Methodologies and practices in contemporary music teaching in Spanish professional and higher music conservatories

Abstract

The 20th and 21st centuries have witnessed the creation of musical works that have explored new expressive, technical, and sonorous horizons, giving rise to what is called contemporary music. This music constitutes a cultural heritage of great value, which should be known, studied and disseminated in Spanish music conservatories, both professional and higher, in order to adequately train new generations of musicians, creators and educators. The present research aims to analyse the methodologies and practices used in the teaching of contemporary music in Spanish professional and higher conservatories. For this purpose, a theoretical framework and state of the art on the use of contemporary music in conservatory classrooms is made, and resources, different uses and implementation of this stage of the history of music used by teachers in these educational centres are analysed. The research instrument was a questionnaire designed ad hoc and there was a sample of 113 participants. The results obtained show that conservatory teachers do not make intensive use of the contents of contemporary music, although listening is the most used teaching methodology. Those with a higher conservatory degree, with postgraduate degrees and with less professional experience are those who most encourage the use of music from this musical stage. Alternative materials to the textbook are quite frequent, especially in this type of teachers. The representation of women composers in the programs is quite scarce, with a predominance of composers who belong to the historical canon in the different manuals, although sometimes recently composed pieces by women composers are used.