Take Note: Wiltshire Music Connect publish key findings from consultation.
‘Music is the best thing I do. My favourite memories are centred around music, as well as my closest friends met through it. Writing and performing is an incomparable experience and I am so grateful that it is part of my life’.
‘I have always been in love with music and without it I think I would be lost’.
‘I love music - because homework ruins my life, and music lets me escape’.
These are just a few of the things that children and young people told us about music making as part of Take Note, a county-wide consultation with children and young people about music making. 769 children, young people, parents and carers took part in the consultation through focus groups, written questionnaires, an online survey, one to one interviews and case studies.
Myself and Jane Harwood were commissioned by Wiltshire Music Connect as freelance consultants to find out young people’s opinions, needs and aspirations in order to influence the Hub’s planning, partnership working and use of resources. We used research questions to explore 7 themes and presented 10 key findings:
- Young people’s awareness of how music contributes to their well-being, from helping them to deal with stress and emotions, to being a way of making new friends, was very high. They value music as a creative activity and as a way to express themselves. These views were expressed consistently by all the groups of children and young people who took part and through all data collection methods.
- Children and young people who are doing lots of music making outside of school have an appetite to do more. They want to explore a wider range of ensembles and performance opportunities, and to try new instruments. Their experiences of music making gives them greater perceptions of what is possible.
- Young people really value having places where the can make music informally with their peers. This includes using practice rooms at school during lunchtimes and using other rehearsal spaces to play in bands. They also want more opportunities to perform to an audience.
- The needs and interests of some of the targeted groups of children (young carers, those with health needs, young people with SEN) are no different to other young people: they want to try new things, make more music, and they recognise that music contributes to their well-being.
- Music in schools was generally spoken of positively although some older young people had issues with being taught about genres and instruments which didn’t interest them, particularly classical music and recorders. Some young people were critical of the school music curriculum, particularly concerned GCSE music. Another issue raised about music at schools was a school informing students that A level music would not be offered if student numbers were low.
- In all of the primary schools who were involved in the consultation, children have access to lots of different music making opportunities within school, but there is a large contrast in the outside of school music making which children are doing. Significantly fewer children at primary schools in Tidworth and Melksham are doing music outside of school, compared with children at primary schools in Salisbury.
- The provision of non-formal music making opportunities, and those which focus on rock and pop genres, is patchy. In some community areas, local providers have replaced music making opportunities which were formerly offered by Youth Centres, whilst in other areas, this has not happened.
- The progression of young people whose musical interests are outside of western classical music and the school music curriculum, does not appear to receive the same support from music educators as young classical musicians receive.
- The greatest barrier to music making which children and young people spoke about was financial. The majority of comments about finances concerned the cost of lessons. The second most common issue around finances was the cost of instruments and equipment. Other issues which were mentioned less frequently were the cost of rehearsal and recording facilities.
- The most common ways children and young people find out about music is from their family, their school teachers and instrumental teachers, and social media. Facebook is the predominant social media site young people use to find out about music – other platforms were mentioned infrequently. Some parents felt that they lacked information about opportunities which are available and that they didn’t know how to find out.
There’s more information about Wiltshire Music Connect’s response to the consultation findings on their website, including an infographic summary. The full report is available by contacting Nick Howdle in the Wiltshire Music Connect Team.
www.wiltshiremusicconnect.org.uk