Creative Music in the Progressive Education Programme for the Exceptional Child *Paper given at Child Research Clinic Spring Conference, Langhorne, Pa., U.S.A. May 1938

It is now eleven years since I first walked through the crowded streets on the Lower East Side of New York on a hot summer day. 1 was struck by seeing half grown boys playing cards on the doorsteps of their houses with an intensity and passion that was astonishing. My first reaction was to think what could be done with these energies if shifted to a more constructive channel. Since then I have founded three Music Schools on the Lower East Side, namely : The Music School of the Henry Street Settlement, Cecilia Music School and the Chatham Square Music School. I have observed several thousand students ranging from the ages of 5 to 60 in my contacts with them during these eleven years. They were talented, average, and delinquent; they represented 15 different nationalities; they were white, negro and Chinese, and gave endless opportunity for observation. Particularly fascinating to me was to see the results of what I call Creative work with small children, as a language, irrespective of the fact whether or not they played an instrument.