Digital Musicianship: Evaluation of the Digital Score Research from the North American Tour 2023

Moroz, Solomiya; Vear, Craig

Abstract

At the start of 2023, DigiScore visited the US and North America to evaluate higher education music students’ wants and needs from digital musicianship education through engagement with digital scores. This work is part of the DigiScore research project focusing on the analysis of case studies and research in music departments worldwide known as “Roadshow”.
The tour gathered data from the point of view of 'a person’s ability to perceive, understand and create sonic experiences', through the broad range of musicking activities revolving around digital score creativity. Here, we hope to present the results of tour through an emerging theoretical framework which encompasses the following areas of interest:
• Skills: what are the skills needed to articulate and interpret features and effects of digital score musicking?
• Contexts, Cultures & Literacy: what contextual, cultural literatures and insights are required to inspire creative thought and support musicking ideas
• Musical Identity and Creative Practice: what are the new modes and possibilities of creative practice?
• Perception and awareness of (digital) music: how do musicians actively analyse digital score music, and what interpretations are they generating when making music?
We conducted two types of polls, the first was embedded Mentimeter slides that allowed the students to engage and contribute to the discussion through the 90-minute lecture. There were also two online survey questionnaires made for the roadshow tour, one addressing the students who would attend the DigiScore lecture and another to collect responses from the students participating in the workshop with digital scores.
By evaluating digital musicianship through digital score creativity we can start to see patterns that suggest it is shifting across 4 realms: skills, contexts, identity, and awareness. We wish to stress that these four realms are immutably interconnected and should not be isolated to the point of exclusivity of the influence of others. The dynamic behaviour of these patterns suggests a DST (Dynamic Systems Theory) approach rather than a separation by each category. For example, skills that are enacted in real-time are done so because of the individual’s context and education, which has informed how they perceive and what they are focusing their awareness on.
Through the early analysis of our data, it is becoming clear that all four categories are mutually interdependent. We are also able to see that creativity plays an important part in digital musicianship setting it apart from regular musicianship. It is also a primary force in this dynamic system as it draws from a person’s context and background, contributes to the music identity and helps in the self-evaluation of one’s digital skills and learning processes.

Citation

Moroz, S., & Vear, C. (2024). Digital Musicianship: Evaluation of the Digital Score Research from the North American Tour 2023. In K. A., P. R., M. I. C., P. J. B., G. S., O. M., …S. A (Eds.), GAPS2 - Global Arts and Psychology Seminar "Creativity in music and the arts": 14-16 September 2023 York, Graz, La Plata, & Melbourne: BOOK OF ABSTRACTS. University of Graz. https://doi.org/10.25364/554.2024.1

• Publication Date: 2024
• Deposit Date: Mar 4, 2024
• Publicly Available Date: Mar 7, 2024
• Publisher: University of Graz
• Book Title: GAPS2 - Global Arts and Psychology Seminar "Creativity in music and the arts": 14-16 September 2023 York, Graz, La Plata, & Melbourne: BOOK OF ABSTRACTS
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.25364/554.2024.1
• Keywords: digital musicianship, digital scores, research tour, dynamic system's theory, creativity
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/32163683
• Publisher URL: https://unipub.uni-graz.at/obvugrveroeff/content/titleinfo/9607275