An Examination of the Quality Rankings of Three Unfamiliar
Wind Band Compositions and Selected Musical Criteria among Undergraduate Instrumental
Music Education Students and Instructors at Five Big Ten Universities
Richard
Mark Heidel, Ed.D.
University
of Wisconsin-Eau Claire
Abstract
The purpose of
this study was to investigate the judgments of quality among undergraduate
instrumental music education students and instructors by examining the
relationship of their rankings of three unfamiliar band compositions and
selected musical criteria. One hundred twenty-nine subjects including 124 music
education students and 5 music education instructors at five Big Ten
universities participated. Subjects were mailed a packet of materials including
(a) instructions, (b) response forms, and (c) scores and recordings of the
three band compositions. The subjects were requested to rank the three band
compositions on the basis of relative quality, rank selected musical criteria
used to evaluate each composition on the basis of relative significance, and
provide general background data. A Kendall's coefficient of concordance
revealed significant agreement on the rank order of the wind band compositions
and the selected musical criteria among the 124 student subjects. Although
moderately high levels of agreement existed among the 5 expert subjects, the
relationship of their rankings of the band compositions and musical criteria
were not found to be statistically significant. A series of Kruskal-Wallis
ANOVA tests revealed no significant differences between the student and expert
subjects' composition and musical criteria rankings.
Richard Mark Heidel,
Ed.D.
University of
Wisconsin-Eau Claire
Department of Music and
Theatre Arts
Eau Claire, Wisconsin
54702
(715) 836-4417