas of the country where it should concentrate its efforts in encouraging/advising/stimulating local contacts to begin jazz education projects.
Regular dialogue and liaison should be maintained by SJF with HITS, SAME and other relevant parts of the education system to exchange information and raise the profile for opportunities in jazz education.
SJF should act as a catalyst for creating a structure for a permanent national network/forum of jazz education activists.
SJF should set up an initial conference to explore setting up a more formal network and what the network needs and wants to develop for itself. The current report could serve as a basic agenda/text for the conference.
The conference should include not only contact and information exchange but the agenda should include serious debate and examination of approaches to jazz education – from Scots activists but also invited speakers from UK and abroad.
SJF and the proposed activists’ network/forum should act as long-term advocates – to local authorities, HE and, teacher training – for the development of regular local plans for jazz education, teacher training and CPD.
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Fair emphasis should be maintained in advocacy for the need for work across the age groups with children and young people, to include early years and the primary-to-secondary transition years.
Fair emphasis should also be put on the need for regular and sustained learning opportunities rather than merely one off projects and taster-only projects.
SJF and the proposed activists’ network/forum should act as long-term advocates to public sector bodies and decision-makers to develop awareness of the value of jazz/improvisation/creative expression in the study of music - and the value of improvisation/creative expression in general education.
7.8
Higher education
There are a small number of courses in Scotland on which jazz can be studied at undergraduate level. 7.9
Royal Conservatoire of Scotland
The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland (RCS) - formerly the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama - inaugurated the only conservatoire course for jazz musicians in Scotland in September 2009, under the direction of Tommy Smith. Prior to this time all young Scottish jazz musicians who wanted to study jazz at this level full-time had been obliged to leave Scotland for conservatoires in England or leave the UK and study abroad, predominantly in the USA. The RCS course admits six or seven students annually on this four-year B.Mus degree course. The first two years’ intake included four students from England and one from India, the rest being Scots. Admission is by audition and tuition is by Tommy Smith and a small number of Scotland’s leading professional jazz musicians. The small student numbers mean that the annual intake is recruited to make up a jazz group, with a familiar line-up of rhythm section and front-line instrumentation. Because of Tommy Smith’s leadership of the course there are close relations between the RCS, Tommy Smith’s YJO and the Scottish National Jazz Orchestra, which he also leads. The remit of the RCS also enables jazz students to work on collaborative projects with musicians on the classical and Scottish traditional music courses. The RCS’ Junior Academy weekend classes for school age musicians include a big band. There are personal connections but no formal link between the RCS undergraduate course and the Junior Academy. 7.10
University of Strathclyde
The University of Strathclyde has offered a jazz major option under the direction of Stewart Forbes on its BA in Applied Music degree course since 1999. As of the time of writing, however, the Applied Music course is due to be closed.
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The annual course intake has formed a jazz combo of jazz majors, tutored by leading professional jazz musicians. Members of each combo also combine to form a larger performing group – and the University has also run a big band made up of teachers, students and ex-students. Through the jazz option on the Applied Music course the University has had a close relationship with SYJO over many years and has also been host to the weekly SYJO jazz school. 7.11
Edinburgh Napier University
Edinburgh Napier University runs two courses – B.Mus in Music (classical) and BA in Popular Music. Students (in roughly even numbers from each) can elect to take one, two or three jazz modules as part of their degree. These may be taken on average by 10-15 students per year intake – the full music intake being circa 60 students per year. Napier’s jazz module options have been available for over 10 years and tuition is largely through practical ensemble work for each module group – but this may mean that the groups’ instrumentation is often not that of a conventional jazz group. The jazz modules are led by Haftor Medboe, a professional jazz musician whose background has also included community music outreach and education project work. Napier also hosts the annual all-age jazz summer school, run in conjunction with Edinburgh Jazz Festival and also led by Haftor Medboe. 7.12
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews has created a short-course structure for jazz study, through their Scottish Certificate, Advanced Diploma and Graduate Diploma courses in Jazz. Established in 1994 (with the Graduate Diploma being added recently) the courses are taken over one year with 4.5 study days and additional tutorial contact days. The courses are at three ascending levels of jazz knowledge and are aimed at a broad selection of musicians and teachers. The annual intake for each of the three courses is approximately 10 to 15 people and the courses are led by Richard Ingham - the University’s Composer In Residence and Fellow in New Music - with tutors including Richard Michael. The courses’ qualifications are validated by the University Senate and can contribute formally towards a Post Graduate Diploma of Education. The prospectuses for the courses emphasise that they offer study for professional musicians (from jazz or any other area of music), music teachers, composers and even St Andrews music undergraduates who wish to extend their own jazz skills and knowledge. Each of the courses also contains elements of study aimed at developing skills and materials for teaching jazz. There is a history of teachers and tutors from schools and local authority music services joining the courses precisely because they wanted to improve their ability to incorporate jazz into their music teaching.
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7.13
Issues in Higher Education
It is important to note that all of the jazz courses in higher education share an approach that is absolutely essential to the music - of placing small group work at the heart of the curriculum. Although the necessity of this may seem blindingly obvious to jazz people, this is not always a feature of jazz education in other contexts. The establishment of a jazz performance course at the RCS is an important achievement. However, for a country with a population the size of Scotland, the available places are inevitably limited and there is only the one course to choose from. As a comparator, although perhaps at the far end of a scale of provision, Norway has five possible courses and the Trondheim course alone has 80 students. Informally there are links between the courses and other jazz organisations via the leaders or teachers of the course – e.g. workshops, YJOs, school projects. But no formal links or collaborations have been established with other organisations to, for example, share resources or provide ‘feeder’ or introductory links for young musicians. In particular there are no connections between the majority of established YJOs – especially NYJOS as a nationally funded youth jazz organisation - and the undergraduate courses, although young musicians do move from one to the other. The jazz courses are not linked to one another in any formal network, nor are they part of structured networks with jazz courses elsewhere in the UK or abroad. Unlike some other genres of music (traditional music at the RCS is a good example) or courses elsewhere, the jazz courses do not build in structured opportunities for undergraduates to gain experience of teaching young musicians or leading youth ensembles. Although it is very early days for the RCS course, it has already attracted non-Scots students. In the context of jazz as a diverse and increasingly global music, it is important for any course to attract a mix of students from other countries as well as Scotland. There are no evident exchange schemes for students (such as do exist elsewhere) between the courses in Scotland and jazz courses in other countries. At present, the other international element that is generally missing (and thus limiting in terms of musical diversity) is permanent or regularly visiting course teachers and musician/educators from other countries. 7.14
Recommendations:
All higher education providers and activists should, of course, be included in the information databases and conference/forum arrangements as outlined in recommendations above.
SJF should develop and maintain dialogue with providers in higher education.
SJF should consult with potential partners (RCS might be an example, the MU perhaps another) about the development of CPD programmes – on teaching methods and on approaches to jazz education - for jazz musician/educators.
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SJF’s aim should be to set up a long-term regular programme of CPD – but in the first year, SJF (and partners?) should run one or more short-courses as pilots.
SJF’s role in relation to the development of jazz work in higher education should be as an advocate and lobbyist over a sustained period. SJF should concentrate its attention on proposing the development of: o
A wider diversity of courses and approaches in jazz higher education
o
The expansion of the number of course places for Scots and non-Scots students
o
Teacher training/apprentice modules within jazz courses
o
Networking by courses and educators – inter-HE and across the jazz education sector overall
o
International networking with jazz educators and student exchanges
o
The creation of more consistent links between HE courses and jazz organisations and educators working with pre-undergraduate musicians
8. Teaching jazz In our on-line survey, local authority officials were asked how many class music teachers in their authority were skilled in and capable of teaching jazz. Only four respondents could give a figure – ranging from three to ten – a total of22 teachers across those four authorities. There was a somewhat better degree of certainty about the capabilities of peripatetic instrumental tutors. 11 respondents enumerated such teachers in their area – anything from two to 30 – and their combined tally indicated 104 peripatetic tutors with jazz skills. Estimating the number of jazz musicians (i.e. musician/educators) who might be able and available to teach special jazz projects in or within their area, only six respondents could provide figures – and these ranged from one to 20. It is self-evident that the great majority of professional jazz musicians live in Scotland’s central belt so the geographical distribution of available musician/educators is likely to continue to be limited. There was similar uncertainty about the levels of teaching skill and knowledge amongst these musicians. 36% of respondents suggested that these musicians did, in general, have gaps in their teaching skillset – whilst another 43% admitted that they didn’t know. The Musicians’ Union note that the number of their members in Scotland registered in their ‘jazz section’ – of all styles and levels and also including semi-professionals - is 258. From the information we have collected in our research, we estimate the pool of professional jazz musicians in Scotland who currently teach or lead youth groups or workshops to be around 50 people (which would seem a reasonable proportion of the overall number of jazz players). In general, the musician/educators that we interviewed confirmed that they had learned their methods and gathered teaching materials ‘on the job’: from their own experience as jazz students; 21 | P a g e
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on their own; or alongside leaders who had provided them with practical examples of skill and experience. There are a small number of jazz musician/educators in Scotland (and elsewhere) who have developed extended methodologies and materials for jazz education work at various levels of ability. They include such people as Richard Michael (a rarity as a long-time class music teacher as well as regular jazz performer), Richard Ingham (of the University of St Andrews and another rarity as a long-term HE academic and teacher), the directors of ABC Creative Music and the directors of NYJOS. A number of other jazz musicians currently working in jazz education programmes in Scottish schools, workshops and youth jazz groups have worked alongside leaders such as those above and have worked with or adapted the techniques that they have established. Our research looked at the current opportunities available in teacher training or CPD to address the issues of training and skills. 8.1
Teacher training
There is no evidence that any of the available undergraduate music courses, whether at university or conservatoire and whether or not they feature jazz studies, cover pedagogical techniques in general or approaches to teaching jazz and improvisation in particular. If music graduates wish to become school teachers in state education they go on to take a post graduate certificate or diploma in education. These one year courses address issues of teaching and learning in general but, again, have little or no elements that relate specifically to teaching in jazz or improvisation. Instrumental tutors in Scotland are not necessarily obliged to have a post-graduate qualification in education, although many do. In effect, therefore, the only real exposure to jazz education processes that any music graduate or diploma/certificate-holding post graduate in Scotland will have had will be the experience of being taught as a result of their own choice to play jazz as a school pupil or HE student. 8.2
CPD for teachers
Our research shows that there is some activity taking place in CPD for music teachers, although once again not strategically planned for the country. The Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music (ABRSM) , which runs the grade examination system across music teaching in the UK and elsewhere and has introduced a limited number of jazz grade exams, holds one-day CPD courses for music teachers and tutors who know a little about jazz and want to bring it more into their regular teaching. In Scotland there are an average of three ABRSM CPD jazz courses per annum, run by well-known jazz musician/educators such as Richard Michael, Richard Ingham and Rob Hall. Attended by an average of 25 people, the courses in particular attract piano teachers (about 60% of each course intake) because of the prevalence of the Associated Board jazz piano grades syllabus and the necessity it imposes to develop improvisation.
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Evaluation over the past four years of these courses suggests that although teachers and tutors felt more confident teaching the first grade of the ABRSM jazz syllabus, having effectively been through it themselves, that confidence was generally not sustained to take the teaching further to higher levels of jazz skills. CPD opportunities are also provided for teachers and tutors as part of the University of St Andrews’ certificate, diploma and advanced diploma courses in jazz (described in the section on Higher Education). Whilst these courses mix theory and performance and can be attended by anyone interested in pursuing their own understanding of jazz and gaining confidence in the genre – their past students have included some well-known classical musicians and composers – they also include elements which relate specifically to teaching needs. Several class teachers and tutors now developing jazz in schools across the country have either been supported by their local authority (or have elected themselves) to take one or more St Andrews course in order to build on their own abilities. Other CPD opportunities are in evidence, generally as part of wider projects in which teachers are expected to carry on the work introduced by musician/educators. Examples of these, encountered via interviews and YMI documentation are: o
Laura Macdonald’s work in Stirling as part of the local authority jazz workshop project centred around the Tolbooth arts centre and her proposed work in South Lanarkshire;
o
ABC Creative Music’s regular inclusion of teacher instruction in their projects in various localities;
o
Richard Michael’s work for Dumfries and Galloway and several other authorities;
o
and in-service and ‘twilight’ after-school sessions undertaken by the music service in Angus council.
The NYJOS programme of workshops around the country (described above in reference to YMI support) does take its own systematic approach to provision of CPD for participating teachers and schools. NYJOS directors run one-day courses for teachers in most of the localities in which they deliver workshops in schools and with youth jazz bands. There may be other examples, although not well-documented, but there is no planned programme of such CPD for teachers across the country or even within most local authorities. 8.3
CPD for musician/educators
We encountered two CPD projects planned for musician/educators in specific circumstances. In Fife, Richard Michael is working with FYJO on planning programmes which the next generation of YJO leaders can follow, and NYJOS tutors are outlining a ‘curriculum’ for use by other tutors engaged by NYJOS in summer school or outreach projects. With the exception of the St Andrews short courses, and the two projects above, each customised for a long-established YJO, our research could not identify any wider CPD opportunities aimed at developing the skills of jazz musician/educators.
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8.4
Issues for jazz teaching
Although the information gathered via our local authority/HITS survey gives a flavour of the current situation, the evidence on the subject of jazz teaching came predominantly from our individual interviewees. They came from a number of perspectives, with or without a specialism in jazz themselves – and included class music teachers, HE specialists, instrumental instructors and jazz musician/educators – and there was a strong consensus on the issues apparent in the current situation. Firstly, almost all musicians and music teachers have been trained in a system that has been tried and tested and fitted to the needs of classical music for over 150 years. It emphasises the need for notation (a visual rather than aural stimulus for music making) and correct performance and has little or no place for improvisation or experimentation. It is only to be expected that most music teachers and tutors have absorbed and subsequently followed that example of music education in their own practice. Unless those who have undergone music education themselves have taken a particular personal interest in jazz they will not have had many opportunities to experience or experiment with it as teachers. Jazz education, however, is a relatively new discipline, particularly in the broader sphere of general music education. Inevitably, there are few music teachers or jazz musicians who have had the opportunity to experience jazz education throughout their musical development – there is not yet even a second generation. There is a strong consensus that in order to encourage teachers and tutors to introduce their pupils to jazz alongside other genres of music, without the immediate need for specialist jazz musician/educator assistance, it is first necessary to encourage them to learn about and experience the music themselves. Teachers need to become confident and sufficiently knowledgeable if they are to overcome the understandable barriers that they may face in practising or teaching improvisation or other jazz techniques. As several interviewees pointed out in our research, in order to acquire and develop skills as a jazz educator it is necessary to experience the music regularly – both by listening and playing – to the extent that the educator feels familiar with it and confident in exploring it further. The prevalence in our research of special projects - led in the vast majority of cases by specialist jazz musician/educators - suggests that in general too few music teachers around Scotland have the confidence or skills necessary to undertake their own jazz projects. The issues of skill, quality and diversity of approach to jazz education are to the fore in local authority music provision. If only a relatively small number of musician/educators and appropriately trained tutors and teachers are available (or known to be available) then people planning projects will be restricted in their choice of project leaders and their styles of work. Although there are a small number of musician/educators with well-developed approaches to jazz education, their capacity is finite and will not be able to satisfy an increase in the demand for jazz project work if there is to be growth and better coverage across the country. Teachers and general educators cited many examples of musicians who had brought impressive skills to the provision of jazz education projects. But there were also too many examples of musicians 24 | P a g e
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who lacked sufficient teaching skills – for example of preparation, thorough methods or a basic understanding of the ways in which teachers can deal with groups of pupils – and who had not achieved success in teaching situations. There was clear agreement that opportunities to explore and develop teaching skills, methods and materials would be welcome for professional jazz musicians. But Scotland does not appear to have any ways of complementing the growth of music teachers’ skills in jazz with an equivalent growth in jazz musicians’ teaching skills. As a music, jazz is diverse and multi-faceted. Teaching or training – or just encouraging - young musicians to explore that diversity also requires a diversity of teaching methods and approaches. Whilst acknowledging the considerable achievements of those who have worked to create their own extended methodologies, a number of jazz musician/educators interviewed were concerned that if approaches to teaching jazz were limited only to a known few there was a danger of what one interviewee called ‘conservatism’ and ‘monotheism’ in jazz education in the country. Several jazz musicians wanted to have opportunities for all those working in jazz education to examine a range of approaches and to debate the development of this kind of educational work. Such opportunities were not available – and neither were opportunities to invite educators from outwith Scotland to share and examine ideas. 8.5
Resources and materials
This research project was not charged with examining resources and teaching materials available to those undertaking jazz education work. In the course of interviews, however, it became apparent that most people that we consulted believed that they had access to sufficient teaching material – either that they had generated themselves or had found already published. The limitation on these teaching resources was that information about them was not collectively documented or available through some kind of database or systematised set of links. The consensus was that jazz educators of all kinds – and the interests of diversity - would benefit from having links to a full range of materials and resources made available. 8.6
Recommendations:
SJF should consult with potential partners (RCS might be an example, the MU perhaps another) about the development of CPD programmes – on teaching methods and on approaches to jazz education - for jazz musician/educators.
The aim of this should be to set up a long-term regular CPD programme of this kind – but in the first year, SJF (and partners?) should run one or more short-courses as pilots.
SJF and partners should explore opportunities for developing a quality standard, qualification or validation for musician/educators in order to ensure that quality of experience and teaching ability can be assured to those engaging them for work.
SJF should explore the opportunity with the MU and other possible partners to establish a database of skilled and experienced jazz musician/educators with examples of their work 25 | P a g e
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and references that would allow those seeking to engage them to access a broader picture of who and what was available for jazz teaching and project work.
SJF should assist in creating structure for a national network/forum of jazz education activists – an initial conference to explore approaches and what the network needs and wants to develop for itself.
SJF and the activists’ network/forum should act as long-term advocates – to local authorities, HE and teacher training – for the development of jazz elements within teacher training and CPD programmes specifically related to work with jazz.
The national network/forum should be engaged in developing programmes and processes of information exchange for those involved in teaching within jazz.
SJF should liaise regularly with HITS and SAME in order to raise the profile of jazz work within the membership of these organisations and create opportunities for ongoing information to be made available to the membership.
SJF should liaise with HITS to explore existing and potential new opportunities for developing CPD and other training in jazz work for instrumental tutors.
SJF and the national network/forum should consult with partners to explore the setting up of a web database resource of links to teaching and learning materials and to examples of good practice, reports, evaluation etc.
All varieties of work (as above) to develop skills and experience should be mindful of making contacts and sharing information with comparators furth of Scotland.
All varieties of work (as above) to develop skills and experience should be mindful of the need to develop a diversity of approaches and methods in jazz education work.
SJF should explore opportunities with partners and encourage various activists to expand the scope and methodologies of their approaches to jazz education - and to encourage others to develop alternative approaches and methodologies.
9. Youth jazz orchestras In recent years, the most familiar way in which young players in the UK and elsewhere have been able to develop their jazz experience is through membership of a youth jazz orchestra. The longestestablished such orchestra in Scotland is Fife Youth Jazz Orchestra, set up by Richard Michael in 1976, at a time when he was a music teacher at Cowdenbeath High School. Although this research project has not concerned itself with history, there would appear to have been little or no organised jazz education work before this time, with the exception perhaps of informal opportunities taken by young musicians who gathered around older jazz players such as Gordon Cruikshank or Bobby Wishart. There also would appear to have been no recognition of jazz within the formal school or higher education system – which was of course the reason that Richard Michael and others that followed 26 | P a g e
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him were determined to find a way of introducing their favourite music to young players in their area. In a variety of ways – in respect of their structures, funding and organising bodies – YJOs straddle the formal and informal sectors in music education. 9.1
Survey
At the outset of this research in 2011 we knew the names and contact details of 11 YJO organisations in Scotland, which between them encompassed 21 youth bands. With the information given by local authorities in response to our survey plus information from individual interviewees, to date we have been able to discover a total of 65 separate bands. Given that only 56% of local authorities responded to our survey, this figure may be higher. These jazz bands range from groups based in individual schools to those formed in a local authority area to bands whose membership is drawn from across Scotland – and they vary widely in membership numbers, from small groups of five or six to big bands of 25 or 30 musicians. Based on a reasonable assumption of an average of 15 musicians per group, we can estimate on the basis of our known YJOs that at least 975 young musicians in Scotland are part of a jazz group of some kind, although since some play in more than one band this figure might be a little lower. 9.2
YJO structures
YJOs are structured, operated and funded in a variety of ways, with no particular pattern predominating. These structures can be summarised as: 9.3
School band
Such a band is most probably started and run by an enthusiastic teacher, usually out-of-school. The group will comprise of whichever young people choose to join and the instrumentation will generally be formed by whatever instruments they are learning or that are available. Funding may not be necessary unless external tutors are brought in to help – and can be raised through fees from pupils, school funds and other small scale sources. These are the most difficult groups to identify, since the instrumental music service in a local authority may not know of them. We were able to identify nine local authority areas in which there were known to be jazz groups in individual schools. 9.4
School band in a specialist music school
These are run by school staff, as a strand or option of the music education offered to all musicspecialist pupils. Broughton High School, St Mary’s Music School and Dyce Academy each have a jazz group.
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9.5
Local authority schools jazz orchestra
These are formed and organised by the music staff of an authority as one of their ‘family’ of music groups (e.g. wind bands, choirs, string groups, youth symphony orchestras etc). Not all authorities have such groups although they are a common arrangement - and for those that do the ‘family’ may differ in composition. These jazz orchestras are open to school pupils from the authority – usually by audition. Funding usually comes from within the authority or YMI formula funding grants. 11 local authorities are known to have a jazz band of this kind, some running more than one group in the authority. 9.6
Area YJOs
These are independently constituted and based in a specific locality but open to young people, whether at school or not, in the wider area – irrespective of their current level of musical ability. Activity will be in the evenings and at weekends. These may be started and led by a teacher or tutor with jazz specialism or by a non-specialist who wants young people to have the opportunity of experiencing jazz. Three of these independent organisations are identified at present – Dumfries Youth Jazz Group (DYJG) , Fife YJO and Strathclyde YJO. Each of them run more than one band – allowing for entrylevel members to begin jazz work in a supportive group which will not necessarily have to perform publicly. Fife YJO is a fine example. It recruits musicians from 8 - 24 years old and encourages all levels of ability to apply. It runs weekly rehearsals and plays a considerable number of gigs per year as well as recording CDs. A recent addition has been an entry-level training band. Dumfries YJG was established in the town by music teacher Christine Barbour who was not a jazz expert but who believed that the young people of the area should have this opportunity. Starting in the late 1990s with a trust fund grant and accessing lottery funding to purchase instruments, DYJG now attracts approximately 120 young people in weekly sessions (split into four bands). DYJG’s age range is 8 to 18 years - recruitment is done through an annual open evening. New recruits are offered a year-long hire of one of DYJG’s instruments, after which they must return the instrument and provide their own. In one case – Strathclyde YJO – the beginnings were a local authority initiative which, on dissolution of the authority, was turned into a trust with invested funds. For the others, funding to pay tutors and basic costs (e.g. rehearsal room hire) may come from a variety of sources – including trust funds/sponsorship, YMI grants, local authority contributions, gig proceeds and annual fees from band members. Each of these YJOs has an artistic director and then draws tutors from musician/educators - in the case of DYJG importing them regularly from the central belt.
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9.7
On a national level
There are two very different models of YJOs on a national level: 9.8
Tommy Smith Youth Jazz Orchestra
The Tommy Smith Youth Jazz Orchestra (TSYJO) was first formed in 2002 by this leading Scottish jazz musician as a private initiative, responding to talented young players who wanted to study with him and also to act as a potential feeder for his Scottish National Jazz Orchestra. Supported in the early years by Smith himself and the parents of the young musicians plus income from concert ticket sales, it became formally constituted and has now also accessed trust funds and Creative Scotland/YMI grants. The musicians are chosen from across Scotland by audition with Tommy Smith to fill places in this big band (currently with a maximum of 27 members), against his criteria of a high level of ability, especially in improvisation, and an aptitude for the discipline that practise and performance demands. Members of the band are not chosen in relation to a specific age range but are in the secondary to undergraduate age group. Some of the members of the orchestra also play in other YJOs in Scotland and several past members have gone on to study jazz at undergraduate level at conservatoires in the UK and USA. 9.9
National Youth Jazz Orchestra of Scotland
The National Youth Jazz Orchestra of Scotland (NYJOS) is operated under the organisational umbrella of the National Youth Orchestras of Scotland (NYOS). NYJOS was founded in the 1996 to complement NYOS’s existing symphony, children’s and chamber orchestras and to lead on from the jazz summer school that had been introduced in 1992. Various musicians and tutors led the band on a short-term basis until 2005/06 onwards, when Malcolm Edmonstone and Andrew Bain became permanent joint artistic directors. Both were past members of NYJOS and had graduated from jazz courses (outwith Scotland) and become conservatoire teachers in England as well as professional jazz musicians. NYJOS runs three set-piece groups: NYJOS is the national flagship YJO, whose (approximately 21) members are chosen by annual audition from across Scotland – from an average of 110 applicants per annum. NYJOS will play summer concerts and occasionally at other events. The membership encompasses musicians from late primary to university undergraduate age groups, with the large majority coming from the secondary and undergraduate age groups. NYJOS Access – a slightly larger training orchestra, added in recent years as a broader opportunity for the next level of auditioning applicants. Membership, as with NYJOS, is across the age ranges but may on average include more younger players. NYJOS Collective – a new and smaller group featuring older and more experienced members of NYJOS, mirroring the NYOS Camerata classical chamber group.
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NYJOS and NYJOS Access meet and rehearse during the NYOS summer school periods in July – over 10 to 12 days for NYJOS (this period includes a run of performances in and outwith Scotland) - and five days for NYJOS Access. NYJOS has a further four to five day course (either at Easter or in the autumn) and NYJOS Access has a further three day course at another time of the year. As an organisation with a permanent professional administrative staff, NYOS is supported with core funding from Creative Scotland and a range of fundraising initiatives (trusts, sponsorship, donations, fund-raising events, concert ticket sales etc). Some of the developments in jazz are further supported by specific fund raising efforts, including grants from YMI. Members of the orchestras pay a fee which includes all residential costs of attendance at the summer schools. NYJOS members pay £585 for the summer course and £270 for the Easter/autumn course. For NYJOS Access the summer course fee is £330 and £185 for the additional three day course. Bursaries are made available for those members who have difficulty in meeting the fees. As described in the section of this report on the Informal sector, as an organisation NYOS/NYJOS also organises a summer jazz course (open to any young musician) in parallel with the residential summer course for NYJOS and Access members. Also, at other times of the year, NYJOS undertakes a range of workshop and training initiatives around Scotland in partnership with local authorities and schools. The dual function of running setpiece YJOs and also providing other forms of jazz teaching makes NYOS/NYJOS unique in Scotland. NYJOS is also unique in having the administrative resources as part of the NYOS organisation to promote the bands and their activities (and the summer school) in an extensive professional manner – and to be able to collect and monitor statistical information about applicants and band members. 9.10
Performance
All YJOs will perform in public (or at the very least to their peers in schools) during the year. The extent and frequency of their performances vary very widely from band to band and are determined by the aims of the organisers of the band. School or local authority YJOs may play in school concerts, in local festivals and for special events in their area. The area and national YJOs are more geared to a higher incidence of performances and are seen as flagship groups for the work of their respective organisations. NYJOS and TSYJO are viewed by their organisers as representing the elite jazz players of Scotland’s younger generation. Some YJOs play in the annual Edinburgh Fringe series of youth orchestra concerts (with orchestras of all kinds from around the UK). They may also take part in UK national competitions for YJOs. For several years now the Glasgow International Jazz Festival has organised a YJO competition each autumn - open to all Scottish groups but in effect entered mainly by those with higher levels of experience from the west of Scotland. The winner of the competition is offered an opportunity to play a concert in the festival in the following year. In the past two years a gathering of a small number of YJOs from the east of Scotland has been held in Fife - under the title of an East Coast Jazz Festival. The YJOs organise the event amongst themselves.
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9.11
Issues in YJOs
Although YJOs will collect the information they need for themselves in order to organise their activities - or satisfy any requirements of funding bodies - there is no standard collectable information available on YJOs and their membership. Database information on the YJOs would be useful for contact, project co-ordination and exchange. Statistical, demographic and financial information would be useful for the purposes of advocacy and development. NYJOS is the only organisation that has presented us with information of this kind on its membership. NYJOS’s statistics tracing applicants for jazz orchestras and summer school places by local authority over the years 2009-2011 cannot be drawn upon for firm conclusions to any great extent because the numbers are relatively small. But there are some modestly discernible trends. One of the clearest perhaps is that the regions where existing YJO and other jazz activity is relatively strong and well-established (e.g. Dumfries, Aberdeen city & shire, Fife, Edinburgh and the exStrathclyde authorities) consistently produce a strong field of applicants to NYJOS. The other indicator is the converse: there are significant numbers of new applicants from areas where this research to date has been able to find out very little about jazz activity – e.g. Argyll & Bute. An essential strength of most of the YJOs we have examined is the motivation and commitment of the YJO leader and/or founder. Such individuals must be celebrated and recognised as pioneers and cornerstones of the jazz education movement. They must also be celebrated for the diversity of approach that each takes with their band: it is a true expression of the diversity that characterises jazz in its various forms. Strong leadership is always an important element in any successful organisation - but the jazz education and YJO movement must be able to survive and develop beyond reliance purely on inspired individuals. For example: if Christine Barbour, Richard Michael or Tommy Smith were to have been taken away from their respective YJO, especially in the early years of the band’s development, the YJO would have ceased to exist. However, if you take the leaders and directors, however inspired and inspiring, away from a YJO that has the organisational remit and framework to be able to seek satisfactory replacements, the work of the band can continue and another generation of young people can benefit. There is no single pattern that should be adopted for YJO organisation - but there should be sufficient diversity of leadership and of organisational structure to ensure that opportunities are always arising for young people to play and learn. Some bands have made good use of volunteer supporters to assist in organising and running their activities. Parents and jazz enthusiasts are the natural constituency from which to recruit such helpers. Our research has not covered the use and incidence of volunteers within YJOs but other experience (including the example of the feisean movement) suggest that building and structuring volunteer support for YJOs would be valuable and productive. There are issues that permanently exist with YJOs. Jazz big bands and orchestras, of course, play a part in the spectrum of the music and are excellent vehicles for ensemble playing techniques and for
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certain kinds of musical discipline - but they are rarely the only way in which jazz musicians express themselves. YJOs are undoubtedly the most efficient way of organising the coming together of a number of young musicians and certainly help to develop ensemble discipline and reading skills. But - jazz is essentially a small group music and its core characteristics are collective interplay and improvisation. These are more difficult to engender within the big band structure. Several YJOs take particular care to arrange ways of working with their players in small groups and methods of developing improvisation skills in whatever context. There are examples, however, of YJOs that are effectively stage bands, playing only in the large group and playing written material with little or no improvisation. And, of course, there are points between the two extremes. The watchword for any development of jazz education and YJO activity must be to ensure that young musicians have the best possible access to experience and skills development in the full diversity of styles, ensembles and core characteristics that jazz represents. 9.12
YJDOs
The previous point leads logically to the roles that YJOs can play. There will always be a need for simple training or performing groups and many YJOs are able to fulfil these roles. But those that have set themselves a wider remit - in essence a remit to provide a jazz education - should more properly be called youth jazz development organisations - YJDOs- rather than just youth jazz orchestras. These YJDOs, which include, not exclusively but very significantly, FYJO and NYJOS, run more than one large band and work with their young players on improvisation skills and in small groups. They have access policies that encourage young people at various levels of skill and aptitude to join up and play jazz. Organisationally or through their leaders they can undertake jazz education work in other contexts - workshops, summer schools, projects in schools and school classrooms - and have demonstrated their abilities in administering projects and raising funds. The successful examples of YJOs taking a wider remit suggests that there is a case for a limited number of YJDOs to be developed around the country. As hubs for jazz work in their area/region, YJDOs could interlink with projects and activists in schools, higher education and the all-age informal sector projects and workshops. They could be the intermediate link between localised YJOs and any national YJO activity. By providing an umbrella structure, YJDOs would allow the individuality of YJO leadership to thrive whilst providing a more permanent but flexible structure for development, less dependent on one individual. If sufficiently well-resourced they could also provide the basis for some of the CPD work proposed in this report. Building a network of regional YJDOs would be a long-term project, dependant on funding and painstaking structural development. But one or two candidate organisations exist at the present time - and the national element of this network - a potential national YJDO and a potential hub for a regional network- already exists in NYJOS. NYJOS currently embraces the functions of national elite performing organisation and a jazz development organisation going into localities with project work for young people of all levels of ability - and also running a national summer school. Although these roles should continue, the 32 | P a g e
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localised work could in future develop into a targeted programme of gathering interest in a locality by direct work in schools, workshops etc. and then helping to establish an embryonic YJDO. The scope of our current research - and the realisation that no-one holds a comprehensive picture of what is happening across Scotland - proves the need for a national specialist organisation that can take the overview of jazz education development and relate to the full range of young musicians, not just the country’s elite. This specialist organisation could be the SJF which would need to expand its operation considerably and quickly to fulfil the role - or more appropriately NYJOS could operate in close connection with SJF as a sister organisation dealing specifically in educational issues. The YJOs that we have encountered in this study had informal, individually created links with other YJOs and jazz organisations. They have been able to refer to or recommend progression routes where requested to their young musicians based on whatever informal knowledge they had acquired. There is not, however, any way of YJO leaders accessing full and current information on what other opportunities may be available to their players in other parts of the country or elsewhere, either in terms of taking their talents further or simply changing to another locality or another kind of jazz activity. In the course of our interviews a few people expressed a belief that some YJO leaders were inclined to ‘hold on to’ their best young players rather than encourage them to find a place in a band elsewhere if their talents or interests might want or deserve to do so. Understandable though this may be - no bandleader likes to lose their best players - it is also unfortunate if any young player has possible developments of their own obscured due to a lack of positive information. 9.13
Recommendations:
SJF should advocate for a diversity of opportunity to exist among YJOs and for improvisation and small group work to play a major part in their activity.
SJF and partners should encourage most YJOs to develop sustainable structures in order that they do not rely solely on one individual - or that they can establish ways of making the transition from one leader to another.
When a contact database has been established SJF and/or partners should encourage all YJOs to gather, use and share basic standardised statistical and demographic information on membership in order to evaluate progress and provide information for advocacy.
SJF should encourage YJOs to develop voluntary support groups - SJF could provide referrals for advice to other organisations that have successfully established volunteer support.
SJF should work with NYJOS and others to explore the potential for NYJOS to plan and operate as a strategic national development organisation (YJDO) and the hub of regional youth jazz development organisations.
SJF should liaise with a small number of YJOs and others to explore the possibility of their developing the role of regional youth jazz development organisations (YJDOs), linking with NYJOS as the national hub of such organisations. 33 | P a g e
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SJF should work with other the other partners involved with building a detailed jazz database to identify referral and progression pathways for young musicians and make these available to YJO leaders, teachers and young musicians throughout Scotland.
SJF should liaise with YJOs or informal sector organisations such as Glasgow International Jazz Festival and the organisers of the East Coast Jazz Festival to explore, and in time to create, an annual national Scottish youth jazz ‘convention’.
10. Informal sector –including all-age provision Outwith the formal education sector and the structured YJO groups, there are a number of opportunities for young people and in many cases people of all ages to play and learn more about jazz. There are also examples of project work undertaken by music promoting organisations – some of which go into schools but are initiated by the promoters and motivated by their commitment to jazz music. 10.1
Glasgow International Jazz Festival
In recent years Glasgow International Jazz Festival (GIJF) has organised a ‘tour’ of Glasgow schools by a jazz group, around three weeks in advance of the festival period (the festival itself taking place out of school term time at the beginning of July). Funded by an earmarked allocation from Glasgow City Council’s grant to the festival, a group of musicians (last year, for example, the quartet Brass Jaw) take workshops in five schools in designated council areas. There is a morning workshop for approximately 30 young musicians, who then play a concert with the group to the school in the afternoon. GIJF offers each workshop participant a complimentary ticket (plus one for a parent) to a youth jazz orchestra gig in the festival programme There has been a good take-up on this offer. During the festival there is usually an event specifically programme to appeal to a young (presecondary) audience – in recent years for example this may have been Kidsamonium, Jazz for Toddlers or Talking Drum. For the past eight years GIJF has also organised a competition each November for youth big bands drawn from YJOs and schools around Scotland. The winner’s prize is to be booked for the festival programme in the coming year. 10.2
Jazz Glasgow Summer School
For five days spanning the period of GIJF (at the beginning of July), Glasgow Concert Halls (GCH) host a summer school for all-comers and all-ages at the City Halls. Now in its sixth year, the course uptake is around 50 people of any age from 15 to 60+. Fees for the course (non-residential) are £295 and £195 for concessions (e.g. OAPs, NUS).
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The course is organised by GCH’s education officer, whose other work embraces the year-round programme of traditional music work in schools directly connected with the Celtic Connections festival. The jazz course is not directly linked to GIJF in the same way as the traditional music projects are to Celtic Connections but it does draw on visiting festival artists as guest tutors when it can and GIJF offers complimentary tickets to course members whenever possible. 10.3
Edinburgh Napier University Jazz Summer School
This summer school, again non-residential and for all ages, runs for five days at the same time as the Edinburgh Jazz & Blues Festival in late July and is organised by the festival (without any financial contribution by the University) and overseen by the University’s Head of Jazz. Attendance can be anything up to 50 people and fees are £320 and £250 for concessions, with one free bursary place for a trumpeter sponsored by Yamaha. As well as Scots musicians, the course attracts a number of overseas visitors to Edinburgh at festival time. Tutors on the course – seven professional Scottish jazz musicians - are similar to (and often the same as) those at the Glasgow Jazz Summer School. 10.4
Edinburgh Jazz and Blues Festival
Participants on the Napier Summer School have an annual ‘end of course’ concert at the festival, featuring a number of small groups formed on the course. On occasions artists from the festival programme may be guest tutors on the course. In general, the festival operates a concession price for those in full-time education over 16 – and a ‘kids go free’ policy for under 16s at venues where there is not a problem with licensed premises (i.e. the Hub and the Queens Hall). Summer school participants get complimentary tickets as part of the course entitlement. Annual programming usually includes concerts by the Edinburgh Schools Jazz Orchestra and other YJOs such as the Tommy Smith YJO. Programme projects in the past have included a large version of Kidsamonium. The festival has also incorporated education/training work of different kind with student internships focussing on marketing and event management. 10.5
Jazz Scotland – other festivals
The merger between Assembly Direct (whose staff run the Edinburgh Jazz and Blues Festival) and Jazz Aberdeen created the organisation Jazz Scotland (JS). They run events and festivals in various parts of Scotland, several of which incorporate work with jazz education and YJOs. In recent years their Islay Jazz Festival has had some opportunities to take jazz musicians into primary schools on the island. Now, however, the festival is sponsored by a distillery group who do not wish their brand to be associated with young people under the legal drinking age. The Lockerbie Jazz Festival, however, is supported through various sources including local authority and economic regeneration funds, and young people, including the Dumfries YJG, have the opportunity to take part as performers and (with discount tickets) as audiences.
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Dundee Schools YJO and the city’s university big band have had the opportunity to participate in the Dundee Jazz Festival programme. Organising the relatively new Fife Jazz Festival (which runs in venues across the county) prompted Jazz Scotland to work with Fife YJO in a specific short-term project funded by a YMI grant. Aberdeen Jazz Festival has drawn on the strength of the local jazz and music education scenes to present a number of local YJOs in the programme. It also incorporates one day or one session allages workshops and masterclasses run by local or visiting artists. 10.6
Fife Summer Jazz Course
Although supported by Fife YJO, this week-long summer school at the beginning of July is run by the Fife Arts & Theatres Trust. It is advertised for any age group and invites participants from anywhere, not just Fife. It takes place in St Andrews and residential accommodation can be provided. The fees are £390 (residential), £275 (residential, concessions), £330 (non-residential) and £215 (non-residential, concessions). The course is led by Richard Michael and features musician/educators from across the UK. 10.7
Lyth Arts Centre Jazz Exchange
The centre is a regular jazz promoter, despite its remoteness and the limited population of Caithness. Its annual weekend-long Jazz Exchange project can accommodate 24 fee-paying adults plus 16 young people. Of the participants, the majority will be local and therefore non-residential – whilst 6 adults and 4 young people might require accommodation. Fees are £300 (residential) and £200 (non-residential), with young people’s fees being only 50% of these because of bursaries subsidised via YMI grant aid. Participants work with four professional jazz musician/educators and the weekend includes performances by a mix of professionals and participants. 10.8
SYJO Jazz School
As well as their youth orchestras, Strathclyde YJO also run a regular weekly Wednesday evening jazz school, mainly attended by musicians of secondary school and university age. The two-hour weekly sessions run from January to June each year. Fees are £100 for annual participation. The school is advertised to all local authorities and draws from a wide catchment across the west of Scotland. 10.9
Jazz Course:UK & The Music Workshop
Jazz Course:UK runs a well-established series of summer/Easter courses in the UK – including at the Tron in Glasgow - led by musician/educator Rob Hall, with tutors drawn from professionals across the UK and further afield. The organisation is associated with The Music Workshop, which also runs a year-round series of weekend jazz courses from its own premises in Lanarkshire. 36 | P a g e
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The courses are for all-ages (although under-16s must be supervised out of course-work times by a parent or guardian). They concentrate on small group work and most of the courses are restricted in numbers for this reason. Some courses are specific to instruments (e.g. jazz piano or saxophone).
Fees are non-residential and are very competitive – an average weekend course costing around £109. The Music Workshop also offers tailored mentoring packages to jazz groups. Rob Hall has also worked extensively in local authority provision and other jazz teaching situations. 10.10 Tolbooth Stirling Tolbooth is a regular promoter of jazz and new music events. It is run as part of the local authority arts provision and its regular weekly jazz workshop is also organised under the umbrella of the local authority’s youth music provision. Run by musician/educator Laura Macdonald with the support of Kevin McKenzie (whose participation is also assisted by the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation funding granted to NYJOS), the workshop is for young people from the Stirling area from P6 age upwards. There are between 10-15 players in each weekly 90 minute session and there are two workshops per week – for beginners and more experienced players. There are nine sessions in each of the three school terms. Places on the workshop are free to Stirling residents and are funded via the local authority YMI funding. 10.11 Shetland Arts project In a two year project, funded by jazz development funding from SAC/Creative Scotland, Shetland Arts Trust were able to combine jazz promotion, audience development, all-age workshops, schools work and YJO training. Since there are few jazz musicians on Shetland, the Trust arranged visits by musician/educators from the mainland over a series of long weekends. During their stay they visited schools, played a gig in a rural area and one in Lerwick, gave a public workshop and played jam sessions in which local players (especially young musicians) could gain experience by playing alongside professionals. 10.12 NYOS jazz summer school As well as running courses for their main NYJOS groups (as described above) NYOS also run a five day summer course for any young musicians who wish to apply, irrespective of membership of any other ensemble. The course was introduced in 1992 and predates the original NYJOS by four years. The age group is 12 to 21 years. Auditions are held for the course in the spring each year to establish the level of experience of each course participant but there is no prospect of applicants being turned down for the course. The course in 2011 had 44 participants, added to which were the participants of the Access youth jazz ensemble. Experienced musician/educators from Scotland and elsewhere in the UK are led by NYJOS artistic directors Andrew Bain and Malcolm Edmonstone.
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The course concentrates on improvisation and small group work as the essence of jazz playing - a clearly stated priority within NYJOS educational policy. Fees for this residential course are £330. 10.13 Vocal jazz and Fionna Duncan’s Vocal Jazz Workshops Founded around 15 years ago and led until very recently by the noted jazz singer Fionna Duncan, these pioneering workshops have been held in many different parts of Scotland, often added into the programme of well-established jazz festivals such as Glasgow, Edinburgh and Islay. Other musician/educators on the workshops have included Sophie Bancroft (a regular collaborator), Cathie Rae and visiting British and American vocalists such as Liane Carroll, Mark Murphy, Sheila Jordan and Barbara Morrison. Vocal specialists have been supported on the workshops by small groups of instrumentalist musician/educators. The workshops have generally run between two and five days, accommodating an average of between ten and 16 participants, and charging fees in the order of £250 to £350 per person. Participants have been from all age groups, a majority being Scots, but the reputation of the workshops extended to attract participants from as far afield as the USA and Denmark. The courses have usually ended with a concert performance. Although Fionna Duncan is not currently leading workshops, the spirit and approach she developed is being taken forward now by others, most notably Sophie Bancroft. As well as this long-standing involvement with Fionna Duncan’s workshops, Sophie Bancroft leads her own workshops in various parts of Scotland, many of them with vocalist Liane Carroll, and others with various musician/educators. These generally run over two days, with intensive work for groups of between four and 12 participants and attract both professional and semi-professional vocalists, as well as beginners to the world of jazz. Sophie Bancroft also leads jazz vocal technique workshops with various established choirs and at general music and choir festivals as well as with the musical theatre post-graduate students at the RCS. She also regularly leads children’s music workshops (combined vocal and instrumental) in Midlothian with fellow jazz and folk musician/educators working with acoustic music that incorporates both jazz and folk influence in band settings. 10.14 Issues in the informal sector It is interesting to note that vocal jazz workshops have been a popular and well-attended activity across the age groups for a number of years. In jazz, as in most areas of music, singing plays an important part and can also be a very effective way of introducing people to music with which they are otherwise not familiar. The voice is an instrument in jazz like any other and is implicitly acknowledged as such in this review and the strategic recommendations. Overall, this outline of the informal sector indicates a lot of individual activities. Few of them, however, have been planned in relation to one another or with a sense of the need for year-round provision. There is a lot of activity in the summer months, either around festivals or for youth organisations during school holidays, but only a limited amount of opportunities in most localities during the rest of the year. Some of the summer activities clash in timetabling with one another. 38 | P a g e
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The various summer school fees are not high in relation to many other kinds of short-course activity. Although most of the courses offer bursaries to some extent, the fees can prohibit some individuals from applying, especially young people with parents struggling to support them. Festival-related projects happen mainly during the festival period - unlike festivals such as Celtic Connections there is no year-round education programme produced by the organisers, nor is there an education officer to organise the work. Tickets to festival gigs are offered to education project participants. This is valuable for older participants but jazz festival events in Edinburgh and Glasgow cannot be offered to schools in the way that Celtic Connections produces a full programme of schools events during the festival itself because it is within school term. It is also important to note that some festival organisers have difficulty in inviting younger people to some of their gigs precisely because they take place later in the evening and/or on licenced premises. Music promoters such as the Tolbooth and Shetland Arts have planned their work to run around the year - tied in with local authority support or other local jazz activity. There are few such examples, however. The Tolbooth project is ongoing but the Shetland and the Lyth projects, like many other jazz education activities, are time-limited because they are project-funded rather than permanently supported. Shetland and Lyth both demonstrate a fundamental problem - the lack of many (if any) jazz musician/educators resident in more remote areas of Scotland (in fact, in most areas outwith the central belt). The cost of importing and accommodating project leaders from the central belt is considerable. Creating development organisation hubs (as in the previous section) might not be possible in areas such as Caithness but the director of Lyth Arts Centre suggested that one way to address the problem might be to create a travelling jazz development resource to serve a number of such areas. The question of distance learning was raised by Shetland Arts. Although no substitute for in-person work, opportunities for online and associated learning are already arising in other disciplines and could possibly be developed to supplement education projects especially for geographically remote areas. Short-term or one-off projects - such as masterclasses with visiting artists or festival workshop sessions - are welcome stimuli but should normally be seen as the icing on the cake of longer-term provision rather than significant provision in themselves. Such activities may often be possible through a particular circumstance of available funding or conditions required of a promoters or festival. Promoters cannot be criticised for making use of such circumstances but should be mindful of the need to build sustainable, long-term programmes. Some interviewees suggested that occasional problems had occurred, in particular with one off projects, in terms of the efficacy of a musician/educator chosen for a project. The kind of problems described could in part be ameliorated by the promoter issuing a clear brief for the work, including descriptions of the participants to be involved in the project and their level of 39 | P a g e
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ability, instrumentation etc. The best and most successful projects happen when a promoter is knowledgeable about the music and about the factors that support good education work. On the other side, it should be incumbent on musician/educators to be sufficiently skilled in teaching the kind of participant group and in the circumstances that they will be required to deal with and to prepare appropriately and adequately for the work. Our interviews found no real evidence of informal sector promoters or project organisers sharing written evaluation, materials or documented examples of good practice. These do exist in some projects, especially where evaluation reports are submitted to funding bodies - and could be of use to those organising new or developmental projects. At the outset of this study YMI colleagues informed us that there had been very few applications for jazz funding from the informal sector to the funds set aside from local authority. Recognising this, and recognising it as one of the gaps identified in the original ‘What’s Going On?’ report of 2003, YMI set improvisation as one of their priority areas. YMI opportunities are discussed later in this document and several incidences of YMI funding are mentioned in this section. But it must be noted that many of the representatives of the informal sector that we interviewed have expressed aspirations for jazz education work that could have already been significantly progressed if projects had been constructed seeking YMI funds. 10.15 Recommendations:
SJF and partners should encourage promoters - especially festivals - to develop sustainable year-round education programmes.
SJF and partners should encourage promoters, especially festivals, to include in their education programmes concerts at planned at appropriate times and places for school age audiences.
Information projects proposed in this report should include guides to summer schools and all-age activities.
SJF and partners should encourage the development of all-age courses (i.e ‘summer’ schools) at other times of the year.
SJF should take the possibility of ‘travelling’ development organisations into account when exploring the YJDO concept outlined in the YJO section.
Similarly, SJF should take the possibilities of distance learning into account when considering the YJDO concept.
Within proposals in this report to develop resources and reference materials, it is necessary to include documentation on models of good practice, useful evaluation and materials which can be accessed by informal sector organisers in their education work.
SJF should work with the MU and others - as part of proposals for CPD for musician/educators - on guidance for musicians in project planning.
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SJF should create opportunities (in jazz promoters forums and publications) to highlight and guide informal sector organisers towards opportunities presented by YMI.
11. Young musicians In order to discover more about the young musicians who are active in jazz in Scotland, we conducted a survey of members of a number of YJOs. To our 11 known YJOs we added a further five which we had identified shortly after we began this research. We mailed copies of a simple questionnaire form to all their leaders and asked them to encourage YJO members to fill them in and return them to us. 99 responses came from members of seven YJOs (and two stray incidences of membership of an all-age big band and a university jazz orchestra). The number of responses and the YJOs from which they came were dictated in part by whether or not the bands were meeting within the timeframe we had to set for answering the questionnaire. Thus the results did not comprehensively cover all the then-known YJOs in Scotland – but they did cover the different kinds of YJOs as described above and 99 responses gave a reasonable sample of young musicians from which to gain some useful insights into their own experience of jazz. Analysis of our respondents’ comments gave some indications of how they view their involvement in jazz from which we can draw some conclusions about what could be provided in future. The most common way in which respondents first became interested in jazz was whilst at secondary school (63%). For 26% the interest had begun at primary school – at first perhaps a surprising proportion given the lack of provision at primary school level, until we recognise that some of the YJOs represented in the survey have been consistent in their reach into the primary sector. The two main things that first got respondents interested in jazz were learning about/hearing jazz at secondary school (44%) and their parents liking jazz and introducing them to it (28%). Only 18% had been attracted after hearing the music at a live concert or festival. The limitations on opportunities to hear the music live seem to continue now that the respondents are active in their YJO. Less than a third of respondents (30%) reported that they go to hear live jazz as a member of the audience once a month or more often, with 36% going 1-10 times a year. Most respondents (68%) would like to hear live jazz more than they do at present. To a knowledgeable jazz ear, the responses to what kind of jazz these young players wanted to hear (which ranged from the generic, e.g. ‘big band’ to specific artists, e.g. ‘Miles Davis’) suggested that their knowledge of and exposure to the full range of the music was unsurprisingly limited and unsophisticated. Encouragingly, however, their playing and listening experiences outwith jazz were healthily wide and diverse. They played a number of different kinds of music including classical (52%), rock (44%), pop (26%) and folk (22%). More than half of the respondents (53%) also reported that they listen to rock music but only 25% listened to classical music. The most common way in which respondents found out about the YJO was through their school music teacher (44%), followed by from a jazz musician (24%) and from a friend (20%). As with their
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first introduction to the music, the school music teacher’s influence and encouragement is clearly an important factor in a young musician’s pathway into developing jazz skills. The majority of respondents (81%) are very/quite likely to continue to be involved in jazz as a player, with some interested in studying jazz music at undergraduate level. But less than half of those who do wish to continue playing jazz know what to do or where to go after they leave the YJO. Of those that do, the most common way in which they found the next step on the pathway was through their YJO leader (40%) or, once again, their music teacher (35%). In answer to an open question on which musical experiences that they think would be good for them to develop in future, YJO members gave a wide range of responses, all of which demonstrated a strong appetite for playing live and improving musical knowledge and technique. 11.1
Issues for young musicians
There is a need to expand the opportunities for young musicians to hear the music - and to expand the diversity of the jazz that they hear and are exposed to in their YJOs and projects. It is clear that young people do get introduced to jazz in significant ways by their school music teacher. The interest in jazz that we want to encourage in schools must be accompanied by good information for the use of teachers. There are gaps in the availability of referral information for young players, especially in terms of the pathways they can take in the development of their playing. Again, this is an issue that can be dealt with by the proposals made in this report for collecting and disseminating such information. Where to go after the YJO? For those who go on to study music the referrals are not difficult to make - but for young musicians who just want to continue playing for their own pleasure the opportunities are not clear. How do young players get and stay in touch with a wider community of other jazz musicians? Where are the opportunities to play outside of the YJO format? Could self-help opportunities be created for young players, along the lines of the Ceilidh Trail programme operated in traditional music by the feisean movement? 11.2
Recommendations:
The database construction proposed in other parts of this report should include a specific referral directory/resource of pathways for learners (any age) who want to begin playing or want take their jazz learning and playing further.
SJF and its partners should then disseminate this referral/resource for pathways to all possible appropriate outlets – by print, email and links set up with a wide range of websites/networks.
SJF through its various activities should advocate for the improvement of the diversity of approach and styles and experience available to young musicians.
SJF and other partners should explore the possibility of setting up a opportunities for those who have ‘graduated’ from YJOs to meet and play - perhaps including an inclusion of such players in any proposed youth jazz convention. 42 | P a g e
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SJF and YJOs should explore the possibility of helping young players to set up an information exchange between themselves so that they can network with a wider community of jazz players.
SJF and YJOs should explore the potential for creating self-help opportunities for young players, possibly along the lines of the Ceilidh Trail.
Better opportunities to hear more jazz should be created - see the following section.
12. Listening to jazz live - issues In the course of our surveys and interviews, there has been a unanimous consensus on the need for people learning and teaching jazz to be able to hear the music played live, in all its diversity. Although there are an increasing number of ways to access and hear recorded music, there is no substitute for the live experience, even more so for a music that has improvisation at its heart. This report is not directly concerned with the needs or incidence of the promotion of the music in general terms. However, the SJF and others are clearly concerned with establishing more opportunities for musicians to play and for audience development. And all of our interviewees and respondents (including the YJO musicians) underlined the relative lack of opportunities for both teachers and pupils (particularly those under the age of 18) to be able to hear jazz played live. We found several examples of promoters actively encouraging young people involved in jazz projects (in schools and YJOs) to attend gigs. In general this was incentivised by either free or very low cost tickets to selected events. There are also good examples of musicians going into schools to perform. Glasgow International Jazz Festival sends small groups into local schools in the weeks before the festival; NYJOS also take the band or small groups into schools; and a few groups - Brass Jaw is an outstanding example make a point of trying to perform for school groups in the daytime in places where they have evening gigs. The section on the Informal sector discusses issues and recommendations for promoters in respect of creating education projects and schools programmes. There could, however, be other ways of ensuring that players and their teachers get access to as much live jazz as possible. SJF’s promoters forum is the ideal group to consider ways of incentivising and target marketing in order to reach and attract young players and their teachers to live gigs. 12.1
Recommendations:
SJF should bring promoters in the promoters forum and others (e.g. YJO leaders, teachers, representatives of young players) together to develop a long-term pan-Scotland scheme for more/different access to jazz gigs by under-18s.
This scheme would aim to get some regular programming/ticketing/invitation/marketing agreement between all promoters which would deliberately attract young audiences, especially young players - and also give incentives for teachers to attend and broaden their experience of the music. 43 | P a g e
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SJF and its partners should disseminate information on the scheme to a wide range of young music groups and teaching contacts.
The scheme could possibly be expanded in time to include a more systematic programme of bands being taken into schools over a prolonged period, perhaps by YJDOs or promoters, in sync with known projects by other promoters, local authorities and YJOs.
13. Youth Music Initiative The Youth Music Initiative (YMI), organised as a part of Creative Scotland, was initially funded by the Scottish Government following the ‘What’s Going On?’ survey and report on music education in 2002. The majority of the YMI’s £10 million annual fund - in fact 80% - is distributed by the YMI to all local authorities on a per capita formula basis. This ‘formula funding’ is designed to add new work and coverage to a local authority’s existing programme in music education in order that they can achieve a comprehensive programme to ensure that all pupils have access to at least one year’s free music tuition by the time they pass through Primary 6. Local authorities are required to identify the specific use to which their formula funds are put each year - and reports and plans submitted in the latest (2010/11) round of funding indicated that 17 authorities proposed an element of jazz work within their annual programme. The work (and the authorities’ descriptions of it) varied widely - as indicated in section 7.3 - Local authorities and the YMI - above. YMI distributes the remaining 20% of its funds - a considerable £2 million - through grant schemes designed to address areas of work that have been identified as priorities in terms of the development of good and equitable provision of music education across Scotland. These grant schemes are described in detail on the YMI pages of the Creative Scotland website: www.creativescotland.co.uk/investment/investment-programmes/youth-music-initiative . In summary the schemes are: o
Informal Sector investments - open to any organisation in the informal sector organising music-making activities outside mainstream education.
o
Access and Excellence - to enhance organisations’ work in providing learning opportunities.
o
Youth Music Forums - to support the creation of localised forums (see below).
o
Training and CPD - for individuals and organisations in CPD and training activities that will improve provision.
o
Independent Music Making - support for young people making music independently i.e. without supervision or teacher support.
o
Early Years - support for provision for under-fives.
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None of the schemes are limited to any one genre of music or style of education - although some prioritise some forms of music-making which are considered as currently under-represented and jazz, improvisation and creative music-making fall into this category. YMI reports, however, indicate that there were only nine projects funded at any level (and five of the nine at under £5,000) for jazz specific work from the Informal Sector grant scheme between 2004 and 2011. Some other categories of grants have accounted for some more jazz work - but given the overall number of grants that will have been disbursed since the YMI began in 2003 the take-up from the informal sector in jazz has been remarkably low. 13.1
YMI issues and recommendations
YMI funding reports and criteria have been consistently clear in identifying jazz,creative music and improvisation as areas of work that are under-represented in music education across the country and in welcoming well-crafted applications for projects that will address such gaps in provision. Those informal sector organisations that have taken the opportunity to access YMI funding for jazz are evident in the narrative of this review. Equally evident, however, is the surprising lack of longterm aspirations and therefore of funding applications by jazz or jazz-related organisations who might be expected to want to take education work further within their own domain. Formula funding reports from local authorities do show more signs of aspiration for jazz development within the formal sector but these could also be much further forward if the jazz specialist sector had been advocating for and advising on possible activity. The recommendations are therefore simple and direct:
SJF and others should be signposting the opportunities inherent in YMI to the wider jazz sector and encouraging them to develop projects which could access YMI funds.
Similarly, advocacy towards local authorities and the formal sector should emphasise not only the availability of YMI funding for jazz but the support and advice that those in the jazz sector can offer to schools or music services wanting to build on their work in jazz.
13.2
Youth Music Forums
Recognising the importance of networking by providers and diversity of opportunity for participants, YMI has encouraged the setting-up of regional forums for youth music. The Youth Music Forum Scotland website is the collective portal for these forums. The site, www.ymfs.org.uk , gives this summary of the forums and their raison d’etre: The Youth Music Initiative through Creative Scotland has over the past three years been supporting groups of stakeholders in local authority regions across Scotland to set up youth music forums. The purpose of these forums is for local music providers who work with young people to begin the process of having unified approach to music provision which reflects local needs and demand. Forums serve the purpose of encouraging and promoting local joined up thinking in terms of music provision, pooling resources, consolidating provision and identifying ‘localised’ gaps. They are platforms for providers of youth music activities, agencies working with young people and young people themselves to play an active role in the development of the youth music sector within their 45 | P a g e
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region. They will have a local impact but with a national resonance and they will contribute to the development of a cohesive national infrastructure for the youth music sector. Jazz education providers have joined the forums where they have been established. A prime example is with the Aberdeenshire forum, where the active jazz programmes of the local authority have been able to extend a communication network to providers and participants through the N.E.Jazzlinks group that can be accessed through the Youth Music Forum portal, via the Aberdeenshire pages. The Youth Music Forum Scotland portal site is managed by SMC with funding from YMI. With the connections being proposed for development in this document concentrating in part on advocacy, networks and information resources, SMC and their partners are well-placed to ensure that contact with the forums makes full use of the information and ideas being generated in jazz education.
SJF and others should ensure that all jazz activists take an active part in their local youth music forums and the opportunities they provide for networking and information exchange throughout the spectrum of youth music activity.
14. Some comparators Direct comparisons with other organisations or countries are not possible because they do not have the same historical or organisational background – but they do show some useful success stories. 14.1
Feisean nan Gaidheal ( Scotland)
In Scotland the growth of the Gaelic cultural and language movement in the Western Isles and Highlands was led in music by the feisean movement. Local hubs of music tuition for young people, predominantly run by volunteers with paid musician/educators, grew into the Feisean nan Gaidheal network, which now has a robust professional central umbrella organisation representing 44 autonomous local feisean serving over 6,000 young people. Feisean nan Gaidheal has been given devolved authority from Creative Scotland to disperse the pool of funds for music tuition to the individual feisean and other pooled funding to support the rapidly expanding young people’s performance programmes (Ceilidh Trails). Feisean nan Gaidheal co-ordinates a number of common interests on behalf of the membership (child protection clearances, for instance, for all adults working with the young people) and supports and advises the individual feisean on their development. It organises training for musician/educators and also runs teachers CPD and other in-school work in formal education for local authorities. The Ceilidh Trails are projects in which small bands of more senior players from feisean youth groups are given training and guidance in setting up, producing, publicising and then playing at their own gigs. Groups are given a modest budget to use and then set up a string of gigs in their locality over a period of a few days. Feisean nan Gaidheal concentrates on Gaelic music but is also senior member of Scotland’s Traditional Music Forum, which brings together all parts of the country’s traditional music scene – festivals, agents, labels, education & community music, academic institutions etc etc - as a central voice for advocacy and forum for collective action. 46 | P a g e
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14.2
National Youth Jazz Collective (England)
Established in 2006 by musician/educator Issie Barratt after a survey of jazz opportunities in England commissioned by Youth Music, the National Youth Jazz Collective (NYJC) aims to ‘provide all young musicians with access to high quality training and performance opportunities in small group jazz improvisation.’ To date, England’s Youth Music organisation has provided grant aid to support NYJC’s activities but there is a need for additional fundraising if these are to expand as the organisers hope. An annual week-long National Youth Jazz Summer School is held to give intensive training and musical experience to highly talented young musicians, most of whom are destined to go on to study jazz at conservatoire level. The course, directed by Issie Barratt (formerly Head of Jazz at Trinity College, London) draws upon an established pool of 40 musician/educators, predominantly from England but including Scots Tommy Smith and Malcolm Edmonstone. Places on the course (for 14 to 18 year olds) are allocated after a round of auditions in different parts of England. Residential course fees are £250 per person but are supported by NYJC through bursaries wherever necessary and possible. NYJC has also inaugurated a wider series of open access weekends in various regions of England. These are open to all-comers at all levels of ability (streamed in the practical work by the course organisers in order to help the young musicians develop from their own starting point). These weekends will generally deal with around 30 young musicians, and musician/educators form the NYJC pool at a tutor/pupil ratio of about one to eight. The work is all focused on small group playing. NYJC has begun to establish partnership understandings with various organisations around England which help recruit for and support the work of the regional weekend courses or the summer school auditions. These partners, in ad hoc groupings characterised as regional hubs, are comprised of different kinds of organisations in different places - they might include, for example a conservatoire, a YJO (e.g. Devon YJO), a concert hall (e.g. Kings Place), a local authority music service like Cornwall or a regional music provider such as the South West Music School. NYJC’s aspiration is to expand and develop the number and strength of such hubs in order that they can extend the work into schools or other institutions in their region. NYJC point out that, as in Scotland, England has no recognised infrastructure for the propagation of and networking for work in jazz education. They recognise the need for better links within an infrastructure of their own and also the need for regular and more substantial links with other parts of the UK and overseas. 14.3
Jazz in Norway
With a population of 4.9 million (compared to Scotland’s 5 million), Norway is one of the most notable exporters of distinctive music, including a tradition of jazz that is markedly different to American norms. The country’s approach to culture and to cultural education is also markedly different from American or British attitudes - but the briefest overview of music education in Norway is at least interesting and possibly instructive. John Pal Inderberg, musician/educator and until very recently Head of the Jazz Department in NTNU Trondheim (Norwegian University of Science and Technology), outlined the music education pathways that could bring young musicians from pre-school to his highly regarded and unique undergraduate course.
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Every local area in Norway is required by statute to make provision for after school or weekend ‘music and art schools’ for children from pre-school age to 18. These schools, which used to be free but to which parents now pay a modest annual fee approximately equivalent to £180, currently accommodate around 100,000 pupils and are centrally co-ordinated by the Norwegian Council for Schools of Music and Performing Art. Described in more detail at www.norskkulturskoleradet.no , the schools have something like 86% of their intake taking music lessons and employ around 5,000 music teachers. Jazz is not a systematic part of a music and art school’s curriculum but John Pal estimates that around 300 of the 420 schools provide jazz education. The Norwegian school system also provides for an annual series of performance visits by professional musicians and groups to each regular state school during normal school days. These groups will be from many different styles of music but include jazz - so that all schoolchildren have regular exposure to live music throughout their educational careers. Regular state high schools provide extensive music education, many including jazz studies. Young musicians can progress to pre-university preparation courses - of which several have a jazz element and then to universities with specific jazz performance (i.e. conservatoire-style) courses, of which there are six, including Trondheim, or other university colleges in which jazz is part of musicology degree courses (John Pal quotes six of these). The jazz course in Trondheim, known for its open and predominantly ear-training aural approach to studying jazz and improvisation (“we are burying all the Real Books” says John Pal wryly), has an average total of 80 students - the majority being undergraduates with approximately ten MA and two PhD students. Approximately 25% of students are from other European countries. Trondheim has also joined a network of five European conservatoires jointly offering a Jazz Masters course for professional musicians of a significantly advanced level. The Trondheim course has been running for 32 years but most of the other courses in Norway began relatively recently (within the past ten years or so). The Trondheim approach is committed to giving students a strong historical basis in jazz but to encouraging them to forge their own individual aesthetic as they develop as performers. John Pal Inderberg suggests that the jazz courses in Stavanger (Norway) and in Aarhus (Denmark) share Trondheim’s pedagogical philosophy. 14.4
Other contacts
In the course of researching this review we were in contact with a number of organisations and individuals in other parts of the UK, as well as those outlined above, to compare experiences and share ideas about jazz education. This was not done as a survey and the contacts were made informally. But the various discussions produced a remarkably consistent picture of issues and concerns. This is the briefest summary of just a few of them - and although acknowledging the thoughts of various individuals, what follows should be interpreted as the perceptions of the authors of this review, not as the definitive statement of any one of those interviewed. James Birkett, Programme and Research Director of the B.Mus course at the Sage, Gateshead and something of a pioneer in jazz studies in higher education, charted the development of the first courses in jazz in the UK over the past 25 or so years. Viewing improvisation as critical not only to musical skills but in wider skills for life, James’ concerns included the sometimes restrictive methodologies of some areas of current jazz education (characterised by the authors as ‘painting by numbers’ jazz). Jazz education in general was at an early stage of development but should strive to maintain a flexibility and responsiveness to change in order to reflect the constantly evolving reality
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of the music. The question of creating a proper network for jazz educators arose in this discussion as in several others. Jazz Services in London, the sister organisation in England for SJF, were taking forward a plan of action that looked to chart education work in one region - the North East - and pilot ways of working. Based on a comprehensive survey by musician/educator Kathy Dyson, the recommendations for action pointed at a number of factors that repeat the concerns of our Scottish review. Inter alia the survey suggested that: local authority music services needed to be better connected to share good practice; CPD and mentoring for teachers, instrumental tutors and musician/educators would improve the scope of education work; regular programmes were essential if young people were to absorb and get closer to jazz; the involvement of the informal sector was important; and a series of pathways needed to be mapped and signposted for young musicians and educators alike. Simon Purcell, musician/educator and now Head of Jazz at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance, London, is one of the rare group of jazz musicians who also have a full formal classroom teaching qualification. His concerns, inter alia, were about the need for music teachers to have a better grounding in jazz and for musician/educators to have more opportunities to develop their teaching skills and methods. The skills of improvisation were crucial to a rounded music education but so was the notion that playing music should also be fun and pleasurable, not merely an academic grind. There was, however, a pressing need for more opportunities to hear and play the music. The issue of diversity of approach in jazz education - again mirroring the diversity of the music itself was raised again, as was the idea that sharing experience and knowledge with jazz educators in other countries who may operate differently to those in the UK or USA. There did seem to be a need for a network of jazz educators. There was already a relatively informal grouping of course leaders from various European conservatoires that dealt in part or in full with jazz and the global International Association of Schools of Jazz (IASJ) - but both concentrated on undergraduate level study.
15. Strategic planning One of the key purposes of this study and report has been to identify the ways in which SJF can pursue its objectives in terms of supporting and developing jazz education in Scotland. This report has identified the areas in which work is necessary and where SJF can play a role - set out in some detail in the recommendations (which inevitably overlap in different sections of the document). These recommendations - summarised and ordered into five broad strands in the following pages are our proposals for the actions that we believe SJF should mould into a long-term strategic plan. We will help to construct the plan within a timetable in agreement with staff and trustees of SJF when they have considered, and we hope adopted, these proposals. The strategy and action plan will be set out with a timetable over ten years. It will assess and cost the resources (generally people and money) needed to undertake the actions proposed. And it will identify points along the way at which funding or other support will need to be accessed by SJF or its partners in the work. The timetable will include regular reviews and updates of the strategy and plan to assess progress and adapt to change as necessary. 49 | P a g e
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15.1
Proposed ten year strategy for SJF in jazz education
ADVOCACY SJF - in partnership with the proposed jazz education network/forum and with the proposed YJDOs should act as an advocate and lobbyist for jazz education and on specific issues. There are some general principles that should apply to all this advocacy and strategic development:
Throughout all our work it is essential that SJF and others in the jazz sector should study and absorb the evidence and arguments for music and jazz education and use them to good effect in networking, planning and advocacy.
SJF and partners should be long-term advocates to public sector bodies and decision-makers to develop awareness of the value of jazz/improvisation/creative expression in the study of music - and the value of improvisation/creative expression in general education.
SJF and the jazz sector should maintain dialogue and networks with other organisations in Scotland and other countries who share common concerns in music education.
SJF should advocate for the improvement of the diversity of approach and styles and experience available to young musicians in jazz.
SJF should encourage activists to expand the scope and methodologies of their approaches to jazz education - and to encourage others to develop alternative approaches and methodologies.
In sustained contact with the formal sector - schools and local authorities - SJF should advocate for:
The development of regular and comprehensive local plans for jazz education, and teacher and instrumental instructor CPD.
Coverage across the age groups with children and young people, to include early years and the primary-to-secondary transition years.
The need for regular and sustained learning opportunities rather than merely one-off projects and taster-only projects.
In higher education SJF should concentrate its attention on proposing the development of:
A wider diversity of courses and approaches in jazz higher education.
The expansion of the number of course places for Scots and non-Scots students.
Teacher training/apprentice modules within jazz courses.
Jazz work within teacher training courses for music teachers.
Networking by courses and educators – inter-HE and across the jazz education sector overall
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The creation of more consistent links between HE courses and jazz organisations and educators working with pre-undergraduate musicians.
In relation to YJOs, SJF should advocate particularly for:
A diversity of opportunity to exist among YJOs and for improvisation and small group work to play a major part in their activity.
YJOs to develop sustainable structures in order that they do not rely solely on one individual - or that they can establish ways of making the transition from one leader to another.
Within the Informal sector, SJF should work to encourage:
Promoters - especially festivals - to develop sustainable year-round education programmes.
Promoters, especially festivals, to include in their education programmes concerts at planned at appropriate times and places for school age audiences.
The development of all-age courses (i.e. ‘summer’ schools) at other times of the year.
Informal sector organisers (especially via jazz promoters forums and publications) to recognise and take opportunities presented by YMI.
DEVELOPMENT: DIALOGUE AND PARTNERSHIPS SJF and the proposed network/forum and YJDOs should develop long-standing dialogue and working partnerships in various areas:
In developing the information databases SJF should seek to work in collaboration with others - for instance NYJOS, SMC, HITS, MU and YMI.
Regular dialogue and liaison should be maintained by SJF with HITS, SAME and other relevant parts of the education system to exchange information with their members and raise the profile for opportunities in jazz education.
SJF should develop and maintain dialogue with providers in higher education.
SJF should use all opportunities in their relationships with the jazz sector (in jazz promoters forums and publications) to highlight and guide informal sector organisers towards education information and opportunities.
SJF and partners should maintain and develop dialogue and networking with comparator organisations in other spheres of music and other countries.
SJF and partners should maintain and develop regular contact with the YMI and Youth Music Forums across Scotland.
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DEVELOPMENT: RESEARCH AND INFORMATION In order to enact much of the strategic planning proposed by this report, better and more detailed information must be collected from around the country, disseminated and regularly updated. SJF should take information from this current research, should conduct research in further detail and work to create a comprehensive contact and information database and resource on jazz education. The items it would contain should be prioritised in terms of the order of collection but should include:
Every known local authority and school programme, project, YJO and activist in Scotland. Links and information on relevant jazz organisations furth of Scotland, particularly in the UK. All higher education providers and provision. A guide to summer schools, workshops, informal courses and all-age activities. Documentation on models of good practice, useful evaluation and materials which can be accessed by informal sector organisers. A database of skilled and experienced jazz musician/educators with examples of their work and references that would inform those seeking to engage in jazz projects. A web database resource of links to teaching and learning materials and to examples of good practice, reports, evaluation etc. A detailed database and guide to referral and progression pathways for young musicians and for learners (of any age) who want to begin playing or want take their jazz learning and playing further.
To which should be added:
An interactive database which SJF and partners should encourage all YJOs to gather, use and share and update basic standardised statistical and demographic information on membership in order to evaluate progress and provide information for advocacy.
SJF and partners (including YJOs) should explore the possibility of helping young players to set up an information exchange between themselves so that they can network with a wider community of jazz players.
SJF and partners should plan for the dissemination and use of this information resource:
Via one website - subject to discussions and financial arrangements as to who would host the information (possibilities might include SMC, SJF, NYJOS).
Via links with all other relevant websites and organisations active in jazz, jazz education and music education.
The site and its range of information would be publicised via print, email and links through all possible other websites to:
Teachers, HITS, SAME, YJO leaders, YJO members, all SJF jazz sector contacts, all music education organisations and contacts.
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DEVELOPMENT: INFRASTRUCTURE SJF should take a direct and active role, with strategic partners, in building a stronger and sustainable infrastructure for jazz education in Scotland. Its key areas of activity should be: Direct intervention to initiate jazz education:
SJF should use current information and the subsequent research (as above) to identify specific ‘blank’ areas of the country where, over time, it should encourage, advise and assist local contacts to begin jazz education work.
A youth jazz education network/forum:
SJF should act as a catalyst for creating a structure for a permanent national network/forum of jazz education activists.
SJF should set up an initial conference to explore setting up a more formal network and what the network needs and wants to develop for itself.
The conference should include contact and information exchange, and examination of approaches to jazz education.
The national network/forum should be engaged in developing programmes and processes of information exchange for those involved in teaching within jazz.
Youth jazz development organisations:
SJF should work with NYJOS and others to explore the potential for NYJOS to operate as a strategic national development organisation (YJDO) and the hub of regional YJDOs.
SJF should work to explore the possibility of a small number of YJOs developing the role of regional youth jazz development organisations.
Similarly, SJF should take the possibilities of distance learning and the idea of ‘travelling’ development organisations into account when considering the YJDO concept.
YJOs and young musicians:
SJF should encourage (and offer advice and referral contacts for) YJOs to develop voluntary support groups.
SJF should liaise with YJOs or informal sector promoters/festivals to explore the creation of an annual national Scottish youth jazz ‘convention’.
SJF and other partners should explore setting up opportunities for those who have ‘graduated’ from YJOs to meet and play.
SJF and YJOs should explore the potential for creating self-help opportunities for young players, possibly along the lines of the Ceilidh Trail.
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Access to hearing live music:
SJF should bring promoters and together to develop a long-term pan-Scotland scheme for more access to jazz gigs by under-18s.
This scheme should seek regular programming/ticketing/invitation/marketing agreements between all promoters - to incentivise young people and their teachers to broaden their experience of the music.
Subsequently SJF and partners should explore the expansion of the scheme to include a programme of bands being taken into schools.
DEVELOPMENT: TRAINING & CPD SJF’s direct intervention in CPD should be for jazz musician/educators:
SJF should consult with potential partners (e.g. MU, RCS) on developing CPD programmes for jazz musician/educators - including guidance on project planning.
SJF should aim to set up a first year pilot course, then a long-term regular programme.
SJF and partners should explore opportunities for developing a quality validation for musician/educators.
And within instrumental instruction, SJF should liaise with HITS to explore opportunities for developing CPD in jazz work for instrumental tutors.
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NKP & EKOS: A REVIEW OF JAZZ EDUCATION IN SCOTLAND
16. Appendices Appendix 1
List of in-person consultees
Appendix 2
All known YJOs or other regular ensembles as at June 2011
Appendix 3
Gazeteer of known activity in local authorities
Appendix 4
Web links
Appendix 5
Analytical report on survey of YJO participants
Appendix 6
Analytical report on results of on-line local authority survey as at June 2011
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