“It’s never too late ”: Adult students and music learning in one online and offline convergent community music school

Abstract

This study is the third and final part of a longitudinal ethnographic investigation of music learning and teaching of the Online Academy of Irish Music (OAIM), an Irish music “school” situated in both online (www.oaim.ie) and offline (Doolin, County Clare, Ireland) contexts. We first examined the online OAIM through teacher narratives in 2011. In the second part of the study, we explored the OAIM through students’ perspectives at the OAIM’s first offline Irish flute summer school retreat week in July 2013. In this third part and final part of the study, we attended the OAIM’s offline tin whistle school week in October 2015 in Ennis, Ireland. The purpose of this part of the study was to continue our investigation of adult music learners who learned Celtic music through the OAIM, as it has continued to evolve as an online and offline convergent community music school. Findings indicate that the adult participants benefited from learning music through a combination of aural/oral, observational, and written notation in both online and offline contexts, but had differing perspectives as to what worked for them and what did not. As an online and offline convergent school, the OAIM offers an intriguing model of music learning and teaching for school music contexts and community music schools.

Keywords

Adult music learners community music school convergent online and offline music learning informal music learning Irish traditional music

Introduction

Research on adult and outside-of-school intergenerational music learning is a relatively new research area that has emerged to become a significant area of study in music education. Researchers contend that more work is needed in this area, in informal and formal contexts¹ (Coffman, 1996, 2002, 2009; Dabback, 2008; Kruse, 2007; Myers, 2007; Veblen, 2012). A subfield of this research area to appear over the past decade is work on informal music learning in online and convergent² online and offline music communities, emergent with the rise of the Internet and Web 2.0 technologies (Blanton, 2016; Brewer & Rickels, 2014; Cawley, 2013; Kenny, 2016; Michielse & Partti, 2015; O’Flynn, 2015; Palmquist & Barnes, 2015; Partti & Karlsen, 2010; Salavuo, 2006, 2008; Waldron, 2013, 2018).

Our rationale for undertaking this longitudinal ethnographic study—of which the present investigation is the third and final part of the research—was based on the recommendations in the literature found above; that more work is needed in the areas of both adult music learning and informal music learning that takes place in online and offline convergent contexts. Based on both of those recommendations, the purpose of this last portion of the study was to continue our investigation of adult students who learn Celtic music through the Online Academy of Irish Music (OAIM), a community music school situated in both online (www.oaim.ie) and offline (Doolin, County Clare, Ireland) contexts. The school has continued to evolve since our initial 2011 and 2013 investigations as advances in Web 2.0 technologies make more and differing content delivery options available to music learners and teachers (see Waldron, 2016; Waldron & Bayley, 2012). Questions included the following: What learning and teaching modes did adult learners perceive as effective in both online and offline contexts? How has technological advancement combined with opportunities to learn offline changed those perceptions? What implications does the OAIM’s online and offline convergent music learning and teaching model have for future school music contexts and community music schools?

Learning “pan-Celtic” music online and offline

Research that has focused on adult music learning and teaching in the related Celtic genres of Irish traditional (IrTrad), Scottish traditional, and Celtic-Canadian music is significant for this study. This body of related work examined why, how, and what motivated adults to learn a specific traditional Celtic music in different contexts, mediums, and modes. Waldron (2007) investigated the music learning of adult students at the Goderich Celtic College, including observations of informal session participation held during the College week. She concluded that adult learners at the College valued informal musical activities (i.e., sessions) as being equal to or more valuable for their music learning than that which took place in formal classes at the College. Waldron’s findings align with Cope’s (2005) results in his study of adult learners of Celtic traditional music in Scotland, as participants in Cope’s research valued session participation because it offered important opportunities to learn Scottish traditional music on the fly. Based on his study’s results, Cope recommended that music educators approach music teaching and learning with “less formality, a respect for other cultures and their practices such as playing by ear, a more relaxed approach to technique and to reading music, and a willingness to allow learners to take more control over their own learning” (p. 139).

Building on Cope’s (2005) findings, Waldron and Veblen’s (2009) ethnographic study focused on examining motivations and successful learning strategies favoured by six adult players in one weekly Celtic pub session. Participants were nonenculturated³ adults who believed playing and participating in sessions contributed to their learning because sessions offered opportunities to learn music “by ear” in context. All participants also mentioned the importance of formally held week-long adult summer schools to their learning because summer schools provided a formal venue in which to learn and meet like-minded persons in community.

Furthermore, all participants mentioned how important access to the Internet and the resources found there were for their continued music learning. Indeed, Keegan-Phipps and Wright (in press) contend that

The great majority of “folk” and “traditional” musicians in the Anglophone West (and beyond) make use of a range of social media networks and digital resources when seeking out and learning repertory and skills. Instrumentalists look for or discover unfamiliar tunes and songs in online archives; attendees at pub “sessions” make recordings on their mobile phones of others singing or playing for future learning; singers identify Broadside ballads on sharing sites such as SoundCloud, to be committed to memory for performance at their local folk club; and folk musicians of all kinds request and dispense knowledge of such material’s provenance or significance via a range of specialist and public social media platforms. (page number currently unknown)

This is paradoxical when one considers how folk music traditionally was learned and transmitted, that is, in person in a local regional context. As Keegan-Phipps and Wright explain,

The digital reality of contemporary folk music practice, however, contrasts starkly with certain underlying conceptions about the genre. Folk music has historically been understood as the product of an “oral” tradition, shaped and—to some extent—defined by the practice of face-to-face learning and transmission. (page number currently unknown)

Regardless, Keegan-Phipps and Wrights’ arguments about how social media and social networks have changed how folk music is learned and transmitted is a musical example of what new media researchers Rainie and Wellman (2012) define as the “Triple Revolution,” that is, the relatively recent convergence of the Internet and mobile smartphones with social networks. Describing how the “Triple Revolution” works in “relationships, families, work, creativity, and information,” they concluded that “the way in which social technological networks now function has profoundly transformed the way we connect in both person and electronically” (p. xi). This is certainly true in the case of the OAIM, discussed further below.

In the researchers’ first investigation of the OAIM (Waldron & Bayley, 2012), the school was examined through the school’s teachers’ narratives. Instructors were interviewed face-to-face and their narratives were then triangulated with their OAIM teaching videos and forum postings to understand how delivering music teaching online differed from music teaching in offline contexts. The researchers concluded that, while not ideal, the OAIM offered Irish traditional music teachers the opportunity to provide students with high-quality instruction that those students would otherwise not be able to access (Waldron & Bayley, 2012). In the second part of the OAIM study, the researchers explored the school from the perspectives of adult students enrolled at the July 2013 OAIM IrTrad flute week in Liscannor, Ireland, framing the investigation with Turino’s (2008) idea of participatory music-making and Jenkins’ (2006) concept of participatory culture. The researchers concluded that the primary motivation of the adult students was to become competent enough at IrTrad to play with other people in sessions; in other words, participatory music-making was everyone’s goal. Participants also felt it important to physically be in Ireland for music learning if only for a short time. However, they also valued being able to go online because doing so afforded them access to music resources not previously available before the advent of the Web. But all of the study participants were adamant that being able to access an online participatory culture for music learning was of lesser significance to them than learning and playing in a face-to-face music-making context, such as a session⁴ (Waldron, 2016; Waldron & Hopper, 2014). This last finding led us to our third and final study of the OAIM.

Background: the OAIM

OAIM Creative Director Kirsten Allstaff, along with her husband “Curly,” founded the online OAIM in April 2011. Its geographical administrative base was originally situated in Liscannor, County Clare, Ireland, but has since moved to Doolin, County Clare, a well-known “hot spot” for Irish traditional music. In addition to Allstaff and her husband, the OAIM comprises a faculty of paid IrTrad musician-teachers based in Ireland and a global community of nonenculturated adult learners who pay a modest tuition fee to be OAIM members. On the site, formal music instruction is integrated with informal music learning practices, delivered online via digital video, forums, e-mail, and texts (www.oaim.ie).

In June 2013, the OAIM began offering a series of offline summer school music week retreats⁵ from its original physical home base in Liscannor, Ireland. Allstaff explained that those first “retreats worked so well—[it became clear that they are] what people want.” Based on those initial weeks’ successes, the OAIM began offering more retreats as a way for the online students to meet face-to-face. Allstaff further stressed that a retreat’s success was dependent on “getting the right people [meaning instructors] in here” and that such endeavours are “not all about the music. It’s all about people [teachers] who are kind and gentle.” As for future retreats, she stated, “We’re going to look at next year at introducing a session retreat, so we might get people back who have already been [to retreats] once or twice.”⁶

The success of those initial music retreats is significant for another reason—they represent the beginning of the OAIM’s evolution from being a strictly online community music school to becoming an online and offline convergent one. Since that time, the OAIM has sponsored “music week retreats” at various places throughout Ireland and Finland. Allstaff’s goal is to eventually offer such events in other countries—for example, Canada and Japan—where a significant number of online OAIM members already physically live.

From a community music school perspective, there are two things that are revolutionary about the growth of the OAIM as described above. First, the offline OAIM is portable—it can go wherever there are groups of OAIM students, or it can go to a destination place where students want to go to learn (e.g., different IrTrad “hot spots” throughout Ireland—this study being one example of this). What defines the school then is its people—administrators, teachers, and adult students—who have met online and make up the school, but not its geographical place. This is a radical idea, because it means that students can either go to where the offline school will be or the offline school can go to where the students are.

Second, this latest development in the OAIM’s expansion became possible only because it has already established itself as a successful online community music school—online networks of learners facilitated the burgeoning offline school in addition to the OAIM’s development as a convergent community, but not vice versa. The OAIM has thus “flipped” and converged the classroom. However, unlike typical learning communities and/or institutions, the “flip” is based on the online context and not the offline one.

What the online OAIM now offers learners since its 2011 founding has also evolved as technology facilitates more imaginative and innovative ways of delivering content. Added features to the site include a virtual jam session⁷ in which members can choose the tunes they want to play, what tempo they want to play those tunes at, and the instruments with which they want to play along with while jamming. Another related initiative is the 50-tune challenge, where OAIM’s users are encouraged to learn 50 of the most common Irish session tunes, with guided help from features and tutors on the OAIM site. Users can then integrate their “50-tunes” learned from the challenge with jamming through the OAIM’s virtual session.

While technology makes the OAIM possible, it is Allstaff’s vision that guides the school’s development. For example, she receives a great deal of feedback from site members relating to “tune quality” and learners also suggest what new courses they would like see offered. It is this feedback that, according to Allstaff, is a major motivating factor for both developing the offline OAIM’s retreats and for determining what new content is offered and how it is delivered on the online OAIM.

On the ground: the present study

In the fall of 2015, two researchers attended a 5-day tin whistle workshop music retreat at the Rowan Tree Hostel in Ennis (County Clare), Ireland. OAIM founder, Kirsten Allstaff, led the face-to-face whistle workshop and participants also had an opportunity to receive instruction from guest artists as well as experience and/or join in sessions during the evening. All of the adult students (researchers included) stayed at the hostel, which was also where the classes took place. Allstaff, along with several well-known guest tutors, taught the classes for the week, which began at 10:00 a.m. and went through 4:00 p.m. with a break for lunch. The week’s headliner attraction was Irish flute superstar Kevin Crawford, of the well-known Irish group Lúnasa.

After each night’s dinner, Kirsten arranged for workshop participants to visit various pubs throughout the city of Ennis—famous as an Irish traditional (IrTrad) hub—to participate both as listeners and performers. We also took an OAIM-arranged day trip to Doolin—another famous IrTrad town to spend the day listening to guest lecturers, visiting the Clare Irish Tradition Museum and the Cliffs of Moher, dining in Doolin, and attending sessions in both Doolin and Ennistymon. The trip was educational, entertaining, and musically engaging as well as being a wonderful bonding experience for the group. We came home tired but invigorated from the day and the night’s musical events, sharing many jokes and tales with one another.

Methodology

Due to the convergent online and offline nature of the OAIM, we employed both cyber-ethnographic and ethnographic⁸ techniques in this qualitative field study. After receiving clearance from our institution’s research ethics board (REB) and Allstaff, but before we traveled to Ennis in October 2015, we gathered cyber-ethnographic data—forum posts, e-mails, and digital videos—from the online OAIM’s tin whistle forum. Online data served to situate the OAIM tin whistle week before attending, were observational data in its own right, and were used to triangulate data interview and observation data collected offline at the OAIM tin whistle week in Ennis, Ireland. Because this was an ethnographic study, the intent was not to generalize to a larger population, and the perspectives and lived experiences of the participants may or may not represent the population of adult learners who participate in music learning through the OAIM.

Research participants

Besides the two researchers, there were 10 adult students—8 men and 2 women—who attended the OAIM whistle week. Of those 10, 5 happily agreed to be interviewed. The five men, ranging in age from mid-40s to late-60s, included one American, a Canadian, an Irishman, a multi-national Indian-German, and a Scot. None of the participants currently lived in Ireland and all had either worked or were presently working as professionals (i.e., teachers, medical doctors, or administrators). Both medical doctors were responsible for overseeing the education of students in medicine. Two of the participants were retired teachers, one of whom also had considerable international experience in public health. As a group, they were beginner- to intermediate-level IrTrad tin whistlers, had experienced informal music learning in online and offline contexts, and were dedicated music enthusiasts. One participant was surprised by “how academic everyone was.” Participants reported a wide array of influences (i.e., parents, schoolteachers, private tutors, and social/cultural contexts), which resulted in their pursuit of music learning as novices.

Data collection

While the five participants were eager to be interviewed for this study, the OAIM week was scheduled so tightly that it was difficult to find time to hold interviews while in Ennis. As a solution, we instead interviewed student-participants 1 week after the OAIM week was finished via Skype, which added another cyber-ethnographic layer to the study. All of the participants received a copy of the interview questions prior to their interview. This was to enhance memory recall (when necessary) and to encourage participants to meaningfully reflect on the questions posed to them. They were asked a series of open-ended questions relating to motivation, the perceived value of music-making in their lives, personal learning goals, the advantages/disadvantages of both online and offline learning, the learning environment, and pedagogical preferences as it relates to these diverse modes and contexts of learning. With respect to the context influencing participant responses, it is highly unlikely, considering that most questions did not ask participants to reflect on specific details of the Ennis whistle workshop.

Triangulation/data analysis

During the OAIM week, we observed the participants at various physical places throughout Ennis, which included classes at the Rowan Tree Hostel, sessions at the Mill’s Inn, as well as pub sessions in the nearby towns of Doolin and Ennistymon. Field notes, digital video observations, and photographs were collected via smartphone and iPad. Triangulation of learning/teaching events was made possible through the comparison of participants’ perspectives with observer/researchers relative to the same. After transcription, the interviews were member checked, where participants were given the opportunity to review the transcript and make any changes they deemed necessary. Data analysis was an interpretive and iterative process where the researchers identified key ideas from the acquired data, which in turn were distilled further, until the final summary encapsulated all essential elements of the original transcribed interviews.

Results and discussion

Participants were asked questions about their professional and musical backgrounds, personal motivation, how they learned, their preferred learning environment(s) (online or offline or a combination of both), and their preferred modes and/or strategies for music learning (e.g., singing tunes, using YouTube for observational as well as listening purposes, or using some kind of written notation). After coding, the following four themes emerged from the data: (1) the significance of music in participants’ lives, (2) motivations for attending/participating in music workshops, (3) advantages/disadvantages of group learning sessions, and (4) learning modes/strategies. The last theme included the sub-themes of finding resources, singing, aural learning versus learning from notation, learning ornamentation, self-developed learning strategies, online, and offline contexts.

The significance of music in participants’ lives

Those still working spoke of how music-making provided a necessary contrast to their daily responsibilities in their day jobs. Michael stated, “I find it so relaxing. . . . It’s another world.” Ash noted, “it [music] really is a different part of your brain than you use for academic thinking.” And Meir suggested that his involvement in music-making made him a “better teacher in medicine and [with] medicine, like music, the most important parts of it can’t be put in a book.” The two participants, who were retired teachers, were emphatic that playing and learning music was now an even more important part of their lives precisely because they were retired. Bill stated,

I can’t imagine life without it. It’s something I like to do. . . I feel like it is one of the most important things in my life and even though it wasn’t the thing that I did for a living, it played a part.

Ian was even more insistent:

It’s become even more important since I’ve stopped working full time. It’s my kind of anchor, really. It’s right at the heart of my life along with family interests. It’s number one and it’s quite hard to explain. I mean, I think it’s first of all the joy of making music. You know? I’m the sort of person that will sing a tune in the shower in the mornings. . . . There’s a therapeutic side.

Regardless of whether participants were retired or still working, it was evident that learning and playing music held a central role in the lives of all of the interviewees.

Motivations for attending/participating in music workshops

All of the participants but one (Bill) had previously attended face-to-face Celtic music workshops, either in or outside their home country. Motivations for workshop attendance by participants were consistent with earlier research (Cope, 2005; Waldron, 2007; Waldron & Veblen, 2009) in several ways. For example, Michael believed that “you can learn a lot on your own, . . .[but] being tutored [in a group] is better” because “it’s a quicker way to get to where you want to be [and] you know there’s more people in the [same] boat just like you.” Ash also indicated that the physical context was an important factor in his decision-making. “Taking a week and just focusing on one thing without distraction. . . . they call it a ‘retreat’ don’t they? . . . it’s a holiday as well.” Ian identified two reasons for participating in face-to-face workshops: the social aspect and the opportunity to become a better musician. Like Michael, Ian spoke of meeting people who “are in the same boat” as learners [and that] “there is a big social side to [it as well]. We enjoy the experience—the people we met.” He also felt that to advance his playing it was necessary to “put yourself in situations that are out of your comfort zone.” Ash was quite specific with what he wanted to take place during these musical “retreats.” “I would hope also that in the workshops you get some new tunes, you get some technical tips on playing, you get to actually play, and participate in sessions.” Bill said,

I tried to be realistic about what [I] was getting into. . . . I knew that probably nothing that happened in five days was going to make a huge improvement in my playing. It was more the inspiration and being among other people who were also learning the whistle and seeing what different professional people . . . whistle players. . . . have to show us.

Participants expressed a variety of reasons for participating in music workshops, including personal advancement, the ability to focus on a music task in an aesthetically pleasing setting, and the opportunity to interact on both a personal and musical level with like-minded individuals.

Group learning sessions

Advantages

Participants felt that such contexts help to “push you farther,” implying that they could advance further in these workshops than they might have on their own. Many spoke positively about the “group dynamics” as adding greatly to the overall experience. This belief was reinforced by the numerous comments identifying the importance of building a sense of comradely in such settings, whether it is during class instruction, at social gatherings (e.g., meals), or playing at sessions in pubs.

Bill spoke of these experiences and the cultural trips (e.g., Cliffs of Moher) as being “invaluable.” All participants spoke positively about the smooth running of the 5-day event and the memorably comradery that developed as a result of living, playing, and eating together.

Disadvantages

While the opportunity to play at evening “sessions” was viewed positively, it could also be challenging. Michael spoke of some “etiquette things,” referencing the fact that established players may feel uncomfortable and are less welcoming to “novice” players, especially if they were struggling with the tunes or attempt to play a “different version of the tune” they already play.

The pacing of the class was also an issue due to the wide range of both the experiences and background of the participants. Michael spoke of his inability to keep up with the rest of the class. “I fell behind on the first day,” in part, due to the fact that not everyone was “at the same place” in terms of musical and technical experience. Like Michael, Meir believed that having a workshop group of participants with a wide range of skill sets and experiences can be taxing for both participants and teachers. Self-criticism was a significant negative for Ian, as “you constantly judge yourself within the context of others. You can’t help but do that.” Ash, who found it difficult to learn new tunes in a workshop context, stated the following:

I could not hear myself playing and I need to be able to hear what I’m doing. So I would learn them better if I played them on my own in a room, somewhere without other people there or without other people playing the same instrument. They could have sent me the tunes before [the workshop]. I could have practiced them and then she [Kirsten] could have said “here are the ornaments for these tunes.”

While participants spoke positively of their involvement in the group learning sessions, it was clear from their responses that they also had some genuine concerns. Therefore, learning in this type of environment required flexibility from both the instructor and participants.

Learning modes/strategies

Finding and choosing tunes

Participants accessed tunes in a variety of ways (e.g., hearing tunes during a concert performance, attending workshops, tune books, online videos, and/or online digital music services). Keegan-Phipps and Wright’s (in press) descriptions of how learners in IrTrad and folk music use various technologies and resources downloaded from the Internet were nearly identical to those reported by participants. For example, Ash recently began using Spotify instead of CDs, “mov[ing] over to just pretty much digital music [only].” Both Bill and Ian regularly access the OAIM online videos; Bill goes through the lessons to find a tune he likes and thinks is “worthwhile” to learn. As well, his children help him find new tunes, and he also draws on his extensive CD collection for inspiration. Furthermore, Bill was unusual in that he was the only participant who did not use Google or YouTube to locate new tunes. Ian, in addition to the OAIM site, accesses the online Banjo Hangout Newsletter. Tunes that are “a little bit quirky and strange” are worth learning for Ian.

Learning “by ear” versus written notation

For new players who are only familiar learning music visually through Western notation, playing “by ear” is often the biggest challenge to overcome when learning IrTrad (Waldron, Mantie, Partti, & Tobias, 2018). Waldron (2016) explains that

For many, just the concept of having to learn to play without written Western notation is terrifying. For perspective learners, this often becomes even more complicated by their own preconceptions that music, regardless of genre, can (and should) only be learned in the one “correct” way—that is, through the standard Western art music notation. (p. 92)

Because IrTrad music is traditionally learned/taught aurally, Allstaff originally planned to teach most of the workshop without written music (i.e., “by ear”), but she did end up using sheet music as well, due to some participants’ discomfort with aural learning. However, this pedagogical approach did not always align with participants’ past and present learning strategies, despite their general acknowledgment that it was important to learn IrTrad tunes by ear, because all recognized that aural learning and playing is fundamental to performance practice in the genre, and this was consistent with the literature (Cope, 2005; Waldron, 2007). When it came to making that a reality, however, many participants relied heavily on some form of notational system either from fear of falling behind or to ensure accuracy.

Each had their own perspective on how well aural learning worked for them, both for accuracy and efficiency. While Michael stated that “The best way to do it is by ear,” he did acknowledge that “the written [notation] is probably a good way of storing [the tunes] for posterity or remembering” them. Michael could read staff notation because he had taken music lessons as a child and, as they were Conservatory-based, was not a proficient aural learner. Despite this, he did prefer trying to learn by ear rather than by reading sheet music. Ash—also the youngest participant—unequivocally stressed his preference for using written staff notation:

It’s [by ear] just not my way of learning. I haven’t got it. Maybe if I practiced it more I would get better at it. It’s just too much work for me now since I’m doing it the other way. I find it too easy to get the sheet music and work from that.

Furthermore, Ash felt that watching others’ fingers either live or on YouTube was “cheating,” despite observational learning (i.e., watching musicians’ fingers for learning tunes) being an accepted pedagogical practice in IrTrad. Both of these factors—his preference to read music and his beliefs about observational learning—were most likely attributable to Ash’s background as a Western art music learner, as observational learning is often discouraged for pedagogical reasons in that genre.

Meir commented that his fellow participants “are absolutely befuddled by the whole idea of not having the music in front of them.” He uses the Amazing Slow Downer⁹ to learn tunes by ear for guitar, but he reads music when playing melody instruments (e.g., flute, whistle). Meir did, however, express that

[Reading music is not] a very productive way of getting the spirit and the groove of the tune. So what I will do is use the music for “how did that tune go?” and then in the workshop setting, I find that I’m slower than others might be at learning by ear, so I’ll use the music to help me learn.

Both Bill and Ian were experienced aural learners. Context, genres, and early exposure played a part in why these two participants were much more comfortable learning a new tune by ear. Bill preferred to learn a tune aurally and thought the introduction of abc¹⁰ notation during the workshop was of little help. “I would have been better off to just listen to it until I get it into my head and then play it.” He then explained a possible connection between aural learning and understanding musical style:

They [the tutors] talk about learning the hornpipe feeling to a tune and things like that. I’m not sure I even know what that means but I think that if you learn it by ear, you get so that feeling comes, whatever it is they are talking about—comes along like that.

He was not sure whether watching a player’s fingers helped him learn tunes, but he thought that it might be possible. As stated earlier, observational learning in IrTrad is a standard pedagogical practice, but for those who are etic to the genre and only familiar with Western pedagogical practices, observational learning is often viewed as “wrong.”

When comparing using tablature or relying on one’s ear to learn tunes Ian stated, “I don’t think they go into your brain in quite the same way—[the] things that I’ve learned by ear.” He indicated that he might resort to looking at a player’s fingers if there is a tricky chord. Bill “does a lot of listening,” in particular of banjo player Jens Kruger. Many of the learning modalities described by participants were observed by both researchers over the course of the OAIM whistle workshop and, while interesting as observations in and of themselves, also served to triangulate the interview data.

Singing as a learning strategy

Although it is common pedagogical practice in IrTrad to sing tunes before transference to an instrument, for the most part, participants did not use singing or were aware of doing so as a strategy for tune learning. Again, this was most likely due both to “Western art music” ideas of music learning (i.e., what is “proper”) and from participants’ negative past experiences with singing. For example, Michael and Ash believed they could not “sing properly,” unlike the other workshop participants who were comfortable singers. All of the participants, however, for the most part, used singing for memory recall after the tune was learned but not for learning tunes at first.

However, even participants who shied away from singing tunes before learning them on tin whistle thought that doing so might be helpful for learning tunes. According to Ash, “I was singing it [the tune] a few times and it helped to fix where I was going with that in my head.” While Bill thought that singing might help to learn tunes, he maintained that

I find that when I watch Thomas’ lessons on OAIM, I don’t really feel the need to hear it sung or to sing it myself . . . [but] I certainly responded well to what Kevin showed us in that workshop and I think that there’s certainly some value in it [singing] but I don’t ordinarily use that myself.

IrTrad ornamentation

One researcher had extensive experience performing Baroque music, where a common learning strategy involves first learning the melody without ornaments; once internalized, the appropriate ornaments are then added to the melody. This researcher was thus intrigued by the approach taken to teaching ornamentation by the workshop instructors. Like Baroque music, IrTrad performance practice dictates that tunes be ornamented in the appropriate style of ornamentation distinctive to the IrTrad genre. However, unlike Baroque pedagogical practice, Irish musicians learn ornaments holistically as they are learning the tune (i.e., they are embedded in the tune). This traditional way of learning and teaching IrTrad tunes was consistent with how instructors taught participants new tunes during the workshop week—that is, with the ornaments.

All of the participants understood that using appropriate ornamentation is important to establish style in IrTrad. As Ash explained,

The thing about Irish (whistle) music is the ornaments, that’s what makes it Irish music, I think. I think really what the workshop has to do, if it’s an Irish whistling workshop, is to teach you the ornaments rather than teach you to play your instrument. So I think it’s important in the Irish music to really add the ornaments, to learn a tune. It’s not bad to know the tune without the ornaments but on the other hand, why learn the wrong thing? Learn it right.

He also addressed the issue of performance practice by stating the following:

If you remember, all of the tutors said that these ornaments aren’t fixed—this is traditional music, there isn’t a right way. This ornament doesn’t have to be here, you could do a different ornament somewhere else. . . . I think the temptation would be to learn it like she [Kirsten] does it and that’s the only version—that’s not right.

Bill made reference to the five-string banjo (which he also plays), where, “if you just play the melody, it doesn’t sound like much.” His strategy to learning a tune with ornaments was to simply “listen to the tune over and over again.”

Self-developed learning strategies

Participants had varied perspectives as to how they might perform better using a wide variety of strategies to improve their own individual playing ability. They were acutely self-aware of what worked for them and what did not. Michael, who also plays Uilleann pipes, watches other pipers’ fingers to learn tunes if there is no sheet music. “Motivation, focus, and continued investment” were also factors that improved his playing. In particular, he felt that performing the piece at a slow tempo was beneficial, emphasizing that “there’s plenty of time to play fast. Slow down and play it correctly.” For Meir, “once I’ve heard a tune I might go to YouTube to see how somebody plays it. Interestingly enough, I have not used YouTube much for [learning] tunes. I’ll use YouTube for [observing] technique.” He uses the strategy of “isolating the parts that are difficult and repeating them” and then goes back to the larger section and plays it through. As an aural learner, notation did not help Bill. He spoke of the importance of internalizing the melody by

Listen[ing] to a tune over and over again. Get it in my head so that I can sort of go through it. At the same time I’ll probably have tried to play it a few times and, but until I get it in my head it’s sort of like whistling; you can’t learn that from a book or something or you just listen and listen and then it comes out of your mouth or it comes out of the whistle.

Ian uses tablature for tunes that have difficult banjo finger picking, because he “can’t learn that totally by ear.” Ian struggled with written notation for learning new whistle tunes but reluctantly used it to not fall behind in class. However, if a song were familiar, he would learn it aurally. Observing other’s fingers while playing whistle did not help Ian much because “if I’m struggling with something, I don’t find it easy to take from the visual with them [other players] facing you. You’ve got to think—is that the left hand or the right hand?”

Online learning with OAIM

Keegan-Phipps and Wright’s (in press) discussion of the Web’s significance as a resource for traditional musicians aligned with the experiences of this study’s participants. For example, participants appeared to have come across the OAIM site when searching for specific instruction (e.g., correct execution of the ornaments, performance style) or looking for a performance of a specific tune. Ian discovered the OAIM through a hit-and-miss approach, while in contrast to his fellow participants, Michael heard about the OAIM by subscribing to Irish Music magazine.

All participants accessed the OAIM website to varying degrees and also mentioned that using the site was a safe and convenient way to learn. Some only used the free lessons, while others “subscribed to the full package, which includes all the instruments, including pipes and flute.” One of the participants (Ash) was encouraged by his wife to take the online OAIM guitar video tutorials, while Bill “almost exclusively [accessed] the [whistle] videos.” He has checked the forums but did not have “any huge questions” for the whistle tutor. Meir stated that convenience of access, the ability to learn a new tune “whenever you feel like it,” was a motivating factor for using online tutorials. Ian accessed the Internet (i.e., YouTube) to find tunes by putting in the name or “the name of the tune and then the [word] ‘whistle’ and things would come up.” Three of the participants stated that they “jumped around” when it came to engaging with the OAIM site, while the other two participants said they accessed only the whistle tutorials. Ian indicated that the nature of the OAIM tutorials was a motivating influence on him. “The lessons are excellent and it’s a really nice way of improving your skills—[it is] quite structured and formal.” The degree to which he would commit to an online session/tutorial depended on whether he thought it was a tune he wanted to learn. He would ask himself, “Is this a tune I want to put the effort in to learning?”

Comparing online and face-to-face learning experiences

Like participants in Waldron and Veblen (2009) research, all of this study’s participants had experience with online and offline learning and acknowledged that there were both positive and negative aspects to both modes of learning. For example, they believed that online learning was convenient, easily accessible, and, at times, “more comfortable” for the learner. Although only some participants used the OAIM to access non-whistle content, all reported using the site’s tin whistle videos. As described earlier, participants felt that that face-to-face group instructional contexts could produce increased anxiety and insecurity.

Meir stated that it depends if the online instruction was in real time (i.e., FaceTime or Skype) or if it was pre-recorded, as in online tutorials. With respect to the latter point, he had the following to say:

I would say that the online is like a book that you can take wherever you want, you can jump around, you can repeat without sounding dumb or being embarrassed, and you can repeat a certain phrase 100 times if you have to. . . . You are responsible for your [own] feedback.

He did not see online and offline learning as a dichotomy.

However, Michael mentioned that with the online instruction “you don’t get the coached approach. . . . You don’t know if you are really improving, whether you could do it just a little bit better.” With respect to human interaction, participants acknowledged, “music is a group activity.”

Participants learning strategies varied greatly as did their perspectives on learning music online or face-to-face. Their approaches, while different, appeared to be tailor-made to accommodate their own personal musical needs and experiences.

Implications and conclusions

Attending workshops like the Ennis whistle week offered participants opportunities not normally available to them, including focusing on becoming better musicians as well as the sheer enjoyment of interacting with other like-minded individuals. Each participant demonstrated their commitment to learning by their presence and perseverance during the week-long whistle workshop. They believed that they benefited from both online and offline instruction but had individual perspectives as to what worked and what was less effective in their own music learning. Musical, professional, and personal backgrounds varied, as did their responses to a series of open-ended questions. While participants identified positive and negative aspects to both online and offline learning, all used several modes of learning in online and offline contexts to become better Celtic musicians. Based on the responses of our five participants and our observations, a combination of learning and teaching modes appeared to be their preferred scenario. This may have been their way of balancing, and possibly confronting, both the advantages and disadvantages of these different modes of learning.

By understanding what motivates adult learners to advance their skills as Celtic musicians, as well as the strategies used to acquire such knowledge, organizations and instructors will be better able to adapt their learning goals and pedagogical approaches to best serve the educational needs of their students. Such insights may also help teachers to better understand inherent fears (e.g., learning by ear) that adult learners have as they attempt to overcome the challenge of acquiring new skill sets and cope with individual self-doubt.

As noted in the literature and from the responses from the participants in this study, adult learners use a wide variety of strategies to locate and learn new tunes. These varied approaches also act as personal motivators for adult learners. Advancements in technology, changes in social networking, and social norms have redefined how people communicate and learn in the 21st century (Rainie & Wellman, 2012). The OAIM is a reflection of this technological and social evolution where adult learners often prefer to use multiple resources when engaging in music-making—accessing the digital world one moment and then choosing to participate in a group face-to-face learning experience the next. This study suggests that the OAIM, as a successful convergent online and offline community music school, could be one potential model for 21st-century community music schools.

Footnotes

Declaration of conflicting interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was funded by the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada (816410).

ORCID iD

Jonathan G. Bayley

Notes

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