ABSTRACT
This chapter begins by considering the possibility for developing ‘an episteme' for music in secondary school. Developing an episteme involves considering the unfashionable idea of musical universals. From a realist position, the chapter argues that discipline-derived subject concepts can provide a map of the subject from which teachers can ‘attach' varied content. A more recent concept-based approach to curriculum is found in the work of Erickson and Lanning and Stern et al. Tonality is an example of a concept that could be considered a primary generative mechanism in music – a music sub-system of meaning with an irrelated web of inferential concepts. Hijleh's notion of qualified universals seems a very sensible place to start. Without a common framework to begin our thinking, there can be no cross-cultural understanding and communication.
