Figure 1.--Here we see waht we at first thought was a basic youth orchestra at an unidentified school in the 1950s. We are now more inclined tonsee it as a kind of reciatal. We think the children all have recorders. As the girls are wearing school uiforms, we believe it is a school group. We are not sure why the boys are not wearing rheir school uniform. We are also not sure about the type of school.

How much of this filtered down to the schools we do not know. England lagged behind many other countries in estblishing free state schools, what in other countries are called public schools. We get the impression that drill and sports were more important than music, but we have few details. We do see choirs and musical instruction in the early 20th century> Major changes did not occur until after World War II. We see a very substantial increase in the emphasis on music. This occurred in both the state schools and the private schools including the boarding schools (public and preparatory) where the sports ethos was so deeply entrenched. A factor here was probably the spread of coeducaion. We note that by the 1980s a very large number of the chilren enrolled at preparatory boarding schools at least attempted to learn a musical instrument. We are less sure about trends in the state system. There are art, mucic, and dabce classes. Music today is an important part of the National Curriculum. At private schools, parents pay extra for instrumental instruction. We are not sure how that is handeled at state schools. We do see school orcestras and bands.

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Created: 9:26 PM 9/9/201915
Last updated: 9:26 PM 9/9/2019