The purpose of this intrinsic case study was to examine the perceived benefits and challenges of implementing informal learning practices through popular music education for preservice music teachers. Specifically, we sought to understand why and how preservice music educators would perceive benefits and challenges from their experiences in a…

Musical expression is often not explicitly addressed in secondary instrumental rehearsals due to the perception of expression as an obscure concept and the instructional time constraints on music educators. Secondary music educators, however, are encouraged to discuss expressive performance goals with instrumental students from the beginning of…

Although playing by ear has important benefits for the development of musicianship, one-to-one instrumental teaching has traditionally overlooked it. The current research describes the strategies applied by three woodwind teachers with their students in a Spanish music school through a multiple-case embedded study. Data were collected through…

The purpose of this mixed methods study was to examine the effect of ear playing instruction on adult amateur wind instrumentalists' musical self-efficacy. Ten volunteer members of a community band in a small town in Ohio completed the "Ear Playing Profile" both prior to and following an eight-week period of instruction in playing by ear…

The Aural Learning Project (ALP) was developed to incorporate jazz method components into the author's classical practice and her applied woodwind lesson curriculum. The primary objective was to place a more focused pedagogical emphasis on listening and hearing than is traditionally used in the classical applied curriculum. The components of the…

This article considers the concepts of "learning style" and "learning strategy". The former connotes an inbuilt trait which tends to remain fundamental to the way an individual approaches learning. The latter refers to a set of consciously-acquired and applied approaches or tactics designed to achieve a learning task. The article relates these…