ATT TONSÄTTA TEXT - En kompositionspedagogisk metodik för skådespelarstudenter

Sammanfattning: Title: Setting music to text: Teaching methods regarding musical composition in acting education. The abundant use of musical terms as prestige words in artistic and educational theatre discourses seems to indicate that musicality – in some sense of the word – is generally considered an important quality in acting. Music is part of the curriculum of the BA programme in acting at Malmö Theatre Academy. However, the students’ musical backgrounds are extremely heterogeneous. Further, it is my experience as a theatre musician that professional actors often lack self-confidence regarding musical tasks. When teaching music at Malmö Theatre Academy I have thus considered a sufficient musical self-confidence to be an important general purpose of the actor’s musical education. I have developed teaching methods in order to cope with the heterogeneity in the students’ musical background and at the same time utilize their shared interest in and aptitude for teamwork and textwork. Students are given the opportunity to develop their musical creativity by carrying out composition exercises. The aim of this study is twofold. Its first part consists of a description of the author’s teaching methods focusing on composition exercises. The second part of the study presents an evaluation and discussion of how acting students perceive these methods and exercises. The music composing exercises in question use text as a point of departure. After a number of preliminary exercises, the students carry out more extensive tasks during their second term of study. Everyone sets music to a text (most often a poem) of their own choice. The result is a number of songs which are subsequently rehearsed, performed and recorded by the composer together with a number of fellow students. Interviews with students point unanimously to a significantly improved musical self-confidence as a consequence of the composition exercises. The students describe their relation to music as having become more independent and less respectful. While enhancing the ability to produce a coherent musical structure as well as the ability to communicate in music and about music, the exercises have also diminished the students’ fears of performing music together and in front of others. Sets of problems associated with composing are further expounded in the interviewees’ individual descriptions of their respective creative processes. In the concluding discussion of the study, some fields for further research are outlined, one urgent future investigation being a qualitative study of professional actors’ views on how music, musicality, musical experience and self-confidence relate to their work.