A pedagogia artística como normação da vida: tecnologias do eu e produção do génio musical em Portugal (final do século XIX a início do século XX)

Abstract

This discussion about Portuguese music education, between the end of the 19 th century and the beginning of the 20 th century, a time when the demand for musical learning was rarefied, seeks to introduce the hypothesis of a biopolitical understanding of the technology of genius. This concept crossed several branches of education, albeit through different modalities -which allows us to ask whether the artistic regulation of the populations was conducted by the same technology. The question arises from the identification of different educational settings, pedagogical practices and artistic incidences that seem to bifurcate the genius into national and individual. Music education (primary, secondary and normal) was encouraged by the State through choral singing practices, given its possibility of reaching the entire population. For the great mass, the incorporation of the national genius was enabled -with its public manifestations of musical, linguistic, emotional, and corporal repertoire. Conservatoire music education was directed, however, to a small part of the population, which would be qualified for musical execution and creation. The incentive of (individual) musical genius reflected a global productivity of rarefaction of opportunities, allowed for the identification of some of these techniques possible within the pedagogy of instruments of great demand, such as the piano. Thus, despite this differentiation, curricula and school practices refer to genius as a univocal technology, facilitated by different pedagogical techniques of subject regulation.