This study focuses on the uses and functions of music in the life of individuals in the province of Groningen at the beginning of the twenty-first century. The study is an ethnomusicological study representing the sub-discipline of ethnomusicology-at-home. It uses Andreas Reckwitz’ formulation of practice theory as a theoretical starting point and introduces methodological principles from the field of qualitative sociology. Central in the study is the individual. 30 theoretically sampled individuals recounted their musical biographies in narrative-biographical interviews, which were analyzed in detail and eventually led to a sufficiently suggested grounded theory of the uses and functions of music in Groningen AD 2010. The theory consists o three interrelated compartments. The first compartment contains a description o the uses o music a expressed b the interviewees. ‘Use’ refers t the ‘customary exercise o music’ i concrete musical social situations. The result o this study i of this study. The study describes how three cultural codes seem to be shared amongst many (though not all) of the interviewees: the codes of playing an instrument, craftsmanship, and musicality, together forming the supercode of the music specialist. These three more general codes are combined with two further codes to form the highly specific and culturally hegemonic musical subject culture of art music, expressing that music is a specialism; it is the craft of playing an instrument by talented individuals; that this craftsmanship must be combined with expressivity; and that through this form of specialized expression musical objects come into being which represent the ideal realm of the artistic. By discussing this attempt at a grounded theory of the uses and functions of music in Groningen AD 2010, a picture is delivered of how individuals become musical individuals. Through their musicking in the context of concrete musical social situations they use music for the functions of affirmation, connection and regulation of the self; and they do this in the context of a web of cultural codes labeling shared and disputed – and sometimes hegemonic – ways of doing and talking. An evaluation of the theory and methodology used in this study shows that both assist in further developing the field of ethnomusicology(-at-home); an evaluation of the results in the light of existing research shows that they contribute to further insights into the uses and functions of music. Four areas for further research are mentioned: typologizing the uses and functions of music, musical discourses, musical subject cultures, and the place of the musical subject order of art music in contemporary society. The study ends with a description of the possible implications for conservatoires. Conservatoires are recommended to encourage students to think of their future audiences in the broadest possible terms, taking into account the wide variety of uses and functions of music figuring in the daily lives of musicking individuals. They are encouraged to make students look upon themselves (also) as service providers, and as such to be open and non-judgmental in their relationships towards the musical other. Conservatoires are recommended to translate this into their curricula by devising transformative projects in which students meet ‘musical others’, and by encouraging their students to take their possible audiences into account consciously in any musical social situation they devise or find themselves in.
In the Netherlands, client and family participation in care for people with intellectual disabilities has been in vogue for a long time, and increasingly receives attention (KPMG and Vilans 2017). However, the perspective and experiential knowledge of service users and relatives is often still insuBiciently used for the co-creation of care. The professional perspective is often still dominant. In addition, professionals mainly focus on clients and less on relatives, even though relatives often play an important role in the client’s (quality of) life (Wiersma 2017). The project ‘Inclusive Collaboration in Disability Care’[1] (ICDC) focusses on enhancing equal communication between people with intellectual disabilities, their relatives, and professional caregivers, and hence contributes to redressing power imbalances in longterm care. It investigates the question: “How can the triangle of client, relative and professional caregiver together co-create better care and support?”.
Yo! Opera asked the Lectorate Lifelong Learning in Music to evaluate the project The Operaflat, which was part of the fourth edition of the Yo! Opera Festival in Utrecht, in 2007. During the project primary school pupils of the public primary school ‘Openbare Basisschool Overvecht’, residents of the ‘Operaflat’, vocal and composition students of a number of Dutch conservatoires and their teachers met during the performance of 25 mini operas that lasted one minute.Purpose of the research of the lectorate was monitoring and evaluating the dialogue between students and teachers of conservatoires on the one hand and the cooperation with a professional organisation (Yo! Opera) on the other hand.
The findings suggests that participation in music practices can significantly support caregivers' and nurses' contact with the people to whom they give care and the healthcare professionals' insights into the patients' and residents' personhood. Music can create experienced changes in the care environment through kairotic moments of connectivity and intimacy of the musical interaction. The music sessions support and reinforce the person-centred values of care delivery.The meaning of participatory music practices for the well-being and learning of healthcare professionals working with ageing patients and nursing home residents.
In leaving the more traditional territories of the concert performance for broader societal contexts, professional musicians increasingly devise music in closer collaboration with their audience rather than present it on a stage. Although the interest for such forms of devising co-creative musicking within the (elderly) health care sector is growing, the work can be considered relatively new. In terms of research, multiple studies have sought to understand the impact of such work on musicians and participants, however little is known about what underpins the musicians’ actions in these settings. With this study, I sought to address this gap by investigating professional musicians’ emerging practices when devising co-creative musicking with elderly people. Three broad concepts were used as a theoretical background to the study: Theory of Practice, co-creative musicking, and Praxialism. Firstly, I used Theory of Practice to help understand the nature of emerging practices in a wider context of change in the field of music and habitus of musicians and participants. Theory of Practice enabled me to consider a practice as “a routinized type of behaviour which consists of several elements, interconnected to one another: forms of bodily activities, forms of mental activities, ‘things’ and their use, a background knowledge in the form of understanding, know-how, states of emotion, and motivational knowledge” (Reckwitz, 2002, p. 249). Secondly, I drew the knowledge from co-creative musicking, which is a concept I gathered from two existing concepts: co-creation and musicking. Musicking (Small, 1998), which considers music as something we do (including any mode of engagement with music), provided a holistic and inclusive way of looking at participation in music-making. The co-creation paradigm encompasses a view on enterprise that consists of bringing together parties to jointly create an outcome that is meaningful to all (Prahalad & Ramaswamy, 2004; Ramaswamy & Ozcan, 2014). The concept served as a lens to specify the jointness of the musicking and challenge issues of power in the engagement of participants in the creative-productive process. Thirdly, Praxialism considers musicking as an activity that encompasses “musical doers, musical doing, something done and contexts in which the former take place” (Elliott, 1995). Praxialism sets out a vision on music that goes beyond the musical work and includes the meanings and values of those involved (Silverman, Davis & Elliott, 2014). The concept allowed me to examine the work and emerging relationships as a result of devising co-creative musicking from an ethical perspective. Given the subject’s relative newness and rather unexplored status, I examined existing work empirically through an ethnographic approach (Hammersley & Atkinson, 2007). Four cases were selected where data was gathered through episodic interviewing (Flick, 2009) and participant observation. Elements of a constructivist Grounded Theory (Charmaz, 2014) were used for performing an abductive analysis. The analysis included initial coding, focused coding, the use of sensitizing concepts (Blumer 1969 in Hammersley, 2013) and memoing. I wrote a thick description (Geertz, 1973) for each case portraying the work from my personal experience. The descriptions are included in the dissertation as one separate chapter and foreshadow the exposition of the analysis in a next chapter. In-depth study of the creative-productive processes of the cases showed the involvement of multiple co-creative elements, such as a dialogical interaction between musicians and audience. However, participants’ contributions were often adopted implicitly, through the musicians interpreting behaviour and situations. This created a particular power dynamic and challenges as to what extent the negotiation can be considered co-creative. The implicitness of ‘making use’ of another person’s behaviour with the other not (always) being aware of this also triggered an ethical perspective, especially because some of the cases involved participants that were vulnerable. The imbalance in power made me examine the relationship that emerges between musicians and participants. As a result of a closer contact in the co-creative negotiation, I witnessed a contact of a highly personal, sometimes intimate, nature. I recognized elements of two types of connections. One type could be called ‘humanistic’, as a friendship in which there is reciprocal care and interest for the other. The other could be seen as ‘functional’, which means that the relationship is used as a resource for providing input for the creative musicking process. From this angle, I have compared the relationship with that of a relationship of an artist with a muse. After having examined the co-creative and relational sides of the interaction in the four cases, I tuned in to the musicians’ contribution to these processes and relationships. I discovered that their devising in practice consisted of a continuous double balancing act on two axes: one axis considers the other and oneself as its two ends. Another axis concerns the preparedness and unpredictability at its ends. Situated at the intersection of the two axes are the musicians’ intentionality, which is fed by their intentions, values and ethics. The implicitness of the co-creation, the two-sided relationship, the potential vulnerability of participants, and the musicians’ freedom in navigating and negotiation, together, make the devising of co-creative musicking with elderly people an activity that involves ethical challenges that are centred around a tension between prioritizing doing good for the other, associated with a eudaimonic intention, and prioritizing values of the musical art form, resembling a musicianist intention. The results therefore call for a musicianship that involves acting reflectively from an ethical perspective. Doctoral study by Karolien Dons
Following the Samen met Muziek pilot research project in 2023-2024 in ZINN Zorg Short Stay rehabilitation departments in the locations De Brink and De Dilgt, REVA BEATS is a co-research project between the research group Music in Context and ZINN Zorg Short Stay departments revalidation of the location De Brink. In this mixed methods research, multiple research foci included: 1) aspects of care innovation and impact measurements will be researched by ZINN Zorg, and 2) aspects of musical expression, communication and wellbeing of musicians and participants, the entrepreneurial skills and development of musicians, and the learning and experiencing of collaborating care professionals will be explored by research group Music in Context. Additionally, there is a PhD-fellow from the HKU researching the practice through the lens of care ethics. The REVA BEATS project will run between February 2025-January 2027, and includes in total 12 music projects, while the preparational work of the projects has started in June 2024.
