FRANCIS WARD
Francis Ward is a music educator and ethnomusicologist based in the School of Arts Education and Movement, Institute of Education, Dublin City University. His varied research interests include the transmission, teaching and learning of music in digital and online environments, music education and social inclusion, and multicultural music education. In 2019-20 he was awarded a Fulbright Scholar fellowship and spent six months at the School of Music at the University of Washington. He completed his PhD studies at University of Limerick as an Irish Research Council scholar investigating the online transmission of Irish traditional music. He has worked previously as lecturer in music and dance, lecturer in music and educational technologist at University of Limerick, Dundalk Institute of Technology and Mary Immaculate College respectively. Francis is also a well-respected teacher, performer and composer/choreographer of Irish traditional music and dance.
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Supporting Pedagogical, Musical and Social Continuities through ‘Participation’ in a Virtual Irish Traditional Music Session
This paper problematises the concept of ‘participation’ in considering ‘Mary O’s Virtual Session’ - an online Irish traditional music session during the Covid19 pandemic – as an illustration of participatory performance (Turino 2008) and participatory culture (Jenkins et al. 2009). While lead musicians broadcast live using YouTube, viewers could either passively listen, interact via the chat feature and through the pre-sharing of a range of artefacts, or actively perform along with the broadcast by practicing a pre-shared repertoire. The virtual session facilitated pedagogical, musical and social continuities for participants during a period when face-to-face interactions were limited, and highlights the role of social media in diverse contexts of music learning.