ABSTRACT

Koda´ly Method was developed by the Hungarian composer Zoltan Koda´ly, his colleagues, and his students, as a comprehensive system of music teaching. The method does not seem to predominzte until 1945. However, his music teaching activities extend farther back. As early as 1907, Koda´ly was involved in the cause of music education due to his position at the Academy of Music in Budapest. In 1925, he heard the appalling singing of a class of girls from a teachers` training college, and he was shocked both by the quality of the singing and the repertoire. From this time, Koda´ly was highly interested in music education. He advocatied the use of Hungarian folk songs as teaching material in schools and began to work for the establishment of musical material and for the development of the teaching method. Since the first singing primary school was established in Kesckemet, in 1950, the development and dissemination of the method rose rapidly. Today there are more than 150 Singing Primary Schools in Hungary, and the method has spread all over the world. The philosophy underlying the Koda´ly approach in as follows: 1. Music belongs to every child. Koda´ly wanted to make music an intelligently understandable laguage for every Hungarian. 2. Music must be experienced by participation. Hungarian music education based on Koda´ly`s idea can be described as active, not passive, in this words: what matters in doing, not being done to. 3. Musical training must be started at an early age. Hungarian music education begins for some, but not all, in nursery schools. However, the years from ages three to seven are considered extremely important. 4. Musical language must be learned in a manner similar to the native tongue. Koda´ly stated at the numerous times that the spontaneous utterances of children were the beginnings of musical pedagogy. 5. The voice is the natural instrument available to all people, and voices together are preferable to voices and instruments in early musical training. The Koda´1y method makes use of the one instrument avaliavle to all, the human voice. 6. The cultural heritage of folk and art music of a nation is the natural point to begin musical training. Koda´ly believed that folk music, rather than being a primitive form, was an art that had matured through the evolution of a thousand years. 7. Music should be a daily experience for children. Koda´ly said that dealing with music every day stimulates the mind so that it grows receptive to everything else. 8. Only the best music is good enough for children. Kod´ly believed that only music of the highest artistic value should be used in teaching. 9. Good music teachers must be carefully trained from their own infacy. Koda´ly emphasized that a poor(musically)teacher can exterminate the love of music for thirty years in thirty successive classes. 10. Children must not be exploited, but treated with respect and concern and developed as far as possible. The study on Koda´ly`s philosophy induces music educators in Korea to deeply consider about the purpose of music education and the musical resource material. The purpose of music can be explained only in terms of human life and musical velues. Meeting music and responding to music is called affective, and the affective to music is that capacity of human feeling, which, though involving intellect, brings emotional commitment and provides aesthetic experience. Such musical experience rewards, fulfills, and gratifies one`s yearning for expressiveness and meaning. For the last several decades, music educators has cited claims of good citizenship, health, social growth, and group morale. These are desirable outcomes of teaching music, however, music plays the role only when music instruction can achieve the objectives of its own. Thus, today`s music educators should change their goals of music teaching. The primary objectives of music deucation are to enable every student to: 1.