Your average youngster who’s hip to the beat of R&B and kwaito may not think there is any possibility of forging a relationship with classical music. Classical music, the youth are most likely to believe, is only suitable for rich, ageing Eurocentrics.
But Zenda Nel believes music is a universal language that transcends religious, political and cultural barriers. The private music teacher has initiated a programme that seeks to promote appreciation of classical music among children at pre-schools, especially in impoverished communities.
The programme, says Nel, is based on ‘active listening through storytelling, dramatisation, creativity and instrumental play”. The idea is not only to expose youngsters to classical musical style, but also to enable teachers to use music as a tool in classrooms.
Nel is involved with 18 pre-schools and three primary schools in Pretoria.
She first educates pre-school practitioners so that they fully understand and appreciate music’s value before they take the programme to the children. After the training, Nel visits each school to assess progress and provide additional support.
Last year, Nel was invited by Colleen Walter, principal of Safe and Sound in Germiston, to present a workshop to 30 teachers.
Elizabeth Nkoane, co-founder of a pre-school in the informal settlement of Rose Acres, near Germiston, attended the workshop. Her school accommodates 130 children between the ages of five and six.
‘Since I started to use classical music during my lessons, I have seen tremendous changes,” says Nkoane. ‘Learners’ participation has increased markedly. They really enjoy themselves. In the past, it was difficult to get them focused and some of them would simply fall asleep during lessons.
‘It has really changed things for better. Even the parents of the children have seen an improvement and often come to school to observe their children sing, dance and act. ”
Nel says that a story is told in picture notation, where learners sing, dance and play instruments in relation to pictures on the wall. ‘Through the use of different characters in the story, dressed in fantasy clothes, the music is dramatised by the learners and brought to life. When the piece is finished, the characters swop clothes and are ready for their next active-listening session. In this way, through repetition, the music is fixed in their memories,” says Nel.
‘The children also get to play a variety of instruments and, who knows, one of them could end up taking music as a career.”
Nel says her methodology integrates arts to make learning more exciting. She says the programme equips learners with well-developed listening skills; better-developed numeracy skills; the ability to work individually, or in small or large groups; the ability to cooperate and follow instructions; better concentration skills; higher self-confidence; improved creativity and problem-solving skills; and an enhanced aesthetic appreciation of the arts.
Walter says the use of classical music is not meant to ignore the worth of other genres, especially African music. ‘What is happening now is that we go in the black townships with white classical music; what I want to see is the complete reverse of that, where black music is taken to the suburbs,” she says.
Nel says: ‘This again proved to me that classical music does not need an audience with bow ties and loads of money to be appreciated, but [that] it could be appreciated by anybody, even by people from the poorest of the poor areas.”
The project will, with time, produce South Africa’s own Mozart and Beethoven.