[CAUT] CAUT credential vs. academic program?

[Fred Sturm]

On 11/5/07 3:00 PM, "Jeff Tanner" <jtanner at mozart.sc.edu> wrote:

> Someone who holds a music degree has merely demonstrated that they can absorb
> material long enough to regurgitate it on an exam, and that they have shown
> some degree of incremental improvement in musical ability over a 2 or 4 year
> period, that they have attended a certain number of performances per term and
> have been present and accounted for in at least one performing ensemble each
> term.  It has not made them musical if they were not already.

Hi Jeff,
    I was planning to sit this discussion out and let it die a merciful
death, but your ever more outrageous and ludicrous claims have finally got
to me. The above statement is mostly pure and simple crap. I¹ll grant the
point that a person has to have a degree of innate ³talent,² or however you
want to put that, to become a musician. I would describe it as a combination
of a good sense of rhythm and melody, an emotional connection to musical
sounds and phrases, with a necessary admixture of physical dexterity
(ability to learn complex and subtle physical actions of a number of kinds)
and an ability to concentrate and focus. In addition to this ³talent² mix, a
future musician needs ³desire,² which includes the obsessive wish to be able
to make music, and the persistence and self-discipline to pursue it.
³Talent² without ³desire² doesn¹t get very far. And there is another equally
important element: training. You cannot become a classical musician (I¹ll
leave aside other genres, as most of our institutions concentrate on
³classical²) without a very fine training background. Period.
    Now a music department can¹t take just anyone off the street and make
that person into a musician. Nor can a math department do the same and
create a mathematician. You have to have talent, desire, and training even
to get in the door. Once you are in the door, you are subjected to a
rigorous four years of very hard and tightly directed work (speaking only of
a bachelors degree). To give a small example, our basic two year theory
program (freshman and sophomore for all music majors) consists of five days
a week for the entire two years. Two days of written theory and analysis;
one day each of sight-singing/solfeggio, ear training/dictation, and piano
skills/harmony. Everyone goes through this. And let me tell you it is not a
walk in the park. You have to work your butt off to get through, and at the
end you have definitely learned a lot.
    That is one small element of our four year program, which includes a
fair amount of music history, additional theory and analysis, performance in
both solo and ensemble, etc. etc. Along the way, the student is repeatedly
tested and required to produce. Juries each semester. Degree recitals.
Ensemble performances. Papers. Quizzes and exams.
    As far as I am concerned, a bachelors degree in music from UNM means a
great, great deal more than your dismissive statement above implies. I¹m
sure programs vary, but I believe there is enough similarity to make that
statement for any accredited program. Are all graduates fine musicians? That
is arguable, depending on taste and definitions. But they have done far more
than the ³merely² you claim.

Regards,
Fred Sturm
University of New Mexico


    
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