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Musical memories: snapshots of a Chinese family in SingaporeChee-Hoo Luma

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Early Child Development and CareVol. 179, No. 6, August 2009, 707–716

ISSN 0300-4430 print/ISSN 1476-8275 online© 2009 Taylor & FrancisDOI: 10.1080/03004430902944296http://www.informaworld.com

Musical memories: snapshots of a Chinese family in Singapore

Chee-Hoo Lum*

National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, SingaporeTaylor and FrancisGECD_A_394601.sgm(Received 7 January 2009; final version received 10 March 2009)10.1080/03004430902944296Early Childhood Development and Care0300-4430 (print)/1476-8275 (online)Original Article2009Taylor & Francis1795000000June [email protected]

This paper examines music in the home of a Chinese family in Singapore withspecific attention to the children (aged five and seven) of the household: anexploration of what constitutes the lived ‘musical’ memory of a family enmeshedin the technology and media of a globalised world. The study is part of a largerethnographic study on the musical lives of young children in Singapore, conductedover a five-month period. Technology and the media encapsulate the homemusical experiences of these children, bringing them musical repertoire andmusical play, attached with social meaning. The pervasiveness of the mass-mediais noted, infused in children’s play, singing and listening repertoire, and even intheir sleeping habits. The media dominated the play environment of these children,providing them with audio and visual stimuli as they carried on with their fantasyplay along with their media-influenced toys.

Keywords: technology; media; home; children; parents

Introduction

Every family has a lived history with distinct memories and artefacts. These memoriescan often be associated with music: grandmother’s lullabies, the singing and skippinggames played with brothers and sisters, father’s guitar playing or the Cantonese operasinging sessions that mother and her friends used to have over tea time. The memoriesconstitute a repertoire that gathers and affects the musical interests of family members.Increasingly with the availability of technology and media, these memories can alsostem from home musical environments that are permeated by mediated musicalsounds from the radio to the television, from CDs/DVDs to MP3 players. Music is notjust ‘bound up with the production of place through collective interpretation, it is alsointerpreted in idiosyncratic ways by individual listeners, with songs, sounds and musi-cal phrases evoking personal memories and feelings associated with particular places’(Cohen, 1995, p. 445). Music can effectively stimulate ‘a sense of identity, in preserv-ing and transmitting cultural memory. Individuals can use music as a cultural “map ofmeaning”, drawing upon it to locate themselves in different imaginary geographies atone and the same time and to articulate both individual and collective identities’(Cohen, 1995, p. 444).

Since the second half of the twentieth century, with the explosion of technologyand the media, people’s everyday lives are becoming increasingly contingent onglobally extensive social processes (Foster, 1999). It would seem that ‘music’s deep

*Email: [email protected]

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connection to social identities has been distinctively intensified by globalisations dueto the ways cultural separation and social exchange are mutually accelerated by tran-snational flows of technology, media, and popular culture’ (Feld, 2001, p. 189).Indeed, our memories are increasingly shaped by technologies and one can now talkabout notions of ‘imagined nostalgia’ (Appadurai, 1996, p. 77) where memories areno longer grounded in lived experiences but ‘memories pillaged from the archive andmass-marketed for fast consumption’ (Huyssen, 2001, p. 64). Albeit the ‘onslaught’of technology and media, our lived memory is nonetheless embodied in the social,‘that is, in individuals, families, groups, nations, and regions. There is no doubt thatin the long run all such memories will be shaped to a significant degree by the newdigital technologies and their effects, but they will not be reducible to them’ (Huyssen,2001, p. 77).

Cannella and Kincheloe (2002) have stated that globalisation is here for the longhaul and any study of childhood must acknowledge its central significance incontemporary life. It is therefore useful to study the effects of technological andmedia sources like television, internet, video games, music CDs and videos, giventhat children can be experts in this domain and their knowledge surpasses manyadults. For teachers, curriculum designers and childcare workers, an understanding ofnot only children’s preferred media and technology devices but also the impact ofglobalisation is essential for knowing their acquired knowledge and their furtherneeds in their developing years.

Purpose and method

As Rice suggested (2003, p. 152), ‘a move away from culture to the subject as thelocus of musical practice and experience may provide a fruitful approach to some ofthe questions about music that our encounter with the modern world leads us toask’. This paper examines music in the home of a Chinese family in Singapore withspecific attention to the children (aged five and seven) of the household: an explora-tion of what constitutes the lived ‘musical’ memory of a family enmeshed in thetechnology and media of a globalised world. The study is part of a larger ethno-graphic study on the musical lives of young children in a Primary 1 classroom inSingapore, conducted over a five-month period in 2005 (Lum, 2007). Theresearcher is a native of Singapore (born to second-generation Chinese parents,raised and educated in Singapore) and access to the family was gained initiallythrough a voluntary home interview session within the larger study, thereafter seek-ing parents’ permission to enter into a focus period of prolonged study within thefamily home.

Data collection included observations, fieldnoting, audio and video recording inthe family home, and interviews with the parents and the two children. The ethno-graphic study follows the procedure of taking and writing-up fieldnotes as proposedby Emerson, Fretz, and Shaw (1995). All audio information was transcribed verbatimwhilst selected video footages that were of interest to the study were also transcribed.Transcriptions also included songs, gestures, movements and conversations that chil-dren created or were engaged in. Analysis was on-going throughout the duration of thefieldwork as data collected were combined with previous data to reconstruct under-standings of the home musical environment. Analysis carried on after the fieldworkperiod and was reflective of an intimate familiarity with the settings generating manymore ideas, issues, topics and themes (Emerson et al., 1995).


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Context

Singapore, located to the south of Peninsular Malaysia and about 130 kilometres northof the equator, is an island state with a total area of 700 square kilometres. It currentlyhas a population of 4.4 million, with a resident1 population of 3.6 million. The ethnicdistribution of the resident population includes Malay (14%), Chinese (76%), Indian(8%) and other (2%) (Singapore Department of Statistics, 2007). Singapore has avaried linguistic, cultural and religious heritage. Malay is the national language, butMandarin, English and Tamil are also official languages. English is widely used in thegovernment, professions, businesses and schools (Ministry of Information, Communi-cations, & the Arts, 2009). The family examined in this study provides a glimpse ofthe musical lives within the dominant Chinese population of the Singapore landscape.

Raymond’s family of four, consisting of himself, his father, Steven, his mother,Julie and his younger sister, Annie, lives in a two-bedroom apartment of 600-square-foot in a heartland neighbourhood of Singapore. Julie and Steven (in their late 30s)were originally from a city in southern Malaysia but came to work in Singapore abouttwo decades ago and have since become permanent residents. Both Raymond andAnnie were born and raised in Singapore. Five-year-old Annie is in Kindergarten2 andRaymond, aged seven, is in Primary 1 (first-grade). Julie walks Annie to school everyday whilst Raymond takes a short trip on a chartered bus to school.

Julie works as a promoter in a karaoke bar. Her workday begins at 9 p.m. and typi-cally ends around 3 a.m. Working in the business of karaoke, Julie has to be well-informed of the latest popular songs that hit the consumer market. She is particularlyfamiliar with the latest Mandarin and Hokkien3 popular songs as these are the songsthat define her clientele. Julie enjoys listening to Mandarin and Hokkien popularballads (or as she puts it, the ‘quiet songs’). If she comes across a song she likes onthe radio (on the local Chinese music channels, FM 95.8 or 93.3) or at work, she willbuy the CD or borrow it from friends. Constantly surrounded by music at work, Juliemakes it a point to hear little of it at home. She typically chooses not to switch on theradio or CD player at home, although she does not object to her family membersdoing so.

Steven is a taxi driver. His day begins at 5:30 a.m. and he usually works until 7p.m. Given the different work schedules of Steven and Julie, family time is restrictedto a two-hour window between 7 to 9 in the evening, when the family comes togetherfor dinner. Steven once listened to a ‘fair bit of rock music’ and had been an avidattendee at rock concerts (he recalled the band, Deep Purple, as an example) at a localtheatre in the mid-1970s. Because Julie finds rock music too ‘noisy’ for her taste,Steven has stopped listening to it. In his words, ‘nobody appreciates [it] at home. If Ilisten to it here, nobody would like it’. Steven listens to the radio when he drives thetaxi, and typically switches between two local Chinese music channels, FM 95.8 and93.3. Driving on the road the whole day can be isolating for Steven. The radio helpshim along, as he noted, ‘Music accompanies me wherever I go when I drive. But toreally appreciate the music, I think I don’t. But I just need some noises around’.

The television

The first thing that little Annie and Raymond do when they wake up is to head intothe sitting room, switch on the television and watch a string of cartoons. Raymond isan avid fan of the cartoons Grand Sazor, Masked Rider, Pokemon and Ninja Storm,all of which are highly action-packed or as Raymond describes it, ‘fighting cartoons’.


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These cartoons are regular features on weekday and weekend mornings on the localchildren’s network (Kids Central). On weekdays, they typically watch for an hour to90 minutes until it is time to wash up, have an early lunch and go to school.4 In theevenings, the television is also a regular and constant feature, usually switched to thelocal Chinese channel (Channel 8) and occasionally, the local English channel(Channel 5). Steven enjoys watching two local Chinese drama series, one at 7 p.m.and another at 9 p.m. Raymond and Annie are usually in the sitting room during thistime, doing homework, playing with toys and/or watching the television programmewith Steven and Julie. As Steven remarked, ‘Yes, whatever we watch they willwatch. They don’t insist on other channels’.

Since my initial meeting with Steven and Julie, they have continuously empha-sised to me Annie’s love for singing and dancing. Steven has observed that Annieloves to sing along with the theme songs of the various Chinese drama series ontelevision at the beginning and the end of the programme. Though her pronunciationof the words are not always accurate, Steven feels that Annie has a good ear and singsthe melody on pitch and in rhythm, almost ‘in sync’ with the music source. Julie isconvinced that Annie has musical talent, too. As she explained, ‘When she listens tomusic, she can pick it up really quickly. She only needs to listen to it two or threetimes and she can pick it up, whether it is English, Mandarin or Hokkien.5 Her absorp-tion rate is very quick!’ Using Annie as their yardstick for measuring musical talent,both Steven and Julie openly proclaim that Raymond ‘doesn’t have musical talents’.Steven feels that Raymond has inherited his traits, lacking in musical talents but goodwith drawing and crafts, whilst Annie takes after Julie in her love for singing andmusic.

Vignette: Tong Hua (fairytale)

Whilst Raymond and Annie were engaged in play in the sitting room, Steven waswatching the local Chinese drama series on television. During an advertisementblock, a snippet of an upcoming programme was broadcasted, featuring secondaryschool students singing the latest Chinese popular hit song, Tong Hua, an originalsong written for the winner of a local Mandarin singing contest. There were excerptsof a solo singer, a duet of singers and an instrumental arrangement of the song onthe piano. Steven alerted Annie to the song, encouraging her to sing along. Almostinstantaneously Annie began to sing. As the Chinese drama resumed, Annie ran intothe bedroom to her mother and requested her to play Tong Hua on the CD player.Within minutes, the CD track could be heard. Annie, now back in the sitting room,smiled at me and started to sing the song (musical example 1), in pitch and inrhythm with the CD track, rising above the sound of the television (which bycomparison was louder than the CD track coming from the bedroom). Annierepeated the song a second time immediately after the CD track had finished, shift-ing the melody to G major. She sang a cappella (i.e. unaccompanied and in pitch)even whilst she watched the Chinese drama on television. The third time sherepeated the song, it was an octave higher than the first time. Realising that shecould not sing the high ‘A’s and ‘B’s in the melody, Annie instinctively sang anoctave lower, ending the song in the exact pitch range that she started with in thebeginning. She offered accompanying hand actions and facial expressions that shecreated on her own, and a meaningful slowing down towards the end of the song.Throughout Annie’s singing, the tempo remained constant.



Musical example 1. Annie singing Tong Hua.

English translation of Tong Hua (fairytale):

I don’t recall when you last told me your favourite fairytale. I’ve thought for a longwhile and am starting to wonder if I have done something wrong again.You told me with teary eyes that fairytales are all lies and there’s no way I can be yourprince charming. Perhaps you don’t understand but since you said you loved me,the stars in my sky have started to twinkle.I’ll be the angel in your fairytale. I’ll open my arms wide and turn them into wings toprotect you. You must believe that we will be like the fairytale with a happy ever afterending. Together we’ll pen our own ending.

The radio

In Raymond’s family, the radio is only heard in the car and much less at home. Stevenpoints out that each time the family travels in the car, Annie will sing away to thelatest hits on the local Chinese radio stations. Raymond is much less enthusiastic aboutthe music. Julie and Steven also enjoy listening to the radio in the car and theirpurchase of CDs is often a direct result of encounters with songs that they have heardover the car radio.

The CD player

When Julie was pregnant with Raymond, Steven bought her a CD of ‘soft andromantic’ Western classical music that featured selections such as the first movementof Beethoven’s Piano Sonata, Op. 27, No. 2 (the Moonlight Sonata). Julie has beenenamoured with the CD, listening to it every night. Raymond has since developed ahabit of listening to that same CD of ‘quiet’ music when he is about to fall asleepeach night. The family CD player is thus located in Raymond and Annie’s bedroom(Raymond and Annie share a bedroom). Interestingly, Raymond has expressed to methat he does not like ‘noisy’ music but loves the sound of the piano, and would like tolearn to play the instrument at some point in time. Raymond may have subcon-sciously been enculturated (Jorgensen, 1997) in this light classical, as early as pre-birth. Anecdotal evidence has suggested that prenatal music memory does exist(Hepper, 1988; Verny, 1981). Further, as LeBlanc (1983, p. 48) stated, ‘forces in theenvironment can influence music preference. A student’s family … are a part of thestudent’s environment, and what they think about music will influence that student’.In a longitudinal study of 45 pre-school children, Peery and Peery (1986) also found


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that exposure and repetition, combined with positive experience that emphasisessocial reinforcement and model factors, had a positive effect on children’s musicalpreference. Clearly, Raymond’s love for piano and ‘quiet’ music have been heavilyinfluenced by his mother’s personal preference during and after pregnancy such thatthe constant and repeated exposure to the same music on the CD had led toRaymond’s personal preference for such music. Perhaps, as Brand (1985, p. 29)pointed out, ‘of all stages in life, the preschool years, and particularly infancy, maybe the time when music (with specific reference to unconscious listening) can havethe most important impact on the individual’. Steven is well aware of Raymond’smusical interest but is unable to provide him with a piano or piano lessons due tofinancial constraints.

Play

Whilst Annie is bubbly and full of energy, always eager to play, sing and dance,Raymond by comparison is more reserved and shy. Raymond has a small pillow asa security blanket and carries it with him everywhere he goes in the family apart-ment. Raymond and Annie like to play together, sharing similar toys and interests,from Power Rangers action figures to Pokemon trading cards. The play space forAnnie and Raymond is in the sitting room, a space just in front of the television,cordoned off by the family sofa set. Raymond’s favourite animal is the tortoise. Hekeeps two tortoises in the family’s aquarium, and enjoys watching them swim aboutamongst the fishes. His favourite cartoon characters are the Teenage Mutant NinjaTurtles. He watches the cartoon religiously every Saturday morning, and has threemoving action-figure toys of the ninja turtles that he never fails to include in hisplay. Raymond’s fantasy play concerns battles of good and evil, and frequently arace challenge between superheroes. He is fond of making sound effects when heplays, from the ‘Brrmmm, Brmmm’ imitation of a motorcycle to a high-pitcheddescending glissandi on ‘Ahhh’ in imitation of the character meeting his doom,along with many rhythmic and melodic utterances that gave voice to each characterin his fantasy play. Annie chooses to be included in Raymond’s fantasy play attimes, taking hold of an action-figure, adding sound effects and dialogue toRaymond’s play. She initiates other games, too, like trading cards, twirling the HulaHoop, or rope jumping when she is no longer interested in participating in herbrother’s play.

Both Annie and Raymond have their individual boxes of trading cards clearlydivided into sets of Pokemon, Digimon and Masked Rider characters. After decidingwhich set of cards to use, they will sit facing each other, placing one card faceddown on the floor. When they reveal their cards, the more ‘powerful’ card (which-ever one has the larger number) wins and the winner takes the loser’s card. BothRaymond and Annie will tend to rock to-and-fro as they play sometimes to theirown individual pulse, sometimes in sync with each other. The two children willmake various sound effects too, ‘Yippee!’, ‘Woo!’, glissandi of pitches in increasingdynamics, and imitations of robot speech in various low and high voices. From thePokemon and Masked Rider trading cards to the Grand Sazor and Power Ranger toyfigurines, it is clear that Raymond and Annie’s playthings are directly connected tothe cartoons they watch. The media has tremendous control over their play prefer-ences, which is encouraged by Steven and Julie’s indulgence in buying them the‘necessary’ toys.



Discussion

The musical interests of Steven and Julie stemmed from the radio and television. Themedia was their initial musical source, and this translated into the purchase of CDs forfurther listening to the music they enjoyed. Similarly, Raymond and Annie’s musicsurroundings at home consist primarily of television, the radio during car trips, and theCD player when they slept at night. The media dominated the play environment ofRaymond and Annie, providing them with audio and visual stimuli as they carried onwith their media-influenced toys in an area that was no more than three feet from thefamily television. Indeed, this family’s interests and experiences illustrate Kincheloe’sproposition perspective that:

Since the 1950s more and more of our children’s experiences are produced by corpora-tions – not as much by parents or even children themselves. Popular and media cultureare now the private domain of the child, even replete with earphones – traditional notionsof childhood as a time of innocence and adult-dependency have been challenged bychildren’s access to corporate-produced popular culture. (2002, p. 83)

The music Raymond and Annie listened and sang to were primarily Mandarin andHokkien popular songs, with ‘soft and quiet’ piano and orchestral music at bedtime.The music that surrounded the children at home was to a large extent the music thatdefined the musical identities of Steven (at least in part) and Julie. This observation isin agreement with Borthwick and Davidson (2002, p.76), who stated that, ‘the musicalbeliefs and experiences of the parents are of central importance … as they shape theway in which the subsequent generation experience and value music for themselveswithin the family’. Also, ‘all immediate family members play a shaping role, bothchildren and adults alike, irrespective of whether or not they learn musical instrumentthemselves’ (p. 76).

Whilst Annie’s show of musicking (Small, 1998) behaviours was abundant withinthe home, often singing, dancing and imitating popular mediated music heard on tele-vision and the radio, Raymond appeared more reserved, showing little interest in sing-ing or dancing. He was more keen in engaging in his own fantasy play, accompanyinghis playthings and actions with melodic and rhythmic utterances, and listening to lightclassical music before bedtime. Annie’s singing (like in musical example 1) alsoshowed her ability at a tender age to mimic complex musical repertoire, including thetransposition of the octave when she was unable to sing notes above her current vocalrange: food for thought for music educators thinking about the musical developmentof children (McPherson, 2006). This observation on children’s complex musickingbehaviours has been corroborated by various research studies (Campbell, 1998; Gaunt,1997; Marsh, 1997).

The parents’ constant acknowledgement and encouragement of Annie’s musicaltalent tended to overshadow their view of Raymond’s developing musical ability. Thiswas further compounded by the parents’ view of their children taking after theirpersonal traits i.e. having the perception that Annie takes after the mother’s musicaltalent and Raymond taking after the father’s lack thereof. Research in the psychologyof music has shown that the home environment and parents’ support play a criticalrole in the musical development of children, particularly in developing skills and theirenthusiasm for music (Davidson & Pitts, 2001; Howe & Sloboda, 1991). Clearly,Raymond’s parents’ attitude towards his and Annie’s musical worth and their enthu-siasm towards Annie’s singing and dancing, had in some ways impacted Raymond inbeing more reserved towards music making in the family home.


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Thoughts for music education

A major challenge in education is the development of curricular contexts that have theability to extend meaningfully into the personal life-worlds of individuals (Barab &Roth, 2006). Teachers need to bridge this gap between home and school to makemusic education relevant and real to the children. Within the current Singapore musiceducation syllabus (Ministry of Education, 2008b), one of the six main learning objec-tives for primary and secondary school children is to ‘understand the role of music indaily living’ (Ministry of Education, 2008b, p. 2) which is inclusive of popular musicand culture. Music educators can build on the extensive expertise that children havegrown already as media consumers and users of new technologies as they enternurseries, kindergartens and elementary schools. It is this researcher’s opinion that itis teachers’ responsibility to discover children’s family musical preferences and toprovide a curriculum that validates and builds on each child’s musical competencies.Music educators should for instance consider including the music of ‘now’ (rock andpop) in the classroom, for popular music is the music that surrounds these children ona daily basis and ‘its rhythms are tantalising, and its cultural implications are consid-erable’ (Clements & Campbell, 2006). Also, music and musicking at home observedin this study served primarily emotional and social functions for the children. Socialin the many musical play interaction sessions between Raymond and Annie, andemotional in the smiles and frustrations coming out of such interactions and theemotional impact on the children of their parents’ perception of musical ‘talent’ascribed to each child. Because children want to enjoy their musicking experiencesand share them with family and friends, it appears that ‘musical development andlearning are more likely to flourish outside rather than within the school curriculum’(Boal-Palheiros & Hargreaves, 2001, p. 117). Teachers need to ‘reflect on the joy, thelaughter and the seriousness with which our students perform music activities’(Dzansi, 2004, p. 90) and this musicking typically involves some kind of game-playing or music with movement which motivates the children to be engaged in theprocess. Music educators should be aware that learners would be more interested andengaged when active participation is involved.

Jorgensen (2003, p. 122) advises that as children come to the music classroom‘with already formed musical perspectives, these need to be taken seriously, listenedto, challenged, and validated because musical beliefs and practices constitute a part ofself’. The notion that all children begin at a similar starting point is in conflict with theconsiderable differences observed in children’s interests, experiences and abilities inmusic (Pugh & Pugh, 1998). There is a need to bring living knowledge and livingthings together in the music-making process that could directly engage the hearts andminds of children. After all, as Shephard and Wicke (1997, p. 34) remarked, ‘a viableunderstanding of culture requires an understanding of its articulation through musicjust as much as a viable understanding of music requires an understanding of its placein culture’. By focusing on the individual’s connection with music in creating acontextualised curriculum, there is then a de-centring of the subject matter, so that theindividual can be placed at the heart of the music classroom. It is essential to knowwho the children are as musical beings so that music educators can tap into their richdiversified musical network of multiple contexts, in order to approach meaningfulmusic making.

Technology and the media encapsulate the home musical experiences of Raymondand Annie. Perhaps years down the road, as they reminisce their early musical memories,



they would fondly recall the light classical CD that lulled them to sleep, the ChineseTV theme songs and radio hits that they and their parents listened and sang to, and ofthe hours of fantasy play afforded by the trading cards of their favourite cartooncharacters from TV. The images and experiences engendered by music are therefore,dependent upon the particular circumstances in which the music is performed and heard,and upon the type of musical style and activity involved. But through its embodimentof movement and collectivity, and through the peculiar ambiguity of its symbolic forms,music can appear to act upon and convey emotion in a unique way and it representsan alternative discourse to everyday speech and language, although both are ideolog-ically informed and culturally constructed (Cohen, 1995, p. 444).

Huyssen (2001) would be correct in stating that Raymond and Annie’s musicalmemories are embodied in the social and shaped to a large extent by technologies, buttheir memories, it seem, will never be reducible to them.

Notes1. The resident population comprises Singapore citizens and permanent residents.2. Singapore kindergartens admit children between the ages of three and six years into the

respective level, viz. Nursery, Kindergarten 1 and Kindergarten 2. It is mandatory thatkindergartens adhere to the age criteria so that children will join formal Primary 1 schoolingat the correct age of six or above six (Ministry of Education, 2008a).

3. Mandarin and Hokkien are different dialects within the Chinese language.4. School begins at 1:00 pm and ends at 6:30 p.m. Primary schools (Primary 1–6) in

Singapore typically function in two separate sessions, with three primary levels in themorning session (7:30 a.m.–1:00 p.m.) and the other three levels in the afternoon session(1:00 p.m.–6:30 p.m.).

5. Steven speaks to the children in English and Mandarin whilst Julie speaks to them inMandarin and Hokkien. In school, due to the bilingual system, children are taught Englishand Mandarin. The TV shows that the family watches at home can be in English orMandarin.

Notes on contributorChee-Hoo Lum is currently an assistant professor of music education at the National Instituteof Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. His research interests includechildrens’ musical cultures and their shifting musical identities; the use of media and technol-ogy by children, in families and in pedagogy; creativity and improvisation in childrens’ music;elementary music methods and world musics in education.

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Early Child Development & Care 2009 Lum