Early Years Music Study Tour to Budapest; February 2012

Reflections on a week spent in Budapest observing and exploring Early Years music provision and practise.

I spent all of last week in Budapest on an Early Years study tour organised by the British Kodály Academy and the International Kodály Institute.  We had a fantastic week visiting a range of day-care nurseries (0-3yrs) and Kindergartens (3-6yrs) to observe music in action - all 29 of us!  There was much to see and much to discuss in the seminar sessions that followed.

Two things in particular were very evident from the start: The physical environment and the musical skills of the childcare staff. 

The whole atmosphere of the settings was calm with no blaring music or noisy electronic toys and it felt very much like a home environment.  There were plants everywhere and curatins at the windows.  The walls were plain with no bright colours and the furniture etc was wooden with very little plastic to be seen.  "Messy play" materials were also not in evidence and I assume that these were either outside or in a dedicated space elsewhere.

Some of the settings we went to were "normal" settings where the music session was led by the kindergarten teacher and some had a visiting music specialist.  What was patently clear was that all of the the childcare practitioners were confident and able to sing in tune and at an appropriate pitch.  Singing was very familiar to them.  The Kindergarten teachers also played a folk song in an instrument for the children to listen to: All applicants for general Kindergarten training in Hungary must be able to play an instrument and to sing in tune.

The content of the sessions was a delight and the children obviously thought so too!  There were lots of rhythmical rhymes as well as songs and all were used imaginatively with a storiy  or a game attached.  The popular image of Kodály songs sees the so-mi interval (falling minor 3rd ) dominating.  This was certainly not the case in any of the settings.  It was there to be heard where the aim was to improve pitching but in general the tone sets were much more varied inclusing a smattering of diatonic phrases.  The leader also played a folk song on their instrument for the children to listen to and then sang it with the other staff joining in.  The children were totally spellbound!

So, my thoughts after Hungary so far...  Be more imaginative with pentatonic tonesets to offer a more varied musical palate; Learn more English folksongs; play folksongs on my viola more often with the children and learn the words to sing; find some new rhythmical rhymes to use and play more often with improvised 4 beat rhythmic phrases verbally (echo/question & answer).

The whole week was a fabulous experience that I can thoroughly recommend.  There is another week planned in October for Primary age organised by National Youth Choir of Scotland and the BKA Early Years tour will be repeated either February 2013 or 2014.