Village band clubs will soon have teaching guidelines that will help them build a full complement of musicians and become more professional.
The guidelines will outline the prerequisites to becoming a band conductor and an instructor qualified enough to teach students how to play instruments, an Education Ministry spokesman said.
As things stand, he explained, there was no structure to teaching in bands. As a result some band clubs did not have complete bands with musicians trained in the various instruments. Whenever there was a feast or event bands had to employ freelance musicians to fill in the gaps, at a cost.
Besides, when bands committed themselves to teaching a new member, the club often gave the instrument to the student.
It sometimes happened that students, possibly disappointed by the level of teaching, left the band and took the instrument with them leading to another financial loss for the club, the spokesman explained.
In an attempt to address these problems, the Band Club Association has asked the ministry to help them draw up teaching guidelines. Yesterday, the ministry held a first consultation meeting with representatives from Malta’s 80 band clubs.
The aim of the meeting was to understand the teaching methods used by the clubs with the aim of establishing the guidelines.
The ministry is also proposing having a band week for each locality in which bands will interact with primary school students to promote their culture and create awareness about their work.