In forwarding comprehensive popular music pedagogies, music educators might acknowledge and address expanded notions of composition in popular music that include processes of recording, engineering, mixing, and producing along with the technologies, techniques, and ways of being musical that encompass these processes. This article advances a perspective of popular music pedagogy that is situated in the role production plays in contemporary music-making. Drawing upon a single intrinsic case study focusing on secondary students’ creation and production of popular music, as well as theoretical frameworks that highlight recording, mixing, and production processes, this article provides an expanded perspective of composition and songwriting within a popular music context and proposes related pedagogical considerations. Themes addressed include: developing a theoretical framework within music education that addresses the role of production in contemporary music-making, expanding notions of aural skills and music literacy appropriate for producing popular music, and incorporating production processes in music classrooms.
AbramoJ. M. (2011). Gender differences of popular music production in secondary schools. Journal of Research in Music Education, 59(1), 21–43.
2.
AiryS.ParrJ. M. (2001). MIDI, music and me: Students’ perspectives on composing with MIDI. Music Education Research, 3(1), 41–49.
3.
DavisS. G. (2005). “That thing you do!”: Compositional processes of a rock band. International Journal of Education and the Arts, 6(16). Retrieved from http://www.ijea.org/v6n16/
4.
EnoB. (2008). The studio as compositional tool. In CoxC.WarnerD. (Eds.), Audio culture: Readings in modern music (pp. 127–130). New York, NY: Continuum.
5.
FolkestadG.HargreavesD.LindströmB. (1998). Compositional strategies in computer-based music-making. British Journal of Music Education, 15(1), 83–97.
6.
GallM.BreezeN. (2005). Music composition lessons: The multimodal affordances of technology. Educational Review, 57(4), 415–433.
7.
GallM.BreezeN. (2008). Music and eJay: An opportunity for creative collaborations in the classroom. International Journal of Educational Research, 47, 27–40.
8.
GeertzC. (1973). The interpretation of cultures. New York, NY: Basic Books.
9.
GlaserB.StraussA. (1967). Discovery of grounded theory. Chicago, IL: Aldine.
10.
GracykT. (2004). Popular music: The very idea of listening to it. In RodriguezC. X. (Ed.), Bridging the gap: Popular music and music education (pp. 51–70). Reston, VA: MENC.
11.
GreenL. (2002). How popular musicians learn: A way ahead for music education. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate.
12.
GreenL. (2008). Music, informal learning and the school: A new classroom pedagogy. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate.
13.
HickeyM. (2009). At-risk teens: Making sense of life through music composition. In KerchnerJ. L.AbrilC. R. (Eds.), Musical experience in our lives: Things we learn and meanings we make (pp. 199–215). New York, NY: Rowman & Littlefield Education.
JaffursS. (2004). The impact of informal music learning practices in the classroom, or how I learned how to teach from a garage band. International Journal of Music Education, 22(3), 189–200.
16.
KaschubM.SmithJ. (2009). Minds on music: Composition for creative and critical thinking. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Education.
17.
KingA. (2008). Collaborative learning in the music studio. Music Education Research, 10(3), 423–438.
18.
KingA.VickersP. (2007). Problem solving with learning technology in the music studio. Journal of Music, Technology, and Education, 1(1), 57–67.
19.
MeintjesL. (2005). Reaching “overseas”: South African sound engineers, technology, and tradition. In GreeneP. D.PorcelloT. (Eds.), Wired for sound: Engineering and technologies in sonic cultures (pp. 23–46). Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press.
20.
MellorL. (2008). Creativity, originality, identity: Investigating computer-based composition in the secondary school. Music Education Research, 10(4), 451–472.
21.
MooreB. (2003). The birth of song: The nature and nurture of composition. In HickeyM. (Ed.), Why and how to teach music composition (pp. 193–207). Reston, VA: MENC.
22.
MoorefieldV. (2005). The producer as composer: Shaping the sounds of popular music. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
23.
PorcelloT. (2005). Music mediated as live in Austin: Sound, technology, and recording practice. In GreeneP. D.PorcelloT. (Eds.), Wired for sound: Engineering and technologies in sonic cultures (pp. 103–117). Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press.
24.
SavageJ. (2005a). Information communication technologies as a tool for re-imagining music education in the 21st century. International Journal of Education and the Arts, 6(2). Retrieved from http://www.ijea.org/v6n2/
25.
SavageJ. (2005b). Working towards a theory for music technologies in the classroom: How pupils engage with and organize sounds with new technologies. British Journal of Music Education, 22(2), 167–180.
26.
SavageJ.ChallisM. (2001). Dunwich revisited: Collaborative composition and performance with new technologies. British Journal of Music Education, 18(2), 139–149.
27.
SchippersH. (2010). Facing the music: Shaping music education from a global perspective. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
28.
SeddonF. A. (2006). Collaborative computer-mediated music composition in cyberspace. British Journal of Music Education, 22(3), 273–283.
29.
SödermanJ.FolkestadG. (2004). How hip-hop musicians learn: Strategies in informal creative music making. Music Education Research, 6(3), 313–326.
30.
StaufferS. L. (2001). Composing with computers: Meg makes music. Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education, 150, 1–20.
31.
TankelJ. D. (1990). The practice of recording music: Remixing as recoding. Journal of Communication, 40(3), 34–46.
32.
ThébergeP. (1997). Any sound you can imagine: Making music/consuming technology. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press.
33.
TobiasE. S. (2010). Crossfading and plugging in: Secondary students’ engagement and learning in a songwriting and technology class (Doctoral dissertation). Available from ProQuest Dissertations and Theses database. (UMI No. 3402496)
34.
TochonF. V. (2007). From video cases to video pedagogy: A framework for video feedback and reflection in pedagogical research praxis. In GoldmanR.PeaR.BarronB.DerryS. J. (Eds.), Video research in the learning sciences (pp. 53–65). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
35.
VäkeväL. (2009). The world well lost, found: Reality and authenticity in Green’s “new classroom pedagogy”. Action, Criticism & Theory for Music Education, 8(2), 1–28.
36.
WebsterP. R. (2007). Computer-based technology and music teaching and learning: 2000–2005. In BreslerL. (Ed.), International handbook of research in arts education (pp. 1311–1328). Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Springer.
37.
WigginsJ. (2007). Compositional process in music. In BreslerL. (Ed.), International handbook of research in arts education (pp. 453–470). Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Springer.
38.
Zagorski-ThomasS. (2008). The musicology of record production. Twentieth-century music, 4(2), 189–207.
39.
ZakA. (2001). The poetics of rock: Cutting tracks, making records. Berkeley: University of California Press.
