ABSTRACT
Composing projects run by professional composers in cooperation with educators deal with ambiguously defined roles and role conflicts. We will draw on interview data in order to analyze different role assignments and role expectations within the relational triangle composer–teacher–student. Niklas Luhmann’s sociological systems theory provides the theoretical background for identifying deep-seated structural problems and discursive tensions concerned with the functional areas “art” and “education.” These structural conditions may be responsible for many challenges in collaborative composing projects such as tensions in the educational process.
