Musikvermittlung and Its Innovative Potential

Abstract

In their introductory article, Sarah Chaker and Axel Petri-Preis aim to contextualise the volume by providing terminological, historical and current sociological approaches to Musikvermittlung. Among other things, they show that the term Musikvermittlung is deeply rooted in German music education and discuss the problems of finding an adequate English translation for the international scientific community. Furthermore, the authors trace the increasing institutionalisation and professionalisation of practices of Musikvermittung and analyse their current significance from the perspective of cultural policy. Finally, they argue that Musikvermittlung has the inherent innovative potential to function as a social bridge builder: through music, people who otherwise would not have met, due to their different social and cultural backgrounds, are brought together and invited to interact with each other. This is how practitioners of Musikvermittlung are »doing universality« in the sense of Andreas Reckwitz (2020), thereby providing »a counterweight to the omnipresent act of doing singularity« (ibid.: 441) in contemporary societies.