Youngsters Making Music

Subject: RE: Youngsters Making Music
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 04 Sep 12 - 03:40 PM

Hank,
Not a criticism, just curious.
Why should everyone learn about music, have perfect pitch, learn to read music? Or is this just an opinion?

Subject: RE: Youngsters Making Music
From: theleveller
Date: 04 Sep 12 - 03:31 AM

Kids these days seem to have a much greater opportunity to learn an instrument than I did. My 12-year old daughter has had violin and cello lessons (but now opted for guitar and keyboard). When I was her age, fifty years ago, I never had the option. Wish I had!

Subject: RE: Youngsters Making Music
From: Allan Conn
Date: 04 Sep 12 - 02:50 AM

"81% of 16-24y.o. in Scotland not playing an instrument doesn't sound wide off the mark to me"

The point was though that it related back to another thread (Where Are The Youngster) where it was claimed that youngsters didn't participate in music when compared with older people. So the figure for youngsters may be low but the table stills shows that the figure for older people is a hell of a lot lower still. The amount of people aged 60 to 75 playing instuments within the last year was only 37% the figure for the younger age group! The figures don't relate to who can play - just who is actively picking an instrument up.

Subject: RE: Youngsters Making Music
From: GUEST,hank gurdjieff
Date: 03 Sep 12 - 11:34 AM

"19% of 16 to 24 year olds have played a musical instrument in the year. This drops gradually as people age reaching only 7% for those aged 60 to 74. Showing that the idea that young people aren't involved in making music is wide off the mark."

81% of 16-24y.o. in Scotland not playing an instrument doesn't sound wide off the mark to me. All children should be taught an instrument from the time they are very young and should be taught to read music in the same way they are taught to read words. Perfect pitch can be acquired, one does not have to be born with it, and those who acquire it were taught how to listen to music when they are very young (few adults can acquire it). The Japanese, for example, teach young children how to acquire perfect pitch in school. Worldwide, though, only about 1 in 10,000 people have perfect pitch and, of those, it occurs mostly in children trained in music from a young age. Perfect pitch is significantly higher in Asia than in Western nations although Ashkenazi Jews tend to have higher rates of perfect pitch than other Westerners comparable to levels found in Asia.

In the link below, America's most musical cities were calculated by taking 50,000 American artists and finding the city of origin and then using that to calculate the number of artists per 1000 residents. I can't vouch for the methodology used but the results are pretty barren. Beverly Hills, CA is the most musical city in the US according to this. With a population of 35,355, Beverly Hills averages only 3.14 artists per 1000 residents making about 111 artists in the city. Although I'm assuming they mean adult artists.

LA ranked #11 with a population of 3.877 million but only averages 1.24 artists per 1000 residents or about 4789 artists in the city. Amazingly, cities that have had such a huge impact on American music as Chicago, Detroit, New York and Memphis don't even rate on this list. Nashville is #3 on the list but only averages 1.68 artists per 1000 people.

Most musical cities in the US

If children have a higher rate of musicianship than older folk, that's really nothing to get encouraged about. It indicates that most will not stick with it. Indeed I know many people from my past who were musicians then who do not play now. But I do know some who have stuck with it. One is teaching his infant grandson to play guitar. He sits him on his knee and plays so they child will be familiar with the guitar when he's old enough to play one himself. He says he wants to train his grandson musically the way he wishes someone had trained him when he was that age. This is how EVERYBODY should learn about music but very few ever do.

Subject: Youngsters Making Music But Where's The Women
From: Allan Conn
Date: 02 Sep 12 - 07:09 PM

As a follow on to the Where Are The Youngsters thread I thought the results from the Scottish Household Survey might be of interest - especially in relation to playing musical instruments. 19% of 16 to 24 year olds have played a musical instrument in the year. This drops gradually as people age reaching only 7% for those aged 60 to 74. Showing that the idea that young people aren't involved in making music is wide off the mark.

Another interesting figure is when it is broken down to gender. For people of all ages 14% of males have played an instrument whilst only 7% of females have done so. Considering Scotland is awash with young female fiddlers I find this stat amazing. I suppose many women may simply give up their hobby to look after the family whilst perhaps men keep at it? I can't imagine far less women actually learn an instrument than men do! Thoughts?

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2012/08/5277/13


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