Music Leadership Training

Musicians Without Borders has developed a methodology for music leadership through 25 years of experience making music with people affected by conflict – in Palestine, Rwanda, El Salvador, Jordan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Tanzania, Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Northern Ireland, and with refugees across Europe.

The methodology invites creativity and participation in places where children and communities live in fear, distrust, and isolation. Music leaders work with care and skill to offer relief, connection, and provide a much-needed safe space. Music leaders apply their skills to lead activities like singing, songwriting, movement and dance, rhythm, and games to engage with communities affected by violence, displacement, and conflict.

The adaptive methodology has been described as a Community Music methodology, but we don’t use that terminology in all settings. It is vital that musical interventions respond to needs and culture, and we work with partners in all our programs to understand how music can help to support the local community.

Together, we develop customised approaches, built upon three pillars.

1. Practical working principles

Five principles guide our music leadership methodology:

• Safety,
• Inclusion,
• Equality,
• Creativity,
• Quality.

2. Principles of nonviolence, fundamentals of universal human rights

Music has the power to connect, but in the wrong hands, can also be used to connect one group against another. This makes a nonviolent approach to our work essential. A clear set of values behind our practical work serves as a guide for our music leaders. 

3. The biological, social and psychological effect of music

Our methodology is informed by an understanding of the ways that music can influence us biologically, socially and psychologically. We connect music to the nervous system, and the ways in which it can counter feelings of dysregulation caused by trauma, disconnection and extreme experiences.

Impact

Musicians Without Borders has been working with people and communities affected by war, conflict and displacement for 25 years. We’ve seen firsthand the effects of the music leadership methodology:

• In El Salvador, to combat gang culture and violence, we trained teachers in music leadership. The teachers used the methodology to incorporate musical and nonviolent approaches into their classrooms. Music becomes a model for peaceful coexistence.
• In Rwanda, children who face the stigma of living with HIV experience inclusion in music. Simple experiences of hearing their names sung, their rhythms echoed, and being welcomed by music leaders into bands create real change.
• Against the backdrop of violence and separation that characterize Europe’s refugee camps, moments of music-making initiated by trained leaders allow young people to reconnect and feel like themselves again.

Community Music and Music Leadership

Our methodology for music leadership overlaps with several schools of Community Music,. As the field continues to grow, our work draws interesting comparisons with models of practice from Community Music, and indeed we work with and learn from many community musicians within our network (some examples of this are shared here). However, our approaches are not aimed at falling within the scope of Community Music, and are most effective when they are driven by musicians and needs on the ground. 

Working in countries and contexts where understandings of “music” are laden with linguistic and colonial legacies, and where constructed fields of knowledge are too often exported as fact, we prefer to free ourselves and our partners from the written histories and models of any field of practice. We draw from the great work of colleagues in every country where we work, valuing all knowledge and histories. We recognise that people and languages hold differing meanings, and this offers opportunity and beauty.