OLD AND BUSTED: The Great Relearning.

The New Hotness? The Great Unlearning: Is classical colonial? Naive proposals to “decolonise” Western classical music risk losing the richness of its history.

In the UK, the Musicians’ Union published an article in 2019 by David Duncan, noting among other things the lack of non-white representation in the curricula of examination bodies. A 2021 issue of Ethnomusicology Forum, edited by Shzr Ee Tan, was devoted to “Decolonising music and music studies”. 

Tan also organised a roundtable in 2021 on “Decolonizing Music Studies” and she with other ethnomusicologists based at Royal Holloway, University of London produced a statement on behalf of their department on “Inclusion, participation and decolonisation in music”. Various other journals and institutions have produced their own statements. 

The issue surfaced again last year when the musicologist J.P.E. Harper-Scott resigned from his chair at Royal Holloway, claiming universities had become dogmatic rather than critical environments and citing rhetoric on decolonisation “which admits of no doubt, no criticism, no challenge”. 

I limit my discussion here to the debate in Europe, especially Britain, as the history and demographics of the Americas, South Africa and the Antipodes create distinct issues. The most frequent target of decolonisers here is the central Western classical tradition, which developed primarily during periods when minority populations in Europe were considerably smaller than today.

In terms of the demographics in France and Britain at the time, it should come as no surprise that black composers such as Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges or Samuel Coleridge-Taylor are exceptional cases. Similarly, it is not unnatural that European music traditions continue to be studied widely in countries where 85-90 per cent of the population is of European ethnic origin.

It is already the case that Western classical music has an ever-decreasing role in British degree courses. Figures from 2020, excluding conservatoires, show fewer than 20 per cent of music students are enrolled on degree courses in which academic study of the classical tradition plays a significant role — the majority of whom now take more vocationally-oriented courses, such as music technology, musical theatre or popular music, equally important but of a different nature. 

It’s not just composing music, there’s also, as the new wave band Re-Flex would say, the politics of dancing: Woke dance school drops ballet from auditions as it is ‘white’ and ‘elitist.’ Leeds’ Northern School of Contemporary Dance reviews ballet art form as part of a diversity drive.