Technology, Accessibility and Creativity in Popular Music Education

There has been steady growth in the affordable music-technology market now for somewhere in the order of thirty years. During this period there has been a noticeable shift in emphasis from complex and often expensive resources to more accessible and affordable counterparts. It is now entirely feasible for the aspiring artist, composer or producer to draw upon any number of technological tools that have been designed to make all manner of processes achievable that would normally have called upon the expertise and skill of ‘the professional’. Individuals who would not ordinarily have been in a position to gain the appropriate skills to perform many, if any, of all manner of complex musical and/or production tasks can often now achieve these same tasks through assisted means. For example, there is no longer an absolute prerequisite of being a highly trained or skilled musician to employ the realistic sounds of any number of common and exotic instruments. This is not only true within a context of composition, arranging and performance but also within many aspects of the production process. Sixty four-track studios with numerous off-board effects and sound processors are no longer the exclusive domain of successful commercial bands; the ‘virtual-studio’ has opened up this potential to anyone with enough space to house a relatively inexpensive home-computer.