Tradition, Obligation, and Innovation: Approaches to the Musical Score and Interpretation in Higher Music Education

This thesis examines approaches to the teaching and learning of interpretation amongst higher music education (HME) performance students, aiming to understand how they view their roles as performers in relation to musical scores and composers’ intentions. Musicological and philosophical literature has debated what a musical work actually is, the validity of composers’ intentions, and how performers should approach musical scores. However, there is a gap in the literature about how these ideas influence musicians’ interpretative training and how developing musicians approach scores, composers’ intentions, and their interpretative role in relation to these topics. Therefore, this thesis aims to provide insights into these important, but underexplored areas.
This project began with an exploratory survey to gain initial insights into how recent and current HME students view their interpretative roles as performers in relation to scores and composers’ intentions. A detailed case study was then conducted which adopted a qualitative approach to capture rich data of students’ experiences of their interpretative training. The study involved multiple interviews with undergraduate performance students at a UK university and their educators as well as observations of lessons and performance classes.
The findings suggest there are predictable influences on students’ interpretative development including one-to-one teachers, institutional culture, and the role of assessments. However, there are also less visible phenomena that can act as a hidden curriculum. These include students’ unexamined beliefs about musical scores, composers’ intentions and the role of tradition; assumptions made about students’ skills; and competing visions about what should be prioritised within students’ musical development. This thesis proposes that by examining these factors, students and their educators can gain insights into underlying interpretative influences. This may, in turn, allow students to better understand the skills needed to take greater ownership of their own musical development and to successfully navigate their role as performers.