This paper reports on the first stage of an international study addressing the future of secondary school music education. Some music educators have asked if school is the right place for music education, and the music education literature continually calls music curricula and pedagogy to account for its apparent shortcomings, while contemporary…

The article discusses the link between a curriculum based on academic subjects derived from disciplinary knowledge and a progressive pedagogy that endeavours to engage students from all backgrounds with it. Section 1 describes the realist theory of knowledge which justifies the argument for this accommodation between curriculum and pedagogy.…