Aesthetic Music Educatin and the Influence of Bennett Reimer Essay

An explicit concept since the late 1950s, aesthetic education first developed to provide a strong philosophical foundation for music education and continues to evolve as a solid theoretical orientation for current effective practices. Bennett Reimer has contributed much to the discussion and development of the value of aesthetic education for the teaching and learning of music. Others in music education also support and promote these ideals and focus on developing an improved understanding for music educators. Some scholars oppose the principles of an aesthetic education, recently demonstrated by David Elliott who favors a praxial philosophy of music education centered on musical performance. The work of Reimer shows an influence of these thinkers and illustrates the essential benefits of a professional emphasis on aesthetics, the branch of philosophy especially devoted to studying the value of the arts. With guidance from aesthetics, music educators better understand the value of music and its fundamental role within the school curriculum. With its introduction, aesthetic education provided an understanding of authentic fundamental characteristics of music not previously discussed and encouraged an articulation of those ideas into relevant objectives for teaching and learning. The appearance of Basic Concepts in Music Education (ed. Nelson B. Henry, 1958) and the college text Foundations and Principles of Music Education (Charles Leonard and Robert W. House, 1959) promoted the acceptance of an aesthetic-based philosophy as a guiding theoretical foundation. These significant resources encouraged individuals to put their previous intuitions into effective practice using a shared, progressive concept of musical experience and learning. Many music educators embraced aesthetic education (and continue to do so) because it reinforced the validity of music study in the school curriculum for reasons intrinsic to the art itself. Reimer emphasizes that we (as music educators) need not establish discipleship to one particular person or point of view of aesthetic education. The ideal of â€Å"Music Education as Aesthetic Education† (MEAE) does not exist as a particular collection of fixed certainties; it supports the attitude that philosophical truths develop and transform as we advance and verify new ideas. Many sources (books, journals, articles, etc.) provide the insig... ...le, J. Scott and Marie McCarthy. â€Å"Music Education Philosophy: Changing Times,† Music Educators Journal, 89:1 (September 2002): 19-26. Reimer, Bennett. â€Å"Putting Aesthetic Education to Work,† Music Educators Journal, 59 (September 1972): 29-33. Reimer, Bennett. â€Å"Music Education as Aesthetic Education: Past and Present,† Music Educators Journal, 75 (February 1989): 22-8. Reimer, Bennett. â€Å"Music Education as Aesthetic Education: Toward the Future,† Music Educators Journal, 75 (March 1989): 26-32. Reimer, Bennett. â€Å"Essential and Nonessential Characteristics of Aesthetic Education,† Journal of Aesthetic Education, 25:3 (Fall 1991): 193-214. Reimer, Bennett. â€Å"David Elliott’s â€Å"New† Philosophy of Music Education: Music for Performers Only,† Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education, 128 (Spring 1996): 59-89. Reimer, Bennett. A Philosophy of Music Education, 3rd edition, (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2003). Schwadron, Abraham. â€Å"Some Thoughts on Aesthetic Education,† Music Educators Journal, 56:2 (October 1969): 35-6, 79, 81-5. Schwadron, Abraham. â€Å"Are We Ready for Aesthetic Education,† Music Educators Journal, 60:2 (October 1973): 37-9, 87-9.