‘I wish I’d had the chance to learn,’ is a phrase I have heard sadly, too often. Whether in the staff rooms of primary schools in the Eastern Neuk where I taught upper strings, or when I was performing across Scotland in the last few years, in mostly rural areas. I feel quite lucky: I get to be the professional, the one that brings music to schools as a part of the local authority’s Instrumental Music Service, and to stages, churches, and village halls. In performances, I am thanked by the audience members for travelling from Glasgow to their village, leading me to reflect these last several years, on how many people have shared how they would have liked to have learned a musical instrument, and never had the chance. This is often due to a lack of teachers in the area, supplies, support, accessibility, or all the above. Thus, they have accepted the status quo: that accessible music tuition in Scotland is just not accessible to all.
Young people fortunately can receive accessible music tuition in schools, largely thanks to the monumental movement in 2021 to make music tuition free by the SNP, pledging £18m annually. The focus on young people is undoubtedly important: music tuition provides numerous benefits including boosting performance in core subjects, self-esteem, motor skills, and improving socially. Wouldn’t adults benefit from this too?
Short answer – yes! Previous studies have shown that music learning in adults (especially the elderly) provides similar benefits. In urban or suburban areas, there are plenty of avenues for adults to take part in music, and so the focus should be on those who struggle to have access: young people or those in deprived areas. But in the rural areas of Scotland this is not the case. Getting to the community ensemble (if there is one) is a challenge (like needing to take the ferry!) or finding a teacher in the area may be next to impossible. That means a lot of the rural adult community is excluded. They are not in school, or near enough to learning or community opportunities.
Although I am not a popular music educator, and my background is in classical music, I resonate with the need to make all music, regardless of genre, open and accessible to all. My PhD research project, ‘CIMSRS’ is a pilot project in which I will provide free upper strings tuition to three rural communities: Millport, Isle of Great Cumbrae in North Ayrshire, Auchtermuchty in Fife, and Glencoe, Highlands divided in three, twelve-week sessions starting in autumn 2024. This will be open to all musical genres and focus on making tuition more accessible to adults who are excluded from music tuition based on geography.
I hope to discover what the impact of this experience is for participants and if it provides similar benefits children receive from the IMS in schools. This includes improvement in core subjects, health and wellbeing.
Another aim for this project is to create a design that remains sustainable post-research. The insight from this project will inform a framework that can be proposed to rural council areas: a community music service for adults as an extension of the existing IMS in schools. This could create a continuity for young people leaving school to continue learning and for rural inhabitants to access music tuition, thus widening the margin of beneficiaries. If more people are involved in tuition, and benefiting from it, this strengthens the argument to continue funding music education.
Rural Scotland Key Facts 2021, published by the Scottish Government, reports that seventeen percent of Scotland’s population is rural, and 98% of the actual land is rural; nearly a million people. Most will be over the age of forty-five in accessible rural areas (within thirty minutes [driving] of the nearest settlement of 10,000 or more) and over the age of 65 in remote rural areas (over thirty minutes [driving] from the nearest settlement of 10,000 or more). Imagine reaching a million more people with accessible music tuition! Impact will focus on the individual, but with time, research, and collaboration, we can make change for many.
This study is unique as there has not been previous research to show the impact of providing instrumental tuition to adults in rural Scottish communities, nor an initiative for community music operated like the Instrumental Music Services, or specific research on the benefits mirroring what young people receive in schools.
I hope that this project will improve our understanding of how music tuition being accessible to rural communities in Scotland can improve the wellbeing and quality of life of the participants as it does for those in urban and suburban areas, and young people in school. I also hope to discover the impact student-teacher collaborative learning with adults can establish a foundation for music making in these areas. I am dedicated to discovering how this research will inform to a framework that can provide tuition to adults in rural Scotland while contributing to the ongoing efforts in making music accessible, including for those excluded by geographic barriers.
Arianna Ranieri BMus, MMus, LRSM; is an Italian American violist and teacher of upper strings. Ranieri received her Bachelor’s Degree from Northern Kentucky University in 2017, and her Master of Music from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in 2021. She received her Licentiate of Instrumental Teaching from the ABRSM with a focus on tension eradication and informed pedagogy in 2023. She works as a freelance violist, teaches upper strings for Fife Music Service and privately, and is a doctoral research student at Edinburgh Napier University in the School of Arts and Creative Industries, her research focus on music education, pedagogy, and community music.
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Sources:
Drury, Rachel. The Wide Benefits of Instrumental Music Learning in Childhood, Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, 2015, pure.rcs.ac.uk/portal/files/2853145/The_wider_benefits_of_instrumental_music_learning_in_childhood_Drury_final.pdf.
Hallam, Susan, et al. “The Characteristics of Older People Who Engage in Community Music Making, Their Reasons for Participation and the Barriers They Face.” Journal of Adult and Continuing Education, vol. 18, no. 2, SAGE Publishing, Sept. 2012, pp. 21–43. https://doi.org/10.7227/jace.18.2.3.
Lehmberg, Lisa J, and C Victor Fung. Benefits of Music Participation for Senior Citizens: A Review of the Literature, University of Massachusetts – Amherst, USA; University of Florida – Tampa USA, 2010, cmer.arts.usf.edu/content/articlefiles/3122-MERI04pp.19-30.pdf.
“Rural Scotland Key Facts 2021.” Scottish Government, The Scottish Government, 14 July 2021, www.gov.scot/publications/rural-scotland-key-facts 021/#:~:text=Definition%20of%20Rural%20Scotland,population%20of%20less%20than%203%2C000.