Music Literacy: More Than Reading and Writing
By Majella Boland, Music Literacy Ireland
The outcome
As you read this you are using a skill that was developed gradually over years. You recognise the letters, but you are probably thinking more in words. The words form sentences and they have meaning for you. You know when to pause, you know where the emphasis on words is, and you aren’t consciously thinking about it . . . although you might be now. You are probably reading this in silence, but you can imagine the sound of the words without having to say them aloud. And if you are reading this out to someone with similar ability to you, aurally, they will be able to process what you are saying and make sense of it; they might even visualise the words and if asked to jot down some notes they will know how to write what it is you are saying. Now, if I were to ask you what literacy is, you might say reading and writing, and rightly so because this is how it is understood in a general sense; at the same time, you might say it with an understanding that your road to literacy didn’t just start with reading a book and writing words; you acknowledge there was a process.
The process
In primary schools, children learn to match sounds to letters. They learn to recognise these letters visually and are also taught how to write them. They put the letters together to form words and eventually they learn about sentences, including capital letters, commas, and full stops. When they start to read, sounding out the letters and words becomes the focus; immediate recognition of the words comes later and eventually gets quicker. In time, the flow and meaning of the sentences are worked on, at which point the reader can focus on getting into character and storytelling. Questions are asked to gauge comprehension of a topic or story, while teachers build students’ vocabulary, assessing accuracy and aural recognition in various ways, which might include a spelling test –a form of dictation essentially. All of this is systematically approached over many years until we get to the point where we can communicate by various means and also read and write in such an automatic, unconscious way that it becomes a tool to explore different subject matters; in other words, reading and writing goes beyond decoding letters into sound.
The start
Now, let’s go back one step further again: children arrive in school with a number of years’ speaking under their belt, during which time they are likely to have been exposed to books: looking at pictures in a book, discussing what is happening in them (including references to colours and numbers), while also having the story read to them by someone else. The first letter of their name might be pointed out in stories, the child might be encouraged to sound it aloud, to think about words that start with this letter or sound, while finding/identifying a specific letter in the story might even become a game. All of this might be further reinforced by children’s T.V. programmes, if watched, that might be educational in nature.
The child’s ability to talk, interact with people, and express their feelings was not impacted by the fact they didn’t read or write; but reading and writing will change how they continue to engage with and acquire information, how they communicate, and it will provide opportunities going forward. To reiterate, the child did not start with reading a storybook by themselves, it was a process, an important part of which was aural awareness, speaking, observing, and exploring. Music literacy is no different.
Defining literacy in music
Music literacy is difficult to define, and in a discipline that involves various types of engagement, perhaps part of the difficulty lies in looking for a definition. Yet, similar to language, it is frequently understood in terms of reading and, specific to music, it also seems to be understood as theory.1 Although parallels are often drawn between language and music, no more than I have done with opening this blog post, there are also notable differences regarding how we think about literacy in both contexts.
In language we expect the ability to read and write to be part of the process, in music its function is often contested. In language, we don’t think of reading a book or following a textbook as the starting point for developing literacy (though this might happen more in second-language acquisition2); one of the misconceptions surrounding literacy in music appears to be that the process often focuses on reading as a starting point as opposed to playing (if this is the case, the process needs consideration, not the literacy). In English, we use the Latin alphabet, but understanding this alphabet does not mean we can automatically speak German or French too. Similarly, reading music is more than just notation and recognising pitch names; it also requires an understanding of pulse, rhythm, and key.3 In language, parents expect their children to learn how to read and write over time, in music, there is often an expectation that children should be playing a piece of music immediately. What I mean by this is that there is sometimes pressure on teachers to produce “results”, which may be accompanied by the phrase ‘I’m just doing this for fun’; this tends to crop up if the focus is not solely on a piece of music and where the development of other skills might at first seem unrelated to the process for the student. It is not uncommon for students to attend lessons with the intention of learning a specific piece of music straight away; even though you probably wouldn’t seek Russian lessons with the goal of being able to read War and Peace in the original language, while working on the assumption that achieving this will mean you only focus on the book itself. Elsewhere, there is an expectation that students should be doing exams within a short period of time of starting lessons; it’s about getting through the grades. In primary school, time is dedicated to learning language, while with music (be it a primary school or music school), there often isn’t the same luxury of time.
To compare or not to compare, that is the question.
All things considered then, is it fair to compare language and music as much as we do? And if so, can we really make comparisons if it is a case that we pick and choose the parts we compare? And could it be that we arrive at the first music lesson in not too dissimilar a place to a child’s first day at primary school? What I mean by this is that references are often made to the fact that we don’t start reading and writing first, we learn how to speak; the discussion then is, why should it be different in music? I’m not sure it is as different as portrayed. Story books have music built into them, there are many toys with musical focus, children’s T.V. programmes contain a lot of music, children learn to sing nursery rhymes, they might even be put to sleep with a lullaby, while learning words and numbers are often achieved through song. Music is present in our daily lives in some shape or form. It is an important part of childhood and children tend to respond to music from a very young age through movement and through their voice; the voice is an instrument. So, if we arrive with music and speaking at a somewhat comparable level on entering school, why are there such contrasting conversations regarding language and music?
Tuition vs Perception
It is the role of the teacher to guide the student musically, to assess where they are, make connections with their musical experiences, develop literacy to enhance engagement with music, and make the process as meaningful as possible. Due to lack of time and, in some cases, unrealistic expectations about music tuition, it’s easy to see how the paths of language and music begin to diverge, and with it so do processes. In addition, music literacy, or rather how we think about it, unfortunately tends to conjure up images of elitism and too often, unhelpful categorisations in music emerge: those that read music and those that play by ear; those that got lessons and those that are self-taught; those that play “classical” and those that play pop, etc. The us-versus-them comparisons are not helpful and only serve to widen the gap between different types of music-making and experiences. At the end of the day, it’s all music. Can’t we learn from each other, rather than pointing fingers?
What gets lost in these debates then is the diversity of music and how personal it can be. There should be space for whatever way you want to engage with it. Furthermore, regardless of what music you play, literacy, in the broader sense, is required, and as long as you are developing musically, you are engaging in a process of increasing literacy. My point is: literacy is not just reading notation and learning theory. And while certain types of music-making and tuition has in some cases gone hand in hand with privilege, literacy, by itself, or reading music, is not elitist; it is important to make a distinction between the two.4 If you do engage with music and have a certain level of literacy, building on that literacy, if there is scope to do so and if you feel like you want to, is a worthwhile venture, for reasons I’ll address later.
Aural literacy
Learning by ear is a significant part of music-making; it is also a type of literacy. In Ireland, trad. music is widely known and is based on an aural tradition. Not reading music in this context doesn’t mean the musicians aren’t musically literate, they have an aural literacy. What’s more, playing by ear or reading the music from a score doesn’t change the tune or the fact that it is still music. And in playing this music, reference is made to a key, different styles, ornamentation, cues are followed to start a tune, musicians play reels and jigs, while a guitar might accompany with chords. By engaging in this practice, trad. musicians are using pulse, grouping, rhythm, melody, harmony, etc. Musically, this needs to be internalised whether you play by ear or read from a score.
In recent years, a student of mine, about 16-years old, was also a self-taught guitarist and a member of a band. He decided he wanted to learn how to read music because he wanted to be able to explore more and he also wanted to be able to write down his musical ideas. In order to do all of this he decided he’d like to take up the piano. I assessed him, we talked about expectations, and we put a plan in place. He progressed with reading music and theory very quickly, but reading music and doing theory didn’t just involve learning pitch names and terminology, we did aural training and talked about styles and character and we looked at YouTube clips together and discussed pieces of music he wanted to play. He was curious, it was great!
He was surprised at his progress though, probably because he had brought a number of preconceived ideas about his ability to the lesson (due to being self-taught), but he had also brought preconceived ideas about his friends who learned music with a teacher and took exams. This perception was not positive, and I explained that the exam itself or reading music was unlikely to be the cause of what he felt was his peers’ inability to perform. My work with him was to join the dots, so to speak, and put a structure in place to get him to where he wanted to be.
Soon, he realised that his progress was due to the fact that he was making connections with what he already knew. He was bridging gaps and joining his musical experiences together. He enjoyed the process, was intrigued to learn more about the chords that he played on the guitar (something that, for him, were just letter names and shapes before this), and overall, he felt it was enhancing his musical experience. He realised that musicians who learn and play by ear are not engaging in a random process. He also realised that he was still playing the same music, he was merely accessing and thinking about it in another way.
Alternative notation
It’s important to take a moment to consider notation and its role in music tuition. Despite what could be described in some cases as opposition to music literacy, musicians often lean towards notation as a means to record or learn music. Although trad. music is an aural tradition, getting lessons in trad. music is common. When I was younger, I also learned trad. music. I had a copybook in which my teacher wrote out tunes in letters, letters that also exist on the stave. My nephew currently takes guitar lessons and relies on chord names that are written over lyrics, chords that also exist on a stave. My time as senior examiner in the RIAM saw me working closely with the guitar community where tab is widely used to play music, music that can also be written out on a stave. In this case, not being able to read music staff notation, does not mean that people don’t see the value in recording music by alternative means. Notation gives us access to music.
Whatever way the person engages with accessing music, we come back to the fact that it is all music, where often there is common ground. The teacher will point out and assist the student in becoming aware of aspects, where appropriate, such as rhythm, pulse, key, melody, while the self-taught musician, through exploration will end up doing the same. Literacy from this perspective could be viewed as knowledge of structure (no matter what music you play). If music literacy is considered unnecessary, many musicians are being misrepresented, and music literacy is being misunderstood.
Other literacies: climate, financial, media, digital . . .
At the start of the blog, I highlighted that reading and writing was much more than recognising symbols on a page. For now, let’s step away from literacy as reading, writing, and (for music) theory to think about this and to how literacy is understood in other contexts. As examples, climate literacy, financial literacy, media literacy, and digital literacy are worth considering; I have chosen these because they have cropped up in my environment a number of times in recent years. Below are some definitions.
Climate literacy is a subset of science literacy. Science literacy ‘refers to the skills, knowledge, and attitudes of the inquiry- or problem-based approaches that individuals apply to decision-making and new situations.’ Climate in particular ‘draws on climate science . . . and the interconnectedness of human beings with their environment’.5 Financial literacy has been defined as ‘the effective use of financial skills and knowledge to manage financial resources in a way that maximizes lifelong financial security.’6 Similar to music literacy, defining media literacy is not so straightforward. On closer inspection, scholars have noted a ‘shared vision’ among definitions where ‘media literacy is concerned with empowering individuals to understand the mass media better and to use that increased understanding to take more control over their media exposure habits, to analyze the meaning in media messages more carefully, and thereby simultaneously to protect themselves from potentially negative effects and enhance the media’s positive effects.’7 Digital literacy has been defined ‘as the complementary and interwoven skills, both technical and social, that people must employ when using Internet-based communication – including hypertext, images, audio, and video – to consume and create messages across a variety of academic, civic, and cultural contexts.’8
The language used in these definitions indicate that the goal of literacy in these contexts is to navigate disciplines, to understand more about them, to enhance how you interact with them, to help you become more independent, and to benefit you. The use of words such as skills, knowledge, application, understanding, meaning, taking control, manage, complementary, and interconnectedness presents literacy in a way that promotes engagement and meaning. Thinking of music literacy in this way, the focus shifts from notation to meaning and communication, where notation is perceived as a tool that allows the musician to acquire information, to become an independent learner, to enhance their aural skills, to learn more about music, and so on.
Even if we were also to consider literacy in the general sense of reading and writing in this way, we then ask the question, reading and writing for what purpose? We read and write to communicate and to convey meaning. It takes time to get there but the goal is to communicate and learn. It is not a redundant exercise. In music, understanding theory for example, is not about learning definitions or terminology, it is also about exploring meaning.
What is equally clear is that for financial, media, digital, and climate literacy, reading and writing is considered a precursor to developing literacies in these disciplines. If this is the case, might it be more appropriate to think of music literacy in a similar vein?
To answer this, let’s return to the music lesson. Parents often ask at what age their child should take up an instrument. While there is no set age, and it depends on the method, the child, and the teacher, as a general response, the answer tends to be that it is best to “start” learning music (though keep in mind I don’t feel we only start music when we attend a music school) is when children have had time to develop writing and reading skills in school. In which case, reading, writing, and theory can be understood as tools to navigate the complex world of music. Music is not only about performing (though a major part of it) in the same way that finance is not only about spending money; music comprises many parts (composing, performing, listening, reading, writing, analysing, thinking) and it is the interconnectedness of those parts that gives us insight into music and the world in which it exists.
So, what does it all mean?
Thinking of literacies in the plural then, highlights various layers within and the multi-faceted nature of literacy. The child in the classroom does not become literate on one day, but each day their level of literacy may increase. What I mean by this is that nobody has ever woken up and said, ‘I am now literate’ or ‘I am not at all literate’. If you are passionate about a topic, you may seek to deepen your knowledge about it and you never get to the end. Inevitably, one person will have a higher level of literacy than the other.
In music, if you don’t feel the need to read notation, that is okay. If you are not interested in knowing more about theory, then that is okay too. If you don’t want to write down music you compose or that you hear, that is also okay. If you choose to learn music in a way that works best for you, again that is okay. What I do not advocate, however, is opposing something or aiming to devalue one level of literacy or even music over another, and certainly not if devaluing is based on mere assumptions or bias.
Literacy is structure, literacy helps you become more independent, literacy is connecting information and making meaning from it, literacy is communicating, literacy requires skill, literacy is a tool, literacy is access, literacy provides opportunities. It should reduce barriers, not create them. All of this applies to music. Earlier, I mentioned that if you have scope to build on your literacy, it is a worthwhile venture. And if you have felt that music literacy is something that’s not for you, something unnecessary, something elitist, I hope this blog has gone some way towards convincing you otherwise; if only because if you are reading this as a self-taught musician, you do have a level of literacy. There is so much music out there, there can’t ever possibly be a one-size-fits-all approach, nor would that be healthy or representative of the world, and that is not what music literacy sets out to achieve; there’s space for everyone.
The outcome
I opened the blog by drawing your attention to what you were doing while you were reading it. You were able to read without thinking, including the emphasis on words, understanding of capital letters, commas, and full stops. You were reading sentences and understanding the meaning rather than just seeing symbols. You didn’t need to say it out loud to hear what it sounded like because you could imagine the sound in your head. If you did say it out loud, someone of similar ability to you listening would be able to process what you were saying aurally. With time you can read by getting into character and tell stories effectively. You may even make up your own stories. In language, reading and writing in this way is generally referred to as literacy, but it is acknowledged that getting to that point of understanding the meaning and of internalising the sound took time; it involved a process, it is multi-faceted. Reading and writing then is much more than one or two actions.
In music, it is the same. There are different types of literacy and different levels of literacy, and if you are reading music you are engaging in a practice that is much more than what it is often considered to be; the manner in which reading music is frequently understood, unfortunately brings to mind games like whack-a-mole. If this is how you have experienced it or perceive it, then the process might need consideration. Reading is internalising the music, responding to it, getting meaning from it, communicating that meaning, getting into character, and telling a story. You don’t have to read music to achieve this, but reading is another valuable layer. If you are connecting all the parts of music together and are reading music, then you are hearing the sound in your head without relying on an instrument and that, no more than in language, takes time and is a process. And no more than with climate literacy, where general language literacy is used as a tool to explore more about the subject, so too in music, reading and listening are tools, the application of which helps you to explore and understand more about the discipline.
Hopes for music literacy
Maybe if we had more conversations, where we actually heard and learned from each other, we would see literacy as important to keeping music alive, to supporting teachers, to providing the best experience for students, and to learning about culture the world over. We just might start to see literacy as a tool as well as the value of literacy regardless of the genre, of how you engage with music, and of how deep you’d like to dive into the discipline. Conversations might also help change perceptions and expectations from music lessons. We might ask ourselves, music literacy for what purpose? And in doing so, acknowledge that it is a meaningful process and one that requires time.
- In a survey by Music Literacy Ireland (2020) to instrumental music teachers and post-primary music teachers, music literacy was generally understood in 2 ways: 34% referred to it as theory, 55.5% referred to it as the ability to read.
- I’m referring to 2nd language in the broadest sense of learning a new language as opposed to a new language for a person who is bilingual or trilingual.
- Having assessed up to 14k candidates collectively, 79% of 29 Instrumental examiners for private exam boards felt that sight-reading was one of the biggest challenges for candidates. In this case, candidates tend to focus on pitch recognition rather than the various parts that are required to read music effectively.
- This topic is much more complicated and cannot be sufficiently addressed in a blog post. The aim of this blog post is to focus on music literacy, its benefits, and as a tool for all.
- Oxford Bibliographies. ‘Climate Literacy and Education’.
- Oxford Bibliographies. ‘Financial Literacy and Social Work’.
- Oxford Bibliographies. ‘Media Literacy’.
- Oxford Bibliographies. ‘Digital Literacy’.