John Cleary is a peripatetic instrumental music teacher who has first-hand experience of the difficulties encountered by those required to integrate technology within conventional music teaching.

Technology in music teaching up to GCSE and beyond is officially endorsed and encouraged by all within education, which would appear to indicate that this is a healthy and productive time to be involved in this aspect of music teaching. Despite this, there appears to be no common approach to funding, and the situation, like the weather, is subject to great regional variation. If you teach in an area where little or no official money is available, life can be grim.

At the outset, there can be great confusion as to what kind of equipment is really necessary. In some cases music technology can simply mean bass, guitar, keyboard and microphones, all playing together through one mixer amplifier at an end-of-term concert. Even where equipment has been supplied, problems arise if the teaching staff lack technology training and experience. It is not uncommon to find items such as multitrack recorders under-used, or not used at all.

Budget restrictions are not the only reason for lack of funds. In some areas there may be a resistance to the whole idea of music technology on account of its early home-entertainment, pushbutton image or its pop music (and hence not to be taken too seriously) connotations. The prominence of Atari computers, strongly promoted by the manufacturers as games machines, can lend weight to this perception, though in reality, it is a very powerful and versatile computer, given its modest price. In addition, there is a view that providing fragile and expensive electronic items for children working alone or in very small groups is not an effective use of resources. As a result, the whole technology issue can easily become low-priority. At school level, this usually means a token portastudio and headphone set, plus a cheap microphone. If computer sequencing facilities exist at all, these are likely to use programs produced for the BBC, Nimbus or Archimedes machines — due to the prevalence of these computers in education rather than because of their suitability for the task. Any available keyboards will most probably have small keys and no MIDI, simply because these are cheaper.

Informed Choices

Starting off a project which attempts to tackle the problem adequately can seem rather like opening Pandora's box. Each item of equipment can have a whole range of options with many possible applications. Worse still, it rapidly becomes clear that many, if not all, of these are inter-dependent in some way. Further difficulties may arise if you are not aware that most currently-available technology was originally developed to meet the needs of the professional music and recording industry. Thus its educational use may well be appropriate but certainly not its prime purpose. This consideration may be reflected in how robust or otherwise certain pieces of equipment are when subjected to the rigours of school life.

One logical approach, should funding allow, would be to purchase an Atari computer with a sophisticated sequencing and score-writing program such as C-Lab's Notator or the lower-cost Notator Alpha educational version. Such a package is flexible enough to be used in the traditional areas of the curriculum for composing and scoring, as well as in contemporary sequencing and MIDI recording. To make use of this system, at least one MIDI-equipped synthesizer would be required (ideally a multi-timbral model capable of playing several differently-voiced parts at the same time) and a MIDI drum machine. Next on the list might be a high-speed multitrack recorder, with at least two microphones and a reverb unit. This would form the nucleus of a small recording studio. Some form of stereo amplifier/loudspeaker system is needed so that the work can be heard by the class and, in addition, a mixing console would allow the computer and MIDI instruments to be linked to the recorder, thus extending the possible applications of the system. This shows up one potential problem area already, because not all cassette multitrack machines are equipped to work with MIDI sync codes or have the facility to provide separate audio outputs for all the audio tracks, which would allow use with an external mixer.

"The shopping list comes to around £2500 — a heavy financial demand but no more than the likely cost of providing a very small school orchestra with budget instruments."

This underlines the need to contemplate your present and future needs before committing to specific items of equipment; if you can solicit the advice of someone experienced in this area, it could save a lot of frustration in the long run. Many teachers forget the potential advisory resource they have in the form of parents — many musicians have some form of recording equipment and are invariably happy to talk about it. Finally, a reasonable quality stereo cassette deck would be necessary to mix down the multitrack recording to the normal stereo cassette format.

The Budget

The above shopping list comes to around £2500 — a heavy financial demand, but no more than the likely cost of providing a very small school orchestra with budget instruments. Furthermore, it doesn't all have to be bought at once. When purchasing equipment, the specifications should be studied carefully in order to gain some understanding of the adaptability of each item. In this respect the cheapest can often turn out to be expensive if future expansion of your setup is restricted (by lack of adequate MIDI options, for example).

Second-hand purchases can be risky and of doubtful quality and reliability, but there are some worthwhile bargains obtainable when new equipment is updated. Again, parents or school car boot sales can turn up useful items, especially out-of-fashion hi-fi systems that can be used to play back recordings. The constant introduction of new models invariably reduces the price of older stock, and it is worth remembering that even these 'older' items may well be vastly more powerful than professional gear of around ten years ago.

A basic system as described (and most home enthusiasts would indeed consider this to be a pretty basic system) would allow young musicians to develop all the necessary music technology skills, while the computing and recording applications could equally be used to develop and reinforce traditional skills. Such separate and combined abilities are required now in modern music, and it seems the future belongs to musicians who can handle technology in a competent and creative manner. Encouraging contemporary pop, rock and jazz within GCSE curriculum music was a bold step in the right direction, which undoubtedly widened the appeal of the subject. However, as yet there are no guarantees that the technology needed to do the job will automatically be funded and supported at anything like the levels enjoyed by traditional curriculum music. Until this happens, many music departments will have to continue the struggle to provide this from petty cash.

John Cleary is a peripatetic instrumental music teacher specialising in guitar, piano, flute and music technology. He is currently teaching a B. Tech course in a West Midlands school, focusing on the technology used in music performance and recording.