The Relationship Between Choir Leaders’ Current Practices and Experiences of Choral Singing During Their Youth

Abstract

This article maps out and considers the relationship between choir leaders’ experiences in choir singing in their youth and their current practices in choir leading, with a focus on the context of Swedish choir leadership. The theoretical framework is a socio-cultural perspective, with a focus on cultural practices and mediating tools. The study is based on a quantitative survey, completed by 352 choir leaders, in which eleven cultural environments and eight mediating tools are in focus. The choir leaders responded to questions about their childhood and youth experiences of choir singing and their current practices. Results indicate a significant connection between the working approaches they experienced while growing up and their use of those approaches in their present choir leaders’ cultural practices. Furthermore, on a group level, results show that two major cultural environments appear particularly dominant: schools and churches, and of the mediating tools, piano and a cappella appear to be dominant. The results also indicate a significant relationship between the mediating tools learned in the participants’ youth, and their use in their choir leading practices today. By contrast, the use of prerecorded voice parts for rehearsals seems to have increased considerably. The results reveal a great variety of educational experiences that the choir leaders bring and illustrate the development of choir leading as a rich, complex interaction between practices that the choir leaders themselves had experienced. The overall results show that the educational environments of choir leading, as reported by the participants, are not a straightforward route by way of a specific educational programme. Instead, it may be described as educational environments explored by the participants themselves — pathways through formal and informal cultural environments.