ABSTRACT
University music education in the UK has undergone a history that is not directly shared elsewhere. In its most traditional form it reflected a Kapellmeister style of education, training all undergraduates in very specific skills such as harmony and counterpoint, demanding aural tests and keyboard skills. Music history was added to this, usually as an uncritical, factually-based study providing basic knowledge of the classical canon. Further possibilities included notation, composition, analysis and organology.
There is no doubt that this model has largely evaporated. Moreover, there has been an enormous growth in the relevance of other musics, whether popular, traditional or non-western. While students are no longer habitually fluent in western classical practice at entry into university, they bring a broad range of musical experiences and are usually open to different cultural and critical perspectives.
Should any elements be saved from the old Kapellmeister model? In the absence of any agreed cultural privilege for western art music, can there really be any justification for studying it in great technical detail? Or can its methods and ideologies play a part in modelling some of the disciplines demanded by the modern world?
