Madam, - The Music Association of Ireland agrees with what Cllr Michael Conaghan says in his admirable letter of September 3rd about building audiences for the arts and the lack of proper provision for the arts in our schools.
Music, in particular, suffers very badly in this respect. There are some fine things being done in our primary schools - e.g. the recent excellent Torc of Gold project, sadly restricted to only six Dublin schools - but in too many primary schools music is not taken seriously (the situation in secondary schools is far worse).
The Minister for Education more or less admitted this earlier in the year when she announced that a CD of Amhrán na Bhfiann and other Irish songs sung by the National Children's Choir was to be sent to all primary schools throughout the country but it was not certain when this was going to be done (hardly a major undertaking). One would have thought that the very least any primary school should achieve in music would be to teach the children to sing the National Anthem without the aid of a CD.
The decision to drop music as a requirement for entry to primary teaching was, while understandable, a retrograde step. Music - i.e. good music (some music is positively harmful) - is essential to the physical, emotional and psychological well-being of children. If young people who do not have Leaving Certificate music want to become primary teachers, there is no reason why they should not be required to take a module in college which could be sufficient to enable them to teach the basics of music, e.g. reading simple notation, singing of simple songs, dancing and the playing of simple, inexpensive instruments. After all, we insist that immigrants must learn Irish if they wish to teach in our primary schools.
Michael Dervan's preview (The Ticket, September 2nd) of Gustavo Dudamel's DG recording of Beethoven's Fifth and Seventh symphonies is a case in point. This brilliant young conductor and his orchestra, the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela, are fine examples of the wonderful music education programme in Venezuela. Popularly known as the sistema, it was founded almost 30 years ago with the aim of providing a musical education for the children of poor families to save them from a life of drugs and crime. During that period it has taught a quarter of a million young people to play musical instruments.
The sistema is the sort of model we could and should follow. Music education must not be left to pop-stations. - Yours, etc,
AIDAN MEAGHER, Secretary, Music Association of Ireland, South Great George's Street, Dublin 2.