Comment / Future Development

According to a number of studies there is a relevant discrepancy between the music lessons stipulated in the curriculum and actual music lessons taught at schools in Spain. Schools that give music a central place in their curriculum are rare indeed. The main problem is the insufficient (or inappropriate) training of future music teachers. Incomprehensibly the higher education reform after Bologna will only exacerbate the problem. From 2010 the current degree course Training of Music Teachers for Primary Schools will be discontinued while music teachers at secondary schools will receive a four-year training course as pure musicologists. The latest implementation of the LOE bill relating to the school-leaving examination in Andalusia provides a good example of this already outdated conception of music education in Europe: here the entire curriculum will concentrate primarily on a chronological overview of “serious” European music.

The advice and recommendations given by music teachers and music education bodies from Spain and other countries over the past few years have been systematically ignored by the Spanish authorities. These political measures will lead to a decline in music education in Spain. On the other hand a number of things have been accomplished in the past few years that lead us to hope that a genuine standardisation of our subject within the European Union will not stay merely a utopian vision. That is reason enough to continue the fight.