"No music or art form is more important

than the right of children to live safe

from all abuse"
https://www.tes.com/news/school-news/breaking-views/no-music-or-art-form-moreimportant-right-children-live-safe-all
TES Opinion
3rd October 2013 at 16:41
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Child protection
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Pastoral care and pupil matters
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Safeguarding
By Ian Pace, concert pianist and historical musicologist
Ian Pace writes in response to a comment article by Institute of Ideas director Claire
Fox, who was in turn responding to an original piece about abuse at Chethams School
of Music in Manchester, England by Mr Pace himself.
Hysterical responses to any type of crime or misdemeanour, however heinous, and
tabloid-stoked vigilantism are wrong. However, Claire Fox (The line between good
teaching and abuse, TES, September 6, 2013) takes this much too far in the opposite
direction and opens the door to trivialisation of a serious phenomenon.
Fox cites exaggerated fears that issues concerning physical contact between teacher and
student will make teaching impossible. But there are constructive ways of regulating
this: I suggest (and now myself practise) that a teacher should ask a student first before
making physical contact, either on each occasion or as a general principle, and respect
the students right to say no. If it is impossible (although I doubt it) for a student who
refuses such contact to progress to a high level, then that is surely an issue for the
student, not the teacher, to worry about.
Fox also asks if benign past experiences are being reinterpreted through the prism of
contemporary sensibilities, citing Didier Gazelles comments on my blog post
regarding his father Marcel, which she takes at face value. I have spoken to multiple
victims of Gazelle (some of whom were aged 10 or 11 at the time) and without detailing
the hideous nature of what occurred when he entered girls bedrooms early on many
mornings, would like to assure Claire Fox that his behaviour, sexually interfering with
pre-pubescent girls, was not acceptable 50 years ago any more than it is now. What has
changed is that it is now (sometimes) possible to report it and not be instantly
disbelieved.

Fox is dismissive of the concept of psychological abuse and claims of sadistic teaching
methods, painting them as rigorous teaching practices. But rigour and abuse are not
synonymous. Many good teachers are rigorous and exacting without wilfully
undermining students self-confidence and sense of being. Others are not. I have been
told of teachers slamming piano lids on students fingers, hitting 11-year olds over the
head with heavy books, hurling cases across the room in an expression of the teachers
own frustrations, questioning students relentlessly about their sexual habits or even
about masturbation. Other examples involve teachers holding students up for public
ridicule, maliciously reducing them to tears at the start of every lesson in order then to
comfort them on their lap, mocking those whose sexual development came later on the
pretext that this makes them unable to approach certain music. And at several specialist
music schools, as a result of such pressures this and other pressures, there have been
epidemics of eating disorders, physical self-harm (sometimes co-ordinated) and suicide
attempts (at one school half the girls in one year attempted suicide; most of them were
expelled as a result). All of these dreadful behaviours and equally dreadful
consequences belong, in my opinion, within a spectrum of abuse which is not
necessarily of a sexual nature. I have spoken to some who have experienced both
sexual and psychological abuse, and would attest that the latter was more damaging.
I do not believe one must lose all perspective by looking at dangers which are specific
to or found in intensified form in the classical music field. Romantic conceptions of
musical geniuses, to whom laws of decent human behaviour apparently do not apply,
remain prevalent; from this emerges some of the monstrous egos which many
musicians well recognise. Many such people are in positions of power which enable
them to make or break younger musicians careers, and some have little compunction
about using this power of patronage for their own sexual advantage, or to engage in
bullying and abusive behaviour to bolster their own sense of self. The opportunities and
incentives for abuse are inherent within such a system. To combat this structural abuse
requires a fundamental examination of the values and workings of the classical music
world. Personally I believe we need more, rather than less, external regulation of the
workings of this world; it is nave to think that musicians, left unregulated, will act
against their own self-interest any more than bankers.
Furthermore, there is no necessary merit in engaging world-class performers as
teachers. Performing and teaching are very different skills and such performers may not
have the understanding, knowledge and maturity to work with children. I have seen far
too many cases where teaching serves primarily to enhance the teachers reputation
rather than help the student.
No musical composition, performance or recording, no reputation of any music school
or institution, is more important than the right of children (and, indeed, many adults) to
live safe from all abuse. Human welfare is more important than music or any other art
form. To maintain otherwise is to possess a distorted moral compass.
Ian Pace studied piano, composition and percussion at Chethams School of Music from
1978 to 1986, followed by Oxford and Cardiff universities and the Juilliard School in
New York. He has a dual career as concert pianist and historical musicologist, and is
lecturer in music and head of performance at City University London. He writes here in
a personal capacity.