I have to say that today I really enjoyed Marie McCarthy's presentation on a fifty year perspective of education and its effects of music education. We all know that times have changed, and with that, so have ideals, morals and ways of teaching. We have shifted from the sense of music as pasttime or family unity to music for individual growth and such. It would be great to check out the facets revolving around this shift and how it gradually changed.

I found it extremely interesting to track this change through observing the titles of the MEJ this morning. I had an article from 1954 entitled, "Music Education in a Democracy." I have to think that the themes and ideas in this '54 article would be TOTALLY different than themes and ideas that would be in a 2005 article about Music Education and Democracy (which I'm sure we'll find once we start reading that democracy book!), based on the thoughts going on in politics, society and education 50 years ago. I would really enjoy researching actual titles from past journals and seeing how they changed over the decades--becoming much more targeted to individual fields, and addressing key issues in teaching music.

Anyway, I know this is nothing spectacular today, but I just wanted to say that I think Ms. McCarthy is really an insightful person and a very thoughtful thinker and speaker. I'm glad we had the chance to interact with her today.