Mediacy Articles - Volume 16, No. 2
For this piece to have maximum impact, before starting it listen to the best song on your favourite record LOUD, and leave it playing in the background as you read. Although I've always included music in my high school media studies courses, something has bothered me about the way I've taught it. Invariably, I've adopted an issue-based approach which focuses on negative aspects of the music industry.
Here are some of the topics that have come up repeatedly over the last few years:
Sound familiar?
Of course, this is all good stuff for kids to know about, but after finishing a unit like this I always feel vaguely dissatisfied and as I reviewed my material on music in preparation for teaching it again this term, I finally figured out why: almost entirely missing was any opportunity for students to discuss this important aspect of their cultural experiences in a positive way.
Certainly it's important to make students aware of the commercial forces that shape popular culture, but I believe we should go beyond this. We must give students opportunities to acknowledge and celebrate the power, the beauty, the joy of music. We must encourage them to think seriously about the role music plays in their lives. Above all, we must allow them to bring music into the classroom, play it and study it as an art form, applying the same rigorous standards we would in dealing with film or literature. By doing so, we provide our students with valuable opportunities to develop a fuller understanding of the role culture plays in their lives and a deeper appreciation of cultural texts that really matter to them. Why pull the plug on the guitar amp when you can turn it to 10 and play windmill power chords?
And while I'm at it, can I also argue that a bigger place be given to the study of music in media courses? My rationale is that I believe music plays at least as important a role in many of my students' lives and has at least as much impact on culture and society in general as TV and movies, formats that traditionally get more attention in media courses.
Music has certainly played an important part in my life. In grades 7 and 8, I was moved by the beauty and hopefulness of songs like "All You Need is Love", "Hey Jude" and "Strawberry Fields Forever". In high school, I was inspired by the music of early progressive rock groups like The Moody Blues, Pink Floyd, Yes and Emerson, Lake and Palmer.
My determination to work outside of the corporate jungle was fueled by the energy and rebelliousness of punk music. I spent three years studying literature in graduate school, but none of the books I read had the raw, visceral impact of the rock anthems of my favourite band, The Who. Even at my relatively advanced age of 37, I still get a lot of pleasure from listening to the many new bands my students have turned me on to.
Here it might be a good idea to stop reading for a moment and listen closely to the music playing in the background.
What's more, while I worry that a childhood spent consuming such questionable cultural products as The Three Stooges, Gilligan's Island, The Flintstones, etc. may have been largely wasted, if not actually harmful, I feel that my involvement with music has always been positive.
Stepping back from the personal, which I'm reluctant to do because it's bringing back so many memories and, let's face it, don't we all enjoy talking about ourselves?...my reading of recent social history is that many of the radical cultural and social changes that took place throughout the Western world in the 1960s were both reflected in and driven by music more than any other art form. I mean, didn't music give us The Beatles, The Stones, The Doors, Hendrix and Joplin while all TV had for us were Rowan and Martin's Laugh- In and The Monkees?
Weren't there dozens of songs questioning American involvement in the Vietnam War a decade before movies even began addressing the issue? And didn't musicians serve as the inspiration as a whole generation grew their hair, wore outrageous clothes and experimented with an astonishing range of counterculture lifestyles?
Since my involvement with music goes back to watching The Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show, there's so much more I could say, but hopefully I've made my point ..and anyway, I'd much rather listen to The Breeders tape I got myself for Christmas. I can think of no better way to celebrate the completion of this piece than moshing to "Divine Hammer". Join me, anyone?