Music in schools

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I’ve started looking around schools for my 3 year old for next year and I’m a bit disappointed that my favourite school overall seems weaker on music. They get the chance to learn keyboard and recorder but that’s it and there are no orchestra or groups other than a choir. How common is this in state primaries now? And if you want children to learn do most people do it outside of school? I went to a fairly rubbish school (ofsted inadequate) but most people had the option to learn an orchestral instrument and there were loads of groups and opportunities to play. I’m starting to wonder now with hindsight whether I just got lucky (there was a v passionate music teacher) and my expectations are out of synch with what’s normal. Or is my prospective school just a bit rubbish at music provision?

Orchestra is quite hard unless you teach the whole spectrum of instruments - and are good at crowd control. Our state primary has a string ensemble, brass band and choir - but no orchestra because it would probably be like herding cats with all those instruments at once.

My dd2's main instrument is wind, which isn't catered for, so she took up a string instrument specifically so she could be in an ensemble.

We also have a choir with a teacher who comes in, free peripetic lessons for all PP children, and singing assemblies each week, as well as a specialist music teacher once a week. Almost every child I know from primary who has gone up to the variety of local secondaries has taken GCSE music, and those who have got that far have picked A-Level. We're very lucky!

We were also lucky with Primary provision, totally accidentally. Amazing choir and free group recorder tuition for anyone who wanted for 4 years. Music service teachers had to be paid for though.

Primary school orchestra had everything from recorders to tubas depending on what DC played! Recorders meant it was very inclusive as any DC prepared to practice and go to rehearals could play. It is still the same.

The teacher leading orchestra and choir is amazing,

I was a music co-ordinator in a junior school for 25 years. I ran a choir, recorder clubs and what I called an orchestra which was a mish- mash of recorders, flutes,clarinets, keyboards, the odd violin, percussion and any other instrument that turned up- I used to write all my own arrangements too specific to the abilities of the children. The children were from relatively deprived backgrounds but we had a reputation in the area as being a school that was known for music. This was all in my own time and no specialist teachers involved.

This was on top of being head of a specialist provision and a fairly hefty teaching timetable.

Oh and only worked 3 days a week. The separate infants and juniors amalgamated and the head then expected me to take on the music responsibility for KS1 too.😡

In the end it just got too much for me and I moved schools and no longer teach music.

Music in primary schools is generally hugely neglected and many I visit in the specialist role I now have do almost no music and what many schools do is woefully inadequate. Shame people in charge of education don't take note of this

Some of the encouraging examples here confirm that where there is a will there is a way. Clearly in some schools there is no will to provide a good music education. I think there is some research somewhere that many primary teachers don't feel confident in teaching music (if I remember rightly, the three most dreaded subjects were music, PE and ICT).

I don't think it's just about funding. My children had an appalling music education at primary and they are now in their early 20s, so there was more money around when they were at school.

My kids’ primary school has an orchestra purely because a mum set it up forty years ago, and continued to run it until she (sadly) died. She also taught all the children the recorder for a year, so they all learnt to read the treble clef at least a little, and she did after school groups for those who were keen to take it further. A few years ago, she knew she was dying, and set up a small charitable foundation that now funds a conductor (usually a student studying music) once a week for an hour. Every child can join, but they’re reliant on children having private music lessons for anything beyond percussion - there’s a few recorders, a couple of violins, one clarinet, and an awful lot of triangles. And some adult volunteers on the piano and various other instruments.

The school supplements this with a teacher who does music and French when class teachers aren’t around (presumably PPA - it works out at about one afternoon a week). She also runs a choir. But none of these involve reading music - it’s all based around the interactive whiteboard.

I think this is probably quite a lot for primary school music - but nothing like enough to give a decent musical grounding on its own. The local music service offers lessons in school, but in very few instruments (piano, guitar, possibly violin) and they aren’t cheap.

Unless you chose a private school, I don't think you are going to find the same level of music opportunities of a few decades or more back. I remember playing in a fantastic orchestra at junior school with pretty much every instrument represented. There was also a wind band, brass band, various string ensembles, choir and lots and lots of concerts. The music provision at my kids' primary has improved since they joined when recorder or guitar were the only options. There are brilliant visiting teachers from the county music service who do whole class lessons and individual instrument lessons on brass and woodwind (no strings), but no ensembles or orchestra. My DD is in year 5 and grade 3 on her instrument and desperate to play with others. I am thinking of contacting the local private school to see if she could possibly join their after school orchestra. Outside chance I know but maybe with their charitable status it ticks a box for them. Worth a go.

Norm around here is that all primaries seem to have a choir and there are borough wide choir events. All primaries would have music lessons (to varying degrees of quality I guess ) and that’s where it ends. Any extras depend on enthusiasm and expertise of individual staff members. Eg. The free guitar club at my dcs school stopped when that teacher left