The elementary secondary curriculum in the United States could benefit from redefining the arts as a discipline to be interwoven into the school's curriculum. Four essays in this issue explore the question of the arts in education. John Holdren comments in "Will the Band Play On?" that music educators must stress the serious study of music as its own language and include instruction in performance as well as in music appreciation. Dennis Gray maintains in "Excellence as Juggernaut" that, with the advent of "excellence in education," there has been increased lobbying from each of the disciplines for inclusion in the curricula. In order to adequately teach all the disciplines, restructuring of schools is necessary. Teachers must spend more time involved in serious discussion of ideas and issues with fewer students. Related disciplines should be integrated--in both curriculum content and in instructional methods. Eight high schools in Los Angeles are merging history, literature, and the arts in a pilot program. Students will find themselves learning about a single period of history in several courses. Elliot W. Eisner says, in "Why Arts Are Basic," that a virtue of an effective arts education is helping children learn from what they see, hear, and touch. The document concludes with a review, by John Holdren, of the book, "Within the Walled Garden: The Story of a School," by Charles Merrill. (SM)