If you are like many students (music majors not included) you will likely need to turn to your trusty search engine to understand the joke being made here. It seems normal, right? Why would you know an obscure fact about two composers? Music is an esoteric thing, totally uninfluenced by history, just an independent form of entertainment, right?
Unfortunately, many history teachers are not qualified to add music history to their curriculum, and many of them probably would not see the value of doing so, especially at a time when they are under so much pressure to meet standards. I would like to make a case for including the history of music in standard social studies curriculum. Now, I am not asking social studies teachers to take in depth courses in counterpoint and partwriting, rather that they familiarize themselves with important works, and take the time to learn their basic characteristics, and how they have been influenced by, or even infuenced, history.
Take a lesson on Charlemagne and the Holy Roman Empire for example. Were I to teach this lesson, I would, of course, include standard facts about Charlemagne, his birth/death dates, the fact that he found education to be an imortant virtue, and was thus somewhat of a bright spot in the dark ages. I would, however, include the somewhat less standard fact that Charlemagne used the standardization of Gregorian chant in his empire as a means of unifying those under his rule. This was not only politically significant, it is musically significant as well, since Western music, and by that I mean popular genres like jazz, rock, or hiphop as well as classical, developed out of this tradition.
It seems a little farfetched to use Gregorian chant to interest students in a lesson, I understand. I have noticed, though, that music of any kind tends to catch students' attention, and many students will really buy into it if you can demonstrate how what you are showing them relates to what they love to listen to. It also can help them to connect more personally to historical events or social climates. Take the following example:
As a high school student I took a European history class. As we learned about the events of World War Two, we often wondered how anti-Semitism could be as widespread as it was. It was not until my music history courses in college that I learned that anti-Semitism was quite common throughout the 19th and into the 20th century. Richard Wagner was an outspoken anti-Semite, giving the villains in his operas stereotypical "Jewish" characteristics. Gustav Mahler, who somewhat ironically was Jewish, grew up listening to, and came to greatly admire, Wagner's work. Mahler struggled against anti-Semitism throughout his life, going so far as to convert to Catholicism to obtain the directorship of the Hofoper, which he directed for ten years dispite pressure from anti-Semitic forces in the Vienna press. This occurred between 1897 and 1907, so it is not so hard to imagine how this same anti-Semitism could be a pervasive influence in Germany and Austria.
When presented, at least occasionally, through the lens of music, students can contextualize historical events or social climates in meaningful ways. Historic events may take on a new meaning when viewed from te perspective of a piece they inspired, or a composer whose work was shaped by them. Music doesn't have to be something that is relegated to a room in the far corner of the school, it permeates or society, why not our schools?
I had no idea Wagner was an anti-Semite. I just recently learned that Luther wrote a lot of anti-Semitic things too, something that I never learned about in my history textbooks in high school and college.
ReplyDeleteI taught in a summer program one summer and taught a "history through music" course...being a history major and not a music one. We did things like listen to slave songs and talk about their message and what they indicated about slavery and the role of Christianity for slaves; we listened to music from the World Wars and talked about gender roles and nationalism; we listened to Vietnam War music; etc. If I had had more music background, I think a more in-depth analysis of musical technique, and not just the lyrics, would have benefited my students too...but mostly we just focused on the words. Anyway, all to say, I totally agree with you that music in almost any form is a great hook. Even Gregorian chants. I think it would be very interesting if you could pair up with a history teacher and co-teach a history/music special topics course, or even co-teach a few lessons together in a regular unit. If you work at the college level, this is definitely possible...but it may even work at an innovative high school.
Thanks for another great posting.